Thank socialism for our Chanukah doughnuts

Last Christmas Day morning, which happened to be the eve of Chanukah, I joined a growing queue in one of the local kosher bakeries keen to buy in enough supplies for our festival. There they were stacked like calorie-packed cannonballs ready to mount an assault against the collective waistline. It was almost a social occasion and I recognised a couple of acquaintances lining up further along. But there was little time for conversation because one had to focus one’s mind on the task at hand, which was to decide how many of which flavour to order – one didn’t want to risk the wrath of the crowd by lingering at the counter.

The Maccabees would have marvelled at the variety of doughnuts baked in their name. For the sophisticated folk of the modern-day heim, a simple, snow-sprinkled sphere is no longer enough: ever-more elaborate fillings arrive in the shops each year to clamour for a slot on the festive platter – salted caramel, tiramisu, pistachio and more. There is even a place in Stamford Hill, Deli Ninety Eight, which offers a savoury version – a doughnut stuffed with meat.

We might have chosen a healthier option to remember the miracle in the Temple – a bowl of supergrains drizzled with olive oil, for example. But amid the surfeit of sugar, let us at least salute the inventor of the mini-doughnut, who deserves a Genesis Prize (a Jewish Nobel) for service to their people’s welfare.

While different groups have different customs – among some Sephardim a crusty, bubbly fried ring called isfeng is popular – sufganiyot have attained a near-universality, although they are not native to Israel. They were apparently imported by Polish Jews during the Mandate period, who had long before adapted them from a medieval German delicacy unappetisingly called Gefüllte Krapfen. However, what helped to propel them to prominence was the Histradut, Israel’s trades union, which in the 1920s encouraged people to eat doughnuts in order to provide more fare for bakery workers. Sufganiyot are a celebration of sugar-coated socialism.

However, if by now, you’ve had your fill of doughnuts and reached your latke limit, there is still an alternative: a cheese pastry – which is eaten in honour of the apocryphal heroine Judith. A cross between a Maccabee and Queen Esther, the beautiful widow went to the tent of Holofernes, the Assyrian general besieging the city of Bethulia in Judea, and plied him with salty cheese: to quench his thirst, he drank too much wine and fell asleep. And as he snored in his lustful dreams, she took his sword and chopped off his head, thus delivering her people.

In truth, there is nothing exactly to link her with the tale of the Maccabees; it appears that only in medieval times did Judith became associated with Chanukah. But why let a millennium here or there spoil the enjoyment of a cheese bun?