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"What About P'tcha?" with Liz and Jeffrey · Meet Me At The Deli

• Heeb Media: Welcome to Meet Me at the Deli, a food advice podcast where the pickles and slaw are always free. I'm Liz. And I'm Jeffrey. Every episode we're answering your burning food and culinary questions, and we're sharing our stories and insights from years working in the industry. And living in our self-made sheddle. Jeffrey, how are you? Hi. Hi. I know, I know. ⁓ okay, so yesterday I did something without you. I missed you. ⁓ I was just working at an adult Jewish summer camp yesterday. ⁓ which is something we've both done. We've done it together. We've done it separately. there's a great organization that does adult Jewish summer camps and they did one ⁓ day camp and I was teaching Lower East Side baking at the camp yesterday. And I'm I wanted to tell you because Wasn't my finest workshop, Jeffrey, I'll be honest. Really? Wasn't my finest. I did three in a row, wasn't finest, and I'm I'm confessing that to you and to our listeners. Right. Well, and to anyone who attended afterwards. It's like ⁓ I I I've been to the sleepaway camp, never the day camp actually. Yeah. Well, the day camps new and it's pretty great. But my problem was the reason it wasn't the best is because I'm a pro. Jeffrey, you and I have taught thousands of cooking workshops across the world, I would say. ⁓ our pickling workshop is very popular. We've done a lot of Kreploch making. And you do more than I'm like I'm not as into the Kreploch works. Right. It's a it's annoying. It's a lot of cleaning sticky. Yeah. We've taught gefilted fish all over the world. That's a tough one. You know what mean? ⁓ but I was like lower east side baking and I didn't think to ask what is my oven situation. Like there's an oven I knew there was an oven. Yeah. Yeah. But I didn't ask about the oven. And you know that if you're gonna make bialis, which we were making, that you need a very hot oven. Yeah. And this camp oven just wouldn't get hot enough. So while they tasted good, I think there was a little I felt like I didn't give everyone the experience I really wanted them to have. And I can make a good bialli. So for those who haven't done cooking workshops before, like the instant gratification. Of giving people something at the end of it is so critical. Yeah. It's such a big piece of it. Yeah. And it's so common. I it it's you know, we wanna be nimble and be able to do these workshops in all conditions. I know. And I remember once when I went to an actual camp and I forgot to confirm that there in fact is running water. Uh-huh. You know, and like, you know, so there are these. You're like, how am I gonna teach a cooking class? Like, how are you inviting me to teach a cooking class? And there's no running water. Yeah, yeah. Like how are we getting any sanitation? Yeah, there was a hose. They brought they brought in from the outside. ⁓ my god. Yeah. So okay, so Yeah. But I was on my own. ⁓ what's up with you? Liz, I, you know. ⁓ We're about a like a f a few days away from the NBA finals. ⁓ and I I know you I know you care not one iota about professional sports, or at least male professional sports. No professional sports no professional sports, yeah. No, I'm not interested. ⁓ th this Knicks postseason is been like so disruptive to my life. Like I I am not sleeping well like like like watching the I'm just feeling it? feeling it? I mean the city's vibrating. There hasn't even been games lately, but I'm like every podcast, every article with like every reel about some element of like Knicks basketball. I didn't even grow up liking the Knicks that much, even though I grew up, you in in Jersey, in Knicks country, even though the Nets were around, no one ever really liked the Nets. But I I I but I I I you know, I was in the the ecosystem when they were great in the nineties and like and living in New York for all these years, being here for Lynn's Sanity and these all these moments in the past, you know, really two decades. Like I am so freaking excited about this this this team. And it's like and they're a bunch of mensches like these guys, like they they pass the ball well, they pass. play a kinda a brand of basketball I love. I have like like my my guys on this team and and who's your guy? Well my my number one is OG Ananovi, who is just like he is he Him and Josh Hart. Josh Hart is like he's literally the heart of the team. But then I mean and like you know, you have your captain Jalen Brunson, whose father is assistant coach, but was on the team in ninety nine the last time they went to the finals. ⁓ that's a great story. It is amazing. I can appreciate that. I I I can't tell you after we recorded ⁓ no after an event or something last ⁓ f a couple weeks ago, I went to the bar and caught the first game of the Eastern Conference Finals when they had this miraculous comeback. And being in New York when the Knicks Are good. And w and and to be a p witness to them down 22 with the last seven minutes coming back, Jalen Brunson hitting shot after shot, random bench guys doing so well. New York. And I was just like, what a hell of a town. I am so glad to live here. And it has been amazing. And to top it all off, to connect it to ⁓ our Podcast to our work. Bring it back, bring it back. Get the the Nova Nicks. So I every time I hear that, so Villanova, the three guys, Josh Hart, Mikhail Bridges, Jalen Brunson, they all won the title together at Villanova. Nova Nicks, first of all, the Pope also went to Villanova, so he's connected to all of this. But Nova Lux. Every time I hear Nova Nicks, I'm just thinking