Archive for March, 2011

Before there were hamantaschen, Sephardim and Italian Jews had their own Purim treat, oznei haman (Haman’s ears), which consisted of deep-fried strips of pastry coated in honey or sugar syrup. Cutting and twisting the dough has practical as well as aesthetic purposes, by eliminating any raw centers and making the fried items easier to turn in the fat.
Ashkenazim never did much deep-frying, as they historically had only schmaltz for fat. In northern Europe, oil was rare and expensive; the predominant oils in much of Germany were poppy seed and turnip. On the other hand, Jews from the Mediterranean generally had plenty of inexpensive olive oil or sesame oil available and, consequently, developed a number of deep fried items in their culinary repertoire. In addition, many North African Jewish communities had the custom of serving the same treats prepared for Chanukah on Purim “to connect miracle with miracle.”
Among the recipes in an anonymous thirteenth century Moorish cookbook from Andalusia was a deep-fried pastry called udhun (Arabic meaning “ear”), so named because the dish resembled that part of the human anatomy. The directions to make these pastry ears entail kneading white flour with olive oil and water, rolling the unleavened dough out into thin pieces the size of the palm of a hand, folding in half, inserting a stick in one end to keep it ajar (like a cone), frying, then coating with rose water-accented sugar. The fried pastry was typically filled with ground pistachios or almonds mixed with sugar and rosewater. In this vein, Isaac Abarbanel (born in Lisbon in 1437 and died in Venice in 1508) in his Biblical commentary in a discussion of the manna, noted, “The wafers are a flour food cooked in oil in the form of a water flask that are eaten with honey and it is like the wafers that they make from dough like the shape of ears, cooked in oil and dipped into honey, and we called them ozneim (ears).” Fried pastry strips became traditional Sephardic Hanukkah fare, a symbol of the miracle of the oil. When the dish went from “ears” to “Haman’s ears” for Purim is uncertain, but it initially appears in Renaissance Italy.
The first record of the term oznei haman was in 1550 in an Italian Jewish comedy Tzachut Bedichuta de-Kiddushin (An Eloquent Marriage Farce) written in Hebrew by Judah Leone Ben Isaac Sommo (1527-1592) of Mantua, the oldest extant Jewish play, drawing from the Midrash and Italian comedy (Commedia dell’arte, which began in the 16th century, was also the source for the custom of dressing up in costumes on Purim). This play was originally produced for a Purim carnival. In an exchange between two characters, one asks:

“Behold it is written in the Scroll of Purim ‘and they hung Haman,’ and in the portion of Balak it is written in explanation ‘and the Children of Israel ate ha’mahn (the manna).’ How could the Jews, who keep themselves from every wicked thing [Deuteronomy 23:10], eat the carcass of the one that was hung, but to the dog you shall cast it?”
To which his friend provides an answer, “For what the Torah says ‘and they ate ha’mahn’ it is a warning and commandment to us that we eat during these days of Purim from oznei Haman (Haman’s ears) — they are the thin wafers made from fine semolina flour mingled with olive oil [based on Exodus 29:2], and thus it says afterward ‘and their taste was like wafers with honey [Exodus 16:31].’”

This pun and the custom of ozeni haman, fried strips of dough in honey, soon spread throughout the Mediterranean and parts of Europe. By eating a pastry formed to represent part of Haman’s clothing or anatomy; most notably his pocket, hat, foot, or ear, symbolically and tastefully erased the villainous prime minister’s name. As with many Jewish food traditions and names, after its appearance reasons were retroactively attached to it, in the case of Haman’s ears the phrase “oznayim mekutafot.” The Roman scholar and poet Immanuel ben Solomon (c. 1261-1328) translated this phrase as “clipped ears,” contending that Haman’s ears were cut off after his hanging, a misnomer arising from the medieval Italian custom of cutting off a criminal’s ear before execution. The phrase more precisely means “twisted ears,” denoting either that someone wrenched his ears or they were deformed, twisted or triangular in shape, like a donkey.
After the Expulsion of 1492, the name and dish spread to become the most widespread of Purim dishes, called oznei Haman in Hebrew, hamanmuetzen in Germany, aftia tou Amman in Greece, hamansooren in Holland, orecchi de Aman in Italy, and hojuelos de haman. Variations on the dish include schunzuchen (“shoddy cakes”) in Alsace, heizenblauszen (“blown up little pants”) in Austria, burbushella in Georgia, kichelkies in Holland, and mafis (“not found/unavailable”) in Turkey, and variously fijuelas, fazuelos, faduelos, and figeolas in Morocco.
Judith Montefiore in The Jewish Manuel (London, 1846) included a recipe for “Haman’s Fritters,” directing: “Take two spoonful of the best Florence oil [olive oil], scald it, and when hot, mix with it one pound of flour, add four beaten eggs and make it into a paste, roll it out thin and cut it into pieces about four inches square, let them dry and fry them in oil; the moment the pieces are put in the frying pan, they must be drawn up with two silver skewers into different forms according to fancy; a few minutes is sufficient to fry them, they should be crisp when done.”
In northwestern Africa, cooks developed a special coiled shape called debla, a Ladino word for “rose.” In the Middle Eastern manner, the fried pastries are dipped into a sugar syrup or honey syrup, appearing like flowers glistening with dew. Deblas are traditional Purim and Hanukkah treats in Morocco through Libya. Using semolina produces an interesting crunchy texture. There is also a nut-filled version very similar to the venerable Iberian udhun, not in the coiled shape, though still called debla, utilizing the traditional triangular shape for Purim. Moroccans commonly enjoy debla with mint tea.
In colonial America, fried pastry strips became known as a cruller or cruller. Most dictionaries attribute this name to the Dutch krullen (to curl). However, the word cruller (or kruller) was unknown in Holland in the nineteenth century and is definitely of American origin. Therefore, some New York historians offer an alternative explanation to this now popular appellation, one entailing a specific person – Bastiaen Jansz Crol -— or the Anglicized spelling, Sebastian Jansen Krol (in either case pronounced crull) – appointed in 1630 the new commander of Fort Orange (later known as Albany, New York). One of the major problems facing the new captain was the monotony of the food and frequent short supplies, including starter for making yeast dough. In response, Crol substitute fried unleavened pastry for the yeast-dough of oliekoeken, forming the pastry into rectangles with several slits. The troops and later community called these pastries after their leader, crolyer (or krolyer).
The term cruller made its first appearance in print in an advertisement in the December 13, 1802 issue of the New York City paper, Commercial Advertiser (page 2), promoting the upcoming publication of the American edition of The Frugal Housewife. The first recipe for crullers appeared in the appendix (page 215) of the American edition of The Frugal Housewife by Sussannah Carter (New York, 1803), “To which is added an appendix, containing several new receipts adapted to the American mode of cooking,” including:

