I basically grew up in the bakery,” says Jennifer Rinkoff. “I worked in the shop from around the age of 12 – my grandparents would drive me on a Sunday and I’d get paid like £2. Some of the older Jewish customers would pay me as well and take me to the sweet shop next door,” she recalls. Three decades later Jennifer heads up new product development and marketing, and her name is on the cover of Rinkoffs first cookbook, The Jewish Bakery, which was released at the end of August just in time for the holidays.
The Rinkoff family have been baking in east London since Jennifer’s great-grandfather Hyman Rinkoff arrived in England from Kherson, Ukraine, at the turn of the 20th century. Hyman opened the first Rinkoffs bakery on Old Montague Street in 1911, and five generations later, they’re an east London institution. Now one of the few Jewish bakeries left in the area, they have two locations: their main bakery on Jubilee Street – an unassuming and somewhat unlikely spot just off Mile End Road, embedded within a housing estate – and a deli on Vallance Road (the Kray twins’ old haunt), just a stone’s throw from Brick Lane.
Rinkoff bakeries have been a presence in east London for more than 100 years (Photo: Kim Lightbody)[Missing Credit]
The new book features more than 100 tried-and-tested family recipes. Split into nine chapters, it runs from “breads” to “basics”, with everything from “traditional Jewish” and “one-tin bakes” to “seasonal treats” in between. Like the bakery itself, the recipes are a mix of new inventions – such as their matcha babka and vegan banana and chocolate bread – and heritage bakes, including Hyman’s original challah and Mandlebrot (a traditional Ashkenazi biscuit not dissimilar to biscotti).
Jennifer explains that their recipes have been “under lock and key” for more than a century and describes the release of the book – and its enthusiastic reception – as a “pinch me moment”. Explaining how she chose which bakes to include, she tells me: “A lot of the recipes have a story behind them that’s meaningful to me. Some of them – like the torten gateau, frangipane tart and chocolate eclairs – we stopped making because there was no demand for them anymore, but I remember serving them to certain customers when I was a kid, or my parent’s bringing them home as a treat. They’re like my core memories, so I really wanted to bring them back.”
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