Sharing A Love for Food and Jewish Culture: An Interview with Author Joan Nathan

January 17, 2011

Joan Nathan is the author of ten cookbooks, including her latest work, Quiches, Kugels and Couscous: My Search for Jewish Cooking in France, which has been well-received. In addition to a varied career as an food writer, host of the PBS television series Jewish Cooking in America with Joan Nathan, and her work with charitable organizations, she also worked for the iconic Jerusalem mayor Teddy Kollek in the 1970’s. In this interview with the New Vilna Review Ms. Nathan discusses her life in food and politics.

NVR: You are the author of ten cookbooks, including the award-winning 1994 book Jewish Cooking in America, and most recently, Quiches, Kugels and Couscous: My Search for Jewish Cooking in France - What first inspired you to combine your love of food (and food writing) with a strong interest in Jewish topics?

When I first started writing I was living in Jerusalem as a young 20 something. I wrote my first cookbook on the Jews, Christians and Moslems in Jerusalem with head notes on the various groups of people and then recipes as a lark with a friend, Judy Stacey Goldman. The book, The Flavor of Jerusalem, (Little Brown) sold 25,000 copies. Then I realized that I knew about Jerusalem but very little about Judaism. So I researched and wrote The Jewish Holiday Kitchen which is now Joan Nathan’s Jewish Holiday Cookbook. Each of my books has enabled me to research and learn about a new facet of Jewish cooking…an endlessly interesting topic.

NVR: This most recent book focuses on your quest to explore Jewish culinary roots in France, can you describe for us the genesis of this project? Why France?

This book has been bubbling for many years. Before I wrote my first cookbook, when I was in my teens, I went to France, first for a summer, and then for my junior year abroad in Paris. My relatives had moved to France from Germany before the war so I had a close connection. But in those years I wasn’t thinking Jewish food, I was in love with everything French!Perhaps I had to learn about other cuisines to understand the role of French food within the context of Judaism. I am still learning.

NVR: Can you give us some sense of your process for writing this book? Who were some of the people you met and talked with in the process?

Whenever I write a book, I put together a chart of who I want to meet and what I want to cover. Then I read as much as I can. Then I go searching for people with stories and good recipes. I also divided France into certain parts I wanted to visit for this book. You find when writing a book that many of the stories get repetitive after a while. So you have to edit, edit. When I have gathered the recipes I want and the stories, then I write my introduction.

NVR: Were there things you discovered in writing this book – about Jewish cuisine, French cuisine, or cooking in general, which surprised you?

I was constantly being surprised by the role of the Jews in France and their food. First, the under the radar of being Jewish in France. As an American Jew who has also lived in Israel, I was surprised at how many people were Jewish or had Jewish roots but never revealed it. I also was surprised when I learned about the Jewish trade routes from the 8th century and I believe much earlier, seeking spices, furs and other goods from as far away as Chine and Russia and India. It made me realize that from the destruction of the first temple Jews had been wandering around the then known world as tradesmen and peddlers. My research made me see the Jews as inextricably bound in the food of France from their role in foie gras, chocolate, wine, grain, etc. In a sense the Jews helped the cog of good food role in France.

NVR: Let’s shift gears for a moment from French cooking to political history – you lived in Jerusalem for a time in the 1970’s where you worked for iconic Jerusalem mayor Teddy Kollek, can you tell us a little about what that experience was like and how you ended up there?

I was like so many young people at that time. I wanted to go abroad in the Peace Corps, which had just started, but decided to go to Israel instead to see what it was all about. It was after the Six Day war and the city was reunited. It was a time of reaching out to the Arab community of Jerusalem and I was able to go with the mayor to visit people in small villages. What I learned from Teddy was that eating together is a great way to break down human barriers between people. When you say I like your food, people are flattered and connect with you, even in strained situations. The entire way that I approach writing about food, stems from that. I remember once going to visit an Arab village that wanted a new road to connect to it. We sat down with the people…you could have cut the tension with a knife….first they brought out tea, it was still tense, then we ate their moussakhan (one of the great chicken dishes of the world made from a confit of onions baked with chicken, sumac, and other spices and served on a pita bread.) By the time we had our coffee we were friends and able to happily negotiate a settlement. That happened over and over again.

NVR: You clearly have had a vibrant and varied career in politics, the culinary world and the arts, including a series on PBS entitled Jewish Cooking in America with Joan Nathan and created an award-winning documentary for Maryland Public Television called Passover: Traditions of Freedom, why do you feel it is important to share the history and traditions of Jewish culture and cooking with the rest of the world?

I feel that we live in a time where traditional foods and customs are fading very fast, are almost extinct. We don’t have a lot of time left to document them. I encourage everyone to videotape their grandmothers in the kitchen (if they still are alive) to find out the history from them. I can’t tell you how many people thank me for what I have tried to do, always lamenting the fact that they did not document a long gone relative.

NVR: What can we expect to see next? Is there something you’re working on now that you might be able to tell us about?

Right now, I am still very busy enjoying promoting Quiches, Kugels and Couscous: My Search for Jewish Cooking in France. I really do not have a lot of time to think about what is next.

NVR: Is there anything else you would like to add?

I’ll be in Boston on January 30th at the New Center for the Arts (check my website Joannathan.com) and on January 31st for a dinner from my book at Lumiere in West Newton.

For more information on Joan Nathan’s writing and cookbooks, please click here.