To Make Crullers
One pound of flour to half a pound of good brown-sugar, and half a pound of butter, let your hog’s lard be boiling, then make them into what form you please, and put them in to fry.”

Soon thereafter, Washington Irving in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1819) used the term cruller to describe “a crisp and crumbling” fried dough, in contrast to the soft fried yeast doughnut: “Such heaped up platters of cakes of various and almost indescribable kinds, known only to experienced Dutch housewives! There was the doughty doughnut, the tender olykoek, and the crisp and crumbling cruller.”

Suddenly in 1845, recipes for crullers leavened with saleratus appeared in American cookbooks, including The Orphan’s Friend and Housekeeper’s Assistant by Ann Allen (Boston, 1845) and The Farmer’s and Emigrant’s Hand-book by Josiah Marshall (New York, 1845). Sarah Hale in The Ladies’ New Book of Cookery (New York, 1852) offered recipes for two types of crullers, one leavened with saleratus and the other unleavened, as well as directions for forming them into twisting them, “divide one end in three or four parts like fingers, and twist or plait them over each other.” In the first edition of The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book by Fannie Merritt Farmer (Boston, 1896) crullers were pastries leavened with baking powder: “roll thin, and cut in pieces three inches long by two inches wide; make four one inch gashes at equal intervals. Take up by running finger in and out of gashes, and lower into deep fat.”
Eventually, the term cruller came to encompass any twisted doughnut, whether unleavened and leavened (a Crol twist of fate), not only in America, but many places overseas as well.
With the mass arrival of eastern Europeans toward the end of the nineteenth century, hamantasachen emerged as the preeminent Purim treat in America and fried pastry strips were neglected. The word was perhaps first recorded in America in July 1896 issue of The Medical Missionary edited by John Harvey Kellogg (Battle Creek, MI) in an article entitled “The Feast of Purim,” explaining, “Jewish women are, however, very busy, in spite of the fast, in preparing choice dishes for the next day, and especially certain little cakes, called “krapplech” fritters, and also cakes in the form of a triangle, called “Hamantashen,” which are delightful morsels to both old and young.” The Jewish Encyclopedia (1903), “The Haman Tash, a kind of a turnover filled with honey and black poppy-seed, is eaten on the Feast of Purim, but probably has no special meaning.”

Oznei Haman (Sephardic Haman’s Ears)
(About 30 pastries)
3 large eggs, lightly beaten (or 2 large eggs and 2 large egg yolks; or 6 large egg yolks)
¼ cup (1.75 ounces/50 grams) granulated sugar
3 tablespoons (45 ml) olive oil, vegetable oil, or melted margarine, or 2 tablespoons (30 ml) sour cream
2 tablespoons (30 ml) water, seltzer, orange juice, sweet red wine, brandy, or rum
½ teaspoon (2.5 ml) salt
¼ cup (60 ml) finely chopped blanched almonds (optional)
1 teaspoon (5 ml) finely grated lemon zest, 1 teaspoon (5 ml) cinnamon, 2 teaspoons (10 ml) rum extract, or ½ teaspoon (2.5 ml) vanilla extract (optional)
½ teaspoon (2.5 ml) baking powder (optional)
About 2½ cups (12.5 ounces/355 grams) all-purpose flour, preferably unbleached

About 6 cups (2 pounds/910 grams) vegetable or peanut oil for deep-frying
Confectioners’ sugar or cinnamon-sugar for dusting

