Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
Central Florida's Independent Jewish Voice
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(JTA) - In the hit show "The Sopranos," veteran actor Jerry Adler plays mob-adjacent Jewish businessman Hesh Rabkin, who made a fortune in the music business decades earlier. In a first season episode, Hesh is confronted by a rapper seeking "reparations" for a late Black musician who he says Rabkin didn't pay fairly for a hit record. When Hesh responds by bragging that he wrote the hit songs he worked on back in the day, Tony Soprano corrects him: "A couple of Black kids wrote that record, you...
This article was produced as part of JTA’s Teen Journalism Fellowship, a program that works with Jewish teens around the world to report on issues that affect their lives. (JTA) — At the SAR High School, an Orthodox Jewish day school in Riverdale, New York, teens participate in anti-harassment training every fall. Students listen carefully as faculty list the dangers of TikTok, the potential social isolation resulting from excessive social media use, and the negative implicit messaging — both Jewish and otherwise — that often pervades these p...
(JTA) - Many fans were despairing as Team Israel trailed Puerto Rico 6-0 in the World Baseball Classic last week, but the team's Twitter account had a different message. "We will never give up," the account tweeted. "After all, Moses was once a basket case." While the quip couldn't stave off the team's ultimate 10-0 loss, it came in the course of a win for Avi Miller, the 30-year-old marketing veteran who runs the @ILBaseball account. For Miller - who tweeted the tournament from 3,000 miles...
(JTA) - The most notable message Melissa Klapper got during her four-night run on "Jeopardy!" didn't come because the Jewish studies scholar was unable to answer a question about Yom Kippur. It also wasn't an unkind note from a game-show stickler who believed she'd gotten credit for a wrong response. Instead, it was an email from a past student who recognized herself in the story Klapper told as part of her self-introductory stage banter - a staple of the game show. Klapper, who teaches history...
Herb Maneloveg, who recently turned 98, is a regular attendee of the Jewish Pavilion's Shabbat services at Oakmonte Village. He has always been connected to his Jewish roots, even though he was born and raised in a small Western Pennsylvania town called Aliquippa, a town of 25,000 with 15 Jewish families. Plans to attend Penn State after graduation were curtailed because he was drafted into the Army and serving two and a half years abroad. Maneloveg was injured in the Battle of the Bulge and...
Hiring a Driver The instinct for many older people is to stay at home as long as possible. Even if a person at home has visitors, he or she may still be alone most of the time, especially if he or she no longer drives. One option is to hire a companion care company to facilitate transportation needs. Another option is to contact Go Go Grandparent, 855-464-6872 (an Uber service geared toward the elderly). Jewish Family Services, 407-644-7593 offers the RIDE program for medical appointments, etc. There are also public transportation options such...
This recipe originally appeared on The Nosher. Apple matzah kugel is a classic Ashkenazi Passover dish. Just like many noodle kugels, this is a sweet kugel that is meant to be served with the main course at the seder. For a modern twist and some textural contrast, a simple streusel topping is added to the kugel for a nutty, sweet, crunch on top of the soft apple filling. Warmed-up leftovers make a perfect breakfast, served with a little yogurt or a drizzle of cream on top. And we won't tell if...
This recipe originally appeared on The Nosher. These dessert truffles are play on the classic Iraqi haroset of date molasses (known also as date honey or silan) and chopped walnuts. Pressed baking dates are available at Middle Eastern and some kosher supermarkets, as well as online. Alternatively, you can use pitted dates (details in the recipe.) Ingredients 1 cup chopped walnut pieces 13 oz package pressed baking dates or 10 oz pitted medjool dates 8 oz dark (semisweet or bittersweet)...
(New York Jewish Week) — What first caught my eye about Jewish food writer Alison Roman was not any one recipe. Rather, it was a photo of her that was published in the New York Times in 2019: Roman was in her tiny Brooklyn kitchen, kneeling in front of her overstuffed and undersized refrigerator. She was wearing jeans and t-shirt — and her feet were bare and dirty. I simply loved the messiness, joy and imperfection of it all. The photo accompanied a selection of Thanksgiving recipes written by the young and rising star, who was first int...
As I write this, I am at 9100 feet in Summit County, Colorado, spending time with my daughter Julie and my granddaughter, The Mountain Girl, while my son-in-law Sam is away on a once-in-a-lifetime rafting trip through the Grand Canyon. On one particularly beautiful morning, I dropped my second-grade Mountain Girl off at school and, with the help of trekking poles, started a hike on the bike path that runs through the county. After an invigorating hour work-out, I considered expanding my hike to...
(JTA) - Rabbi Yael Buechler conceived of her latest product two years ago, after planning ways to make the Passover seder fun for her two young sons. But it wasn't until she started promoting the matzah pajamas she designed that she decided to make adult sizes, too. After she reached out in December 2021 to The Maccabeats - the Orthodox a capella group that releases splashy new videos for most holidays - to offer kids' pajamas for their Passover project, they demurred. "They wrote back...
Passover, the annual celebration of the Exodus from Egypt, is one of Judaism’s most beloved holidays — and also the one that requires the most preparation. The Torah teaches that one should remove leaven or hametz (understood by Jewish tradition to mean food that is made from one of five forbidden grains and food that has been fermented) from one’s home — it should neither be seen nor found in one’s possession. Traditionally, Jews attempt to clean all the leaven from their homes, chasing out the cracker crumbs and stray Cheerios wherever...
