Bunch Family

David Wall is a composer, lyricist and singer, and dad to two young sons. As a member of the beloved Toronto band Bourbon Tabernacle Choir in the 1990s he toured Canada from one end to the other. He’s since recorded several solo albums and a collaboration with pianist Marilyn Lerner, become a Cantor, and joined the Flying Bulgar Klezmer Band.  

He can be found every July performing with Ken Whiteley at the Hillside Festival’s Sunday Gospel Hour. In recent years he’s focused on composing for film, including the score for John Greyson’s video opera Fig Trees and Avi Lewis and Naomi Klein’s documentary The Take.    Read more...

Sometime around 1996, I was working in an office that only played Pharcyde records while I was mostly into David Krakauer and the Klezmatics, and I got this idea stuck in my head: mix klezmer and hip-hop! Luckily for y’all, I was neither a musician nor much of a head so the idea was quickly discarded. Luckily for me, around that time Josh Dolgin a/k/a Socalled got the same idea while thumbing through a crate of Yiddish records, and sometime around 2001 the “HipHopKhasene” collab and “The Socalled Seder” appeared and all my Jewy hip-hop dreams came true.

Since those early days Dolgin has initiated a klezmer boat cruise down the Dnieper river, been the subject of an NFB documentary by Garry Beitel, put together a funk-klezmer supergroup (with David Krakauer!), freestyled to an electronic dreidel, arranged music for and toured the world in Gonzales‘ band, recorded two more of his own albums and produced many others, recorded with Theodore Bikel, coaxed Irving Fields out of retirement, performed at the Apollo Theatre and Carnegie Hall, and helped launch his mom’s career as a cookbook author.  Read more...

One day, before I properly met our new neighbours, I was jostled out of a toy-tidying reverie by a few abstract squawks of saxophone. The player was obviously excellent and since baby slept through anything, I pushed open the window and enjoyed an impromptu concert. Weeks later I went to see Destroyer perform the new record at Lee’s Palace, and noted to my partner that the sax player seemed familiar.

It wasn’t until a spontaneous stoop-party a few months later that I realized my neighbour was saxophonist Joseph Shabason, the guy that made Destroyer’s 2011 record Kaputt one of the best of the year. His own band is called DIANA and there’s already a ton of good buzz building. AND Jos’ knows a killer latke recipe.  –  Helen

Joseph says:  Read more...

I met Emma Waverman in New York City in a haze of estrogen at a totally effing crazy conference called BlogHer. I did not immediately realize that she was food royalty. I just thought she was fun and knew where to buy bras on the Lower East Side. Emma is the co-author of the family cookbook Whining and Dining and her mom, Lucy Waverman, is a serial cookbook writer and culinary doyenne. Emma also has some pretty smart things to say about the whole parenting thing over on her MSN blog, Embrace the Chaos. Now, I just order whatever Emma’s having and all is good. Like Emma herself, this latke recipe is no-nonsense but quality. — Rebecca

Emma says:  Read more...

I met Dan Seligman at a Broken Social Scene/Stars show in New York City in 2002. He had just co-founded this thing called Pop Montreal, which he tried to explain to us Guelph nerds as we raced through the Lower East Side trying to see as many bands as humanly possible. A decade later, the ties between Pop and Guelph are still flourishing and Pop Montreal is widely acknowledged as a musical utopia of a festival, running simultaneously with Kids Pop, the craftastic Puces Pop maker fair and the Pop Symposium.

Over the years, Dan’s introduced me to the smooth soundz of Socalled and Gonzales and Katie Moore, and was the first person to tell me about this great record Feist was recording in Berlin. Pop Montreal presents music year-round in Montreal: the 12th annual festival is scheduled for Sept. 25-29, 2013. Make plans now. — Helen

JULIA, DAN AND DAUGHTER JOHANNA

Seligman says:  Read more...

When I was a kid, my mother would pack up the electric griddle every year and schlep to my public school for a latke-making session, to help balance the Xmas excess with a festive, oil-redolent dose of Jewish culture. I would love to claim this is an old family recipe that dates back through several generations of Bubbes.