1. Blend together the eggs, sugar, oil, water, and salt. If desired, add the almonds, zest, vanilla, and/or baking powder. Gradually stir in enough flour to make a soft dough. On a lightly floured surface, knead until very smooth (2 to 3 minutes). Cover and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes or overnight.
2. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to about 1/8-inch thickness. With a pastry cutter, fluted pastry wheel, or sharp knife, cut the pastry into strips 1-inch wide and 4- to 6-inches long. Pinch the strips in center and twist. (The pastry can be prepared ahead to this point, placed on a floured baking sheet, covered, and refrigerated for up to 3 hours.)
3. Slowly heat about 2 inches oil to 375 degrees (190 C).
4. Fry several strips at a time in the oil, turning to fry evenly, until golden brown on all sides (about 1 minute). Remove with slotted spoon and drain on paper towels. Sprinkle generously with confectioners’ sugar or cinnamon-sugar. Store in an airtight container at room temperature.

TO CUSTOMIZE – Cut dough into semi-circles, then pinch center of straight edge to suggest an ear.
– Klenatter: Starting 1/3 of the way from 1 narrow end, cut a 1-inch slit lengthwise in each pastry strip; and pull longer end through slit.
– Cut dough into 2-inch squares; cut a 1-inch slit through center of each square; and pull on corner through the slit.

VARIATIONS:
Orecchi di Aman (Italian Haman’s Ears): Add 2 cups (480 ml) chopped candied peel and 2 tablespoons (30 ml) fennel seeds, and substitute 3 tablespoons (45 ml) orange blossom water for the water.

Sesame Dough: Add ¼ cup (60 ml) sesame seeds.

Debla (Northwest African Sweetened Roses)
(About 20 pastries)
About 2 cups (10 ounces/280 grams) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon (5 ml) granulated sugar
½ teaspoon (2.5 ml) baking powder
Dash of salt
3 large eggs, lightly beaten (scant 2/3 cup/5.25 ounces/150 grams)
1 teaspoon (5 ml) vanilla extract, grated orange zest, or grated lemon zest (optional)

About 6 cups (2 pounds/910 grams) vegetable or peanut oil for deep-frying
Honey Syrup:
2 cups (14 ounces/400 grams) granulated sugar
1 cup (11.75 ounces/340 grams) honey
1 cup (8 fluid ounces/240 ml) water

1. Sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Beat the eggs until thick and creamy. If desired, add the vanilla or zest. Gradually stir in the flour mixture to make a soft dough.
2. Place on a lightly floured surface. Using oiled hands, knead the dough until smooth and uniform (about 10 minutes).
3. Roll out the dough into a ¼-inch-thick rectangle. Cut into 1-inch-wide strips.
4. Heat at least 4 inches oil to 360 degrees (180 C).
5. Meanwhile make the syrup by combining sugar, honey, and water, bring to a boil, and boil until syrupy (about 10 minutes).
6. Dip a metal tablespoon into the hot oil. Wrap a dough strip around the spoon to form a rose-like shape. Place into the oil, removing the spoon slowly so that the dough retains a coiled shape. Fry until golden.
7. Remove with a slotted spoon. Carefully place the warm pastry rolls into warm syrup and simmer for 2 minutes. Cool on wire racks or wax paper. If desired, sprinkle with ground cinnamon or chopped pistachio nuts.

Koeksisters (Dutch Pastry Twists)
(About 18 pastries)
These braided pastries are pronounced KO-uk-sis-ters.

Syrup:
½ cup (3.5 ounces/100 grams) sugar
¼ cup (60 ml) water
½ cup (5.9 ounces/170 grams) honey
1 tablespoon (15 ml) lemon juice
¼ teaspoon (1.25 ml) ground cardamom or cinnamon
Pastry:
2 cups (10 ounces/280 grams) all-purpose flour, preferably unbleached
1 tablespoon (15 ml) baking powder
1 tablespoon (15 ml) granulated sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons (1 ounce/30 grams) shortening or margarine, chilled
About 1 cup (240 ml) milk or water (or 2/3 cup (160 ml) milk or water and 1 egg yolk)

About 6 cups (2 pounds/910 grams) vegetable or peanut oil for deep-frying

1. To make the syrup: Simmer the sugar and water until syrupy (about 10 minutes). Add the honey, lemon juice, and cardamom or cinnamon and simmer until flavors meld (about 2 minutes). Let cool, then chill.
2. Combine the flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt. Cut in the shortening to produce small crumbs. Stir in the milk or water to make a soft dough. Knead briefly to combine (about 1 minute) and form into a ball. Cover and let stand at room temperature for 20 minutes.
2. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the pastry to a ¼-inch thick rectangle. Cut into strips 3-inch long and 1/3-inch wide. Braid 3 dough strips together, pinching the ends to seal.
3. Heat about 2 inches of oil to 375 degrees (190 C).
4. Fry the braids, 3 to 4 at a time, until golden and crisp (about 1 minute per side). Remove with slotted spoon and drain on paper towels.
5. Coat the hot koeksisters in the cooled syrup, letting the excess drip off.