Aging is a process that brings many changes. There are several simple steps you can take to keep your eyes healthy during your lifetime. Visiting an eye care professional regularly for a comprehensive dilated eye exam is the most important thing you can do to reduce your risk of vision loss as you age. A comprehensive dilated eye exam is different from the basic eye exam or screening you have for glasses or contacts. By dilating the pupils and examining the back of the eyes, your doctor can detect eye diseases in their early stages, before visi...
This recipe originally appeared on The Nosher. Matzah pies called minas are a classic Sephardic Passover dish, traditionally served for brunch or lunch with the slow-cooked, hard-boiled eggs called huevos haminados. The truth is that a mina makes a great side or main dish for any meal, even when it's not Passover. With a top and bottom "crust" made from sheets of matzah, the filling can be made of meat - like seasoned lamb, beef, chicken - or vegetables, most commonly spinach and cheese, though...
Passover is one of Judaism’s most beloved holidays — but it can also be one of the most expensive. Passover requires a menu that avoids all hametz (leavened products) and often necessitates the purchase of many new foods that are certified kosher and free of hametz. Jews also attend one or two seders — elaborate festive meals with multiple courses. Complying with Passover rules of kashrut alone can present a financial burden, as many Jews find themselves in need of purchasing one or two extra sets of dishes or cooking utensils, or other...
For most of his life, Chiune Sugihara received little recognition for the dramatic actions he undertook as Japanese vice-consul to Lithuania on the eve of World War II: the rescue of some 6,000 Jews from Poland and elsewhere from the Nazi death machine. For decades, the Jewish world remained largely ignorant of his heroism. When, in 1985, Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center located in Israel, honored the unassuming retired diplomat as a Righteous Among the Nations, Sugihara was to...
I don’t know what the tradition is in your family, but in ours, seder night is a dress-up affair. Suits and ties, dresses, new clothes for the kids — “Shabbes” clothes we call them. Imagine our surprise when one year we arrived for seder at the door of our friends David and Shira Milgrom-Elcott in our dressy clothes, and they greeted us wearing the long, flowing robes of Bedouins! “Welcome to our seder!” they exclaimed. “Please take off your shoes before you come in.” We dutifully took off our shoes and entered their home. On the right, we s...
(JTA) — Just over 100 years ago, in April 1922, my great-grandparents emigrated to the United States with their four children, fearing for their lives in Kremenets, a Russian city in present-day western Ukraine. My great-grandfather, Aaron Shimon Shpall, an educator and journalist, recorded his thoughts about leaving “the city that we were born in and that we spent years of our lives in,” acknowledging how hard it would be “to separate from our native land, and our birthplace and our father’s house.” But he was clear that the Russia he k...
(JTA) - For millennia, Jews have eaten matzah. And for years, Jewish patrons of Trader Joe's have been able to purchase matzah off the shelves of the tiki-themed grocery chain - which has gained its own quasi-religious following. Now, for the first time ever, Trader Joe's will be selling matzah under its own famous private label. The question, even among the store's diehard Jewish fans, is what makes Trader Joe's-branded matzah different from all other matzah. The grocery chain with more than...
(JTA) — Olives. Tomatoes. Oranges. Artichokes. Dates. Cotton balls. And, now, sunflowers. This list might seem like a setup for a logic puzzle or a grocery run. But it is, instead, a (non-exhaustive) list that I have seen of additions to the seder plate, items to highlight and include stories and histories that are not, at least explicitly, part of the Passover seder. On its surface, it is a noble goal — why shouldn’t we consider the plight of Ukrainians in spring 2023 (sunflowers), or remem...
(JNS) - There has been a lot of discussion about what Holocaust memory will be like as fewer survivors remain. Less discussed are those who risked their lives to save Jews during World War II. The German-born doctor Traute Lafrenz, who died on March 6 at 103, was the last known surviving member of White Rose, which formed in Munich in 1942 and advocated nonviolent resistance against the Nazi government. As young German college students allied against their country's government, the group...
(JTA) - Next Sunday marks the 90th anniversary of Philip Roth's birth. In celebration of the famed novelist's work, a scholarly conference titled "Roth@90," sponsored by the Philip Roth Society, will be held starting Wednesday at the Newark Public Library. That will be followed by a weekend of high-profile events - staged readings, panel discussions, a bus tour of Roth's old Newark neighborhood - co-presented by the library and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center. Exactly 10 years ago, we...
There is a long history of Jews working in the alcohol industry, from running the majority of taverns in Poland in the mid-19th century to founding distilleries and wineries that are still in operation today. You may even be familiar with some of these businesses, such Herzog wineries, Seagram or the Carmel Winery. But what you probably don’t know is that Baileys Irish Cream liqueur was invented by a South African Jew. Turns out, Baileys does not have deep roots in Ireland as its label, which d...
A Lady Bird deed in Florida is a legal form that transfers property upon death inexpensively and without probate. A Lady Bird deed allows the current property owner to use and control the property during the owner’s lifetime, while the property automatically transfers upon death to designated beneficiaries. In Florida, a Lady Bird deed is also called an enhanced life estate deed. To be valid in Florida, a Lady Bird deed must include: Grantor — The current owner of the property. This person is splitting their fee simple legal interest in the...
MIAMI (JTA) - They didn't call it the "Pool of Death" for nothing. After a 3-1 come-from-behind victory over Nicaragua on Sunday, Israel finished the World Baseball Classic with only one additional run over the next three games. Israel lost 10-0 to both Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, recording only one hit across the two games, both of which were cut short by the WBC mercy rule. On Wednesday, Israel's bats came alive in the final game, with nine hits, including three for Noah...