Alas, it’s really only one generation old, but was handed down by a woman who many would claim is one of Toronto’s reigning notable culinary Jews: Bonnie Stern. According to my mother, who is herself an astonishingly gifted kitchen wizard, this is adapted from a recipe Stern posted in the Toronto Star many, many years ago.

As a hard-headed vegan (17 years and counting) I must admit I’m excluded from the many splendours of these tater cakes, but I wanted to share this recipe and not a more dietary restriction–friendly one because a) I have yet to find a truly Bubbe-worthy vegan latke [write in! -Ed], and b) THESE latkes are what I think of when I think of Hanukkah.

Sarah Liss’s mom’s adapted-from-Bonnie family latke recipe

• 1 small onion, peeled

Introducing a new monthly illustration feature from Sarah Lazarovic.

Find more Sarah comics here.

I met Vancouver musician Shane Nelken ages ago in Austin but then he came to my (once-famous) Red Hook Brunch for wayward Canadians there for the CMJ marathon. This makes us sound sporty. I was an (unhired) one-woman street team for the Awkward Stage and I now impatiently await his imminent solo record. I bugged him for a latke recipe and he sent me inappropriate photos and then he sent this.  Read more...

Here is the Nelken family recipe as it was stolen from the internet and altered to suit our family. Please read carefully and follow all instructions for the desired results:

The last two latke recipes have been in the traditional vein. Today we’re going to mess with your heads and give you an amazing recipe for maybe the healthiest latkes you will ever eat.

Bob Wiseman says:

My latke recipe is gluten-free and also no oil. Another miracle!”

• 3 onions (Spanish or red)
• 3 potatoes
• 1 yam
• 1 English cucumber
• carraway
• pepper
• apple sauce

Cut up 3 onions, Spanish or red. Cook in frying pan with no oil at medium heat. Shake a bunch. Some will caramelize but mostly will go translucent.

This will take 20 minutes.

Turn off and let cool.

Grate 3 Yukon Gold potatoes and  1 yam.

Mix the onions with the potato and yam.
Add a pinch of carraway and pepper.

Spread on a baking tray lined with parchment paper and bake at 450 degrees for 40 minutes.  Read more...

You wanna know why some reporters are great? Start with their methods. I’ve avidly followed the once-mysterious Goldsbie‘s chronicles of Toronto City Hall the entire length of time (five years) that I’ve been on Twitter, long before Rob Ford took office. For the average Torontonian, he’s the people’s journalist, translating the machinations of city council into something comprehensible.

After generously complying with our request for his family’s latke recipe, intrepid City Hall chronicler, passionate Torontonian and cult figure Jonathan Goldsbie did due diligence and fact-checked his mom’s hand-written recipe card. A quick look on ProQuest (search term: “relish-like”) revealed it was a Jim White recipe (which was noted on the card by his mom) reprinted in the Toronto Star in 1989 and 1990.

So here is the fully attributed latke recipe – they go for a slightly smoother latke texture, those Goldsbies – complete with the above photo of adorable baby Goldsbie on his first Hanukkah with his babe of a mom.   Read more...

To kick off our “OMG How Is It Hanukkah Already This Weekend?” coverage we present you with EIGHT CRAZY DAYS of rock ‘n’ roll Latke Recipes. We’ve got all bases covered: traditional, gluten-free, slapdash. And you can say “I got this recipe from <insert notable Jew>” at your Hanukkah party.

Our first recipe comes to us from someone I like to think of as “LaurenTrouble” because is that not the best twitter handle? Also she has the best smile ever. Exhibit A (Lauren Moses-Brettler + her husband Damian + their two delicious children)

Lauren says:

This is my recipe for the BEST latkes in the world. Well, it’s actually my aunt Barbara’s recipe. She pretty much doesn’t cook at all (she has been known to eat cheese wrapped in cold cuts throughout the day) but one of the few things she makes every year are these incredible latkes. Estimate slightly less than 1 lb of potatoes per person assuming there are a few other dishes.  Read more...

When you’re not home for the holidays

Rebecca’s family was in Panema for the beginning of Hanukkah and not wanting to skip out on some important traditions, like lighting the Menorah, they made do with what they could find at the beach.