Janna Gur is the author of The New Book of Israeli Food, which I reviewed earlier, and editor of Al HaShulchan, Israel’s most widely-read and respected food magazine. A few days ago she generously gave me time to talk about herself, the magazine, and her important historical food project.
The first thing we established is how to pronounce her name. It’s “Zhana”, as in the French “Jean.” Once I finally pronounced it correctly, we had enjoyed a few chuckles and chatting came easy. Janna answered my questions with patience and humor - ranting sometimes, musing and just sharing her thoughts other times. She asked about me and my family with sincere interest, which surprised and pleased me. I felt personally how her warmth and curiosity brought her to a wide, almost anthropological vision of how food preserves culture; culture, food.
Janna told me that she immigrated to Israel in the mid-1970s from Latvia, together with her parents and grandparents. She was a teenager with no concept of culinary greatness except for the Russian Jewish foods cooked by her loving grandmothers. Her mother, she said, and I could hear her smiling as she said it, is not a very good cook.
Janna experienced the usual immigrant struggles but eventually fit into Israeli life, learning to speak perfect Hebrew. Grown up, she worked for a while as an airline stewardess to finance her university studies. Those international flights opened up opportunities to try out new cuisines. The interest in food took root, that would later develop into a passion. Although her studies focused on translation, her publisher husband drew her into the world of editing and magazine publication. Inevitably, she wrote about food. Seeing how successful that was, the Gurs launched Al HaShulchan Gastronomic Media and the magazine in 1991.
“I’m interested in food as culture, how restaurants and markets work, who the people eating are, and what they’re eating,” Janna said. “I’d love to have more food articles and food writing in Al HaShulchan, but the readers demand lots of recipes, so we provide them.” Apart from intriguing recipes, the magazine features beautiful photographs, in-depth articles, cooking techniques, and restaurant and cookbook reviews.
Janna has witnessed, and influenced, the development of an identifiable Israeli cuisine, one that takes full advantage of the rich food variety available here. (“Israel is a paradise of fruit and vegetables,” she says.) It’s a cuisine suited to the climate and temperament of the Israeli, a sophisticated one that broke off from French and Italian models to develop its own unique taste. Keeping track of the new cuisine could fill a lifetime, but Janna is already moving in another direction.
“I hate the word gourmet,” she says passionately. “How about a soft-boiled egg, one of the world’s most delicious foods – isn’t that gourmet? Why not? What does gourmet mean – another elegant recipe, or simply what tastes good to you?”
Part of the beauty of Israeli cooking is how it evolved out of narrowly ethnic Sephardic communities whose cooking was influenced by the local style and which used only local ingredients. As the Jews of Iraq, Syria, Egypt and other countries left their ancient homes to settle in the safer West, they left the old foodways behind. The labor-intensive dishes that Grandma cooks seem old-fashioned and inconvenient. Modern working women are too busy to cook that way, so the old foods have become Shabbat treats at Grandma’s table only.
“The new generation has grown up not knowing the taste of the old foods. People don’t have the craving, the nostalgia for the old foods that compels you to go to the kitchen and start recreating them.” (I had a sudden flashback to my mother’s black beans and rice). “Whole cultures based on family gatherings, that are in turn based on eating specific foods, are dying out.”
When I asked Janna what culinary trends she sees for Israel, she replied that the new interest in organic produce, simplicity, and returning to sustainable agriculture will create a wider place for ethnic cooking. Some lesser-known styles such as Syrian-Jewish may become fashionable.
Janna edits and supervises many projects connected to Al Hashulchan, but her heart is in a new project aimed at preserving the old ethnic foodways: The Treasure Box.
“I want this not to be a ‘living museum,’ but a site that encourages people to reintroduce their traditional foods back into their lives. Ethnic cooking is an important cultural point that has received little attention. Jewish languages, music, and folklore are well documented, but not the old foodways, ways that Jews lived by till only recently.”
Janna asks that people compile family cookbooks and family stories about food and submit them to her site. She declares that the material will be free-access. She will not copyright volunteered material, nor intends to profit from it. She mentioned that the project needs a sponsor.
I thought all this over after our interview, and the more I thought about it, the more valuable the Treasure Box project seems to me. Food history is intimately tied to our background, our roots. What a pity to let the foods of our grandparents die away as we turn towards convenience and food products.
I, too, encourage you to write down your family’s favorite old-fashioned Jewish dishes and submit them to the Treasure Box – then put on an apron and cook some of them up yourself.
Thanks, Janna.
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