The kosher guide to turning waste into taste

Gordon Brown says we bin too much food. It’s easy to avoid waste

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How far has your challah travelled?

It may seem local, but your Shabbat loaf may have come from Israel

No Friday-night meal is complete without an in-depth discussion about the quality of the challah. In fact, few things evoke such local pride in the Jewish community as baked goods.

But before you shower the baker round the corner with compliments, you may want to find out what, exactly, his or her role is.

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How to go eco-kosher

Food writer Ruth Joseph explains how you can be kind to the planet as well as your guests when inviting them around for an ethical dinner

With green issues becoming ever more important in our lives, more of us are considering our surroundings, and the need to save the world’s resources and limit waste.

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The new Friday fare

British Jews are increasingly adapting traditional Friday-night recipes to suit modern times. So how do we do it — and what happens to roast chicken?

Traditionally, whether you are devoutly Orthodox, a practising Liberal, a little lapsed or even just plain traditional, Friday night is spent around the table with your family. It is the Jewish equivalent of Sunday lunch.

Surveys suggest that fewer than three in 10 UK families sit down to a meal together more than once a week. Even those meals are often eaten in front of the television.

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Supershmaltz me!

Our Food editor sets out to discover what effect two weeks of eating only haimishe shtetl food has on his body

I have always enjoyed Jewish food. There is something intensely comforting about a big, fatty salt-beef sandwich slathered with mustard, a bowl of golden chicken soup with lockshen and a kneidl or two, or a fat slice of challah with chopped liver and a pickled cucumber. Comfort food does not get more comforting than this.

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Why it's rise and shine for the Israeli breakfast

The morning meal is now so fashionable that cafés are specialising.

The four 32-year-old men who sit down at Mattina, a restaurant in Tel Aviv’s picturesque Neveh-Tzedek district, on a sunny weekday morning do not hesitate much before making their choice.

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Kosher — to go

We talk to the entrepreneurs reviving the kosher-sandwich market

If you keep kosher, finding lunch or a snack on-the-go is not easy. Unless you work in a predominantly Jewish area, it is not so simple to grab a quick sandwich or salad during the working day or on a day out.

Your can eat in an approved restaurant (difficult outside certain areas), eat at home, or plan ahead and pack yourself a kosher snack. Most likely your only option would be the packed lunch.

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A little cake gets big

Suddenly cupcakes, which you only used to see at your grandma’s tea parties, are in culinary fashion

You can thank — or, if your waistline is expanding, blame — Nigella for the revival of that retro teatime treat, the cupcake. After putting one on the cover of her How To Be A Domestic Goddess cookbook in 2003, she made a batch on TV, amid — naturally — much pouting and licking of spoons.

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Ronen Givon and Chistian Mouysset encourage open democracy — for hummus

Ronen Givon and his business partner Christian Mouysset, founders of food chain Hummus Bros, are used to cooking up their own variations of the chickpea snack. But after encouraging others to try their luck, they are so impressed with what they have seen — and tasted — that they have decided to serve it.

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Rolls of honour: our bagels taste test

They were once a Jewish staple. Now bagels are everywhere and available in a huge number of varieties. But which are tastiest? Victoria Prever conducts a survey

Some call it a bagel, some a beigel, but it is hard to imagine life without this doughnut shaped, chewy, boiled-bread roll. The very first bagel was supposedly produced in 1683, by a Polish Jewish baker as a tribute to the King of Austria for protecting his nation against Turkish invasion. Its shape was said to be modelled on a German riding stirrup called a “bugel”.

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