Hurry up and get there! Only one more Monday night left!

Every Monday in July, shuk Machaneh Yehudah throws a huge street party. It’s the rowdy Balabasta festival. The punning name celebrates  basta (produce stand), ba’al ha’basta (owner of the stand), balabusta (housewife), and the culture of the open market in Jerusalem.

I went to see it for myself this week, just me and my camera. The shops and vendors were doing great business.

Here and there bands played and people gathered to listen. In one little space, youngsters sang old songs of aliyah and Eretz Israel. I loved this red-haired girl, who sang in a fresh alto and blew a mean trombone too.

A rooftop concert rocked the crowd (pictured above).The band is called Acharit HaYamin, and sounds were rock, reggae, psalms set to heart-banging Yemenite/jazz fusion – all Israeli, punctuated at intervals by enthusiastic ululations from the crowd or the rooftop stage.

Yes, it was crowded. But it was a friendly crowd, everyone giving way to old folks or women pushing strollers, everyone intent on just having fun. It felt safe, it felt homey.

This band was playing an amusing, cool-jazz version of the “Pink Panther” theme.

Something for everyone: whimsical fairytale figures to entertain the kids

I stood slightly to one side, taking photos and moving with the music and watching the people.

One delicatessen intelligently set up a stand of cheeses and wine by the glass. It was fun to stand in the middle of the shuk and the noise and the surging crowd, savoring Cabernet Sauvignon.

I felt an multi-layered emotion I couldn’t describe.When the musicians sang of peace, of our longing for peace one day, and the people shouted “Amen!” I stood like a fool among all those people, with tears in my eyes.

Sweaty heat and the cooling Jerusalem breeze as the evening set in. Loud, cheerful music, Jerusalemites dancing in the ancient street, the stone buildings that have seen so much of struggle, war, and the everlasting everyday. Smells of fresh bread, sewage, something acrid and smoky, grilled meat.

I longed to suspend the moving, living moment like a scene in a movie. Soon it would dissolve into memory, and our transient wonder and enjoyment, placed fleetingly over the eternal, were already becoming the past.

It came to me so clearly then, how we are born, live, and die, and Jerusalem – Jerusalem is forever.

Get an excellent, printable, English map of the shuk here.

My friend Sarah Melamed of the Foodbridge blog has opened a fascinating new site: Exotic Markets.

Bloggers from around the world submit photos of open-air markets featured in their blogs. Click on any picture that grabs you and you’ll find yourself almost in Bankok’s floating market, or gazing at cone-shaped stacks of spices in Marrakesh…not to mention wandering through Israel’s shuks. Yes, I’ve contributed some photos.

It’s become one of my favorite places to go when I feel like doing some arm-chair traveling. Thanks for setting up this great site, Sarah!

Happy Shavuot to all of Am Israel, from the Israeli Kitchen!

Udi, father and Ruth, mother – their sons, 11-year old Yoav and 3-year-old Elad, and baby girl Hadas, 4 months old.

The terrorists entered their home through a window and slit their throats as they lay in bed – stabbed the little ones in the heart. And escaped to shelter in the Palestinian territories.

Now surviving daughter Tamar, all of 12,  will watch  her family’s bodies  returned to the earth, as their souls to G-d.

As for me, I just ask you to look at their faces as they were in life, and to remember why they died.

They died for being Jews and living affirmative Jewish lives.

May G-d avenge the spilled blood of the innocents.

What should I call myself now? City farmer? But I’m not. I grow herbs and tomatoes on my balcony, forage for wild edibles and preserve seasonal produce: I’m an Urban Homesteader, darn it.

If I ever get to the point of owning a rooftop garden, I might consider styling myself a city farmer. Although – who knows – if you can copyright words, maybe you can copyright a concept as well. It follows that you’ll be able to copyright an action after that. It might become illegal to grow chickweed or basil at home, because doing that is the exclusive property of someone else.

Isn’t that the logical progression?

Now I’m getting nervous.

I guess I’ll have to give up using the words urban homesteader and urban homesteading. Urban home-maker maybe, too, just to be on the safe side. Because urban homesteading are words that now belong to someone who copyrighted them. Nope, no urban homesteading for me anymore. Who wants to be an urban homesteader, anyway? Let’s all be… greedy, instead.

Does anyone else think this is absurd? Find out more about what urban homesteaders are doing about it on the Take Back Urban Homestead(s) Facebook page. And since today is Take Back Urban Homesteading(s) Day, tweet this post, add it to your FB page, follow one of the suggestions on the Take Back site.

Then go do something radical, like pulling weeds.

Have an easy fast!

And may we hear the best of possible news in the coming year!

Two years! The first post here was published on August 25, 2008.

I started writing a little memoir paragraph about the events in my life over the past two years, but deleted it. What I really need to say is this:

I hope that I interest and amuse you. I hope my recipes make you hungry, and inspire your cooking. When I type a post and hit the “Publish” button, I know you’ll be reading it.

Thank you, reader, for being here.

Many of you know my face, since I published a photo of myself on The Great Brooklyn Nosh post.  Some have told me, by private email or here in the comments, that they feel they know me through my writings. But I’ll only ever know a handful of those who read this blog. That’s OK. In a way I didn’t expect when I first started typing out my recipes and thoughts, you’ve become a part of me.

I’m curious to see where we’ll be going as Israeli Kitchen unravels towards the future – curious to know how far we’ll go together, and what discoveries we’ll make on the way. As long as you and I are meditating on food, cooking together, and enjoying it – I’m game for more years of this journey.

…And you?

If you’re searching for holiday meal ideas, go to the Pre-Holiday Kosher Cooking Carnival. No posts of mine there this time, but stay tuned – a reader has asked me for my thoughts on cool dishes for a hot holiday.

Hot-weather recipes. Living in the hot, humid center of Israel, I naturally accumulated a bunch of them. Easy-going chicken recipes; lots of fish; some breads. Desserts that sit lightly. Here’s a roundup of the best, for your hot-weather cooking.

Soup:

Eggplant Soup

Chicken:

Nut/Herb-Crusted Chicken Fillets

Roast Chicken with Figs

Meatballs with Swiss Chard

Vegetables:

Peperonata

Majadra

Golden Herbed Potato Wedges

Eggs:

Shakshoukah

Fish:

Moroccan Shabbat Fish

Grilled Sea Bass in Spicy Lemon Marinade

Baked Fish in a Walnut Crust

Quick Breads:

Peach Cobbler Muffins

Cornbread-covered Ratatouille

Desserts:

Cherry Cobbler

Flim-Flam Flan

Orange Rolls

Malabi, Middle-Eastern Milk Pudding

Fruit Soup

Israeli Kitchen is going to be taking it slow  for the next three weeks while I’m traveling to the States. New posts will appear on Mondays because two friends have kindly contributed guest posts, and I’ve scheduled posts of my own to appear. While I silently work the mechanism behind a curtain.

So check in on Mondays for the new posts.

I look forward to my trip to the States, where much of my family lives – and to my return. Although the Little One already shows promise of a serious cooking talent, I know that she and Husband will be happy to have me back in my Israeli Kitchen.

Strange. I feel as if this blog is a living, breathing thing that I’m leaving at home.  Pity I can’t take it with me in my luggage. But you, reader, are in my mind every day and so in a way, I’ll be taking you along. Shhh, though, don’t tell the Little One. She’ll get jealous.

See you in July!