Chanukah. Season of Mists and Crembos.

Chanukah is a special time out here, of course the communal candle lighting is fun and the latkes and the parties but to be honest the best thing has to be the Crembos.

For the uninitiated, a crembo is the traditional Israeli “seasonal” treat, a combination between a marshmallow and a chocolate biscuit, yet not so sickly as you might think. Marshmallow fluff loaded onto a round biscuit base covered in thin chocolate. Mmmmmmm. Horrendously addictive. Husband came home with some in his chanukah pack from work, amidst all the crappy Israeli chocolate. For a whole week, all our conversations started with “Have you had yours yet?” and “How many are left?” and “I think I should get another one today because…” Anyway it was all very seasonal.

Jojo got really into Chanukah, requesting the sevivon song on CD every few minutes, and taking candle lighting Very Seriously. He’s actually very into Judaism [no idea why, nothing to do with us] requesting to do brachot, asking for his special shabbat becha weekly and insisting on bensching. He seemed to really enjoy the chanukah story [well I fiddled it a bit, to Jojo Hamacabee… well why not?] and seems to have discovered the benefits of frying. We lit candles over at friends one night who actually fried fresh home made doughnuts which were AMAZING [thank you Mike]. You have not truly experienced a doughnut til you have eaten one out of the pan.

Bizarrely, we found ourselves missing the xmas spirit of the UK. Well, not really the spirit but more the fact that everyone else is busy running around preparing for a chag and stressing about gifts whereas we could just relax and enjoy a [genuine] holiday and some really tacky TV. There is no real down time for religious jews in Israel, which probably explains the high rate of people ditching the religion entirely… if all holidays require extensive preparation with children under house-arrest erev chag lest they actually [gasp!] do something other than help at home then when to people actually get to relax?
Happily, husband managed to get us some English tv and we got to watch outnumbered and Nigellas Christmas Kitchen, [god bless her] which brings all the xmas spirit one needs into the living room. MMmmmmm. How can anyone not have a crush on her? did you see the Butternut soup with the blue cheese sauce? Husband was positively salivating. Unfortunately, despite Nigellas evident taste for all things middle eastern, you would be surprised how difficult it is here to get hold of her ingredients. Cranberries, port, lamb… all things she used that I would have to cross the desert for. Let alone Mincemeat! Sigh. So i abandoned the Friday night xmas pudding and made a Tuscan xmas cake instead. It was a bit dodgy at first but after a week or so in the tin I must say its got pretty good. Maybe I will just pop to the kitchen on my way to bed…