Review by Booklist Review
Mediterranean food isn't a new U.S. culinary trend, but in the past few years a tantalizing subset of this cuisine has taken over. Israeli food, with its mix of ethnic influences and representative countries, dominates restaurants and beloved cookbooks like Ottolenghi's Jerusalem (2012) and Solomonov and Cook's Israeli Soul (2018). In their first cookbook together, restauranteur Admony (Balaboosta, 2013) and Gur (founder of Israeli food and wine magazine Al Hashulchan) create a collection of recipes that almost literally begs to jump from page to kitchen, oven, and barbecue. They also spotlight seven shuks (markets) in Haifa, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and elsewhere that provide the freshest of products and also harbor top-notch yet hidden eateries. The 140 gorgeously illustrated recipes are peppered with intriguing sidebars on tomatoes, the story of amba (a spice), pomegranates, and others. Dishes reflect a true love of the finest ingredients and the 60-plus ethnicities that comprise Israel: cauliflower tabbouleh with crunchy seeds, Israeli ceviche, shakshuka three ways, chicken liver schnitzel, meatballs in walnut-pomegranate sauce, and couscous from scratch, to name just a few. Occasionally lengthy instructions will lead to foods that resonate in hearts and souls.--Barbara Jacobs Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Admony (Balaboosta), who owns the restaurants Balaboosta and Taim in New York City, and Gur (Jewish Soul Food) excel at crafting recipes for Israel's flavorful melting-pot cuisine, and they organize this fascinating cookbook around eight shuks, or markets. They include Tel Aviv's Levinsky Market, which houses a stall selling roasted seeds and nuts and a spice store that traffics in potions and powders reputed to "drive away an evil eye, lift a curse, or help you find your soul mate." Dishes are equally intriguing: a chopped salad of avocado and kohlrabi highlights the country's abundant produce. Traditional selections and clever inventions intermingle, the latter exemplified by challah braided around mushrooms and za'atar, and, in a chapter on stuffed items, a cake of cabbage leaves encasing a filling of pine nuts, almonds, pistachios, ground beef, and rice. A chapter on couscous includes a brace of stews for ladling over the pasta, as well as two options for creating couscous from scratch. A grilling primer features whole fish, kebabs, and arayes--pitas stuffed with beef and lamb and cooked over a flame. Sidebars range from suggestions for optimizing Israeli salad to an explanation of the evolution of date syrup. This energetic and exciting volume serves as an edifying deep dive into Israeli food market culture and cuisine. (Sept.)
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
A shuk is an open-air marketplace found in towns and cities across Israel, where one can buy fresh, local ingredients. Israel's multicultural cuisine includes hints of Persian, Moroccan, Ethiopian, Yemenite, and Iraqi tastes. This cookbook, coauthored by New York restaurateur and chef Admony and food writer Gur, is a flavorful tour through Israeli dishes yet accessible enough for an American home cook. Recipes feature Israeli staples from salads, rice, meats, flatbreads, and soups as diverse as the country itself. Commonly used ingredients include pomegranates, tahini, and cauliflower; the authors' cultural notes provide context for the recipes and a better understanding of the region and cuisine. Most intriguingly, interspersed between the recipes are profiles and photographs of eight of the author's favorite shuks and suggestions on when to visit. VERDICT A colorful, flavorful tour of the many tastes of Israel, as well as many other Middle Eastern favorites, nicely packaged for home chefs.--Jennifer Clifton, Indiana State Lib., Indianapolis
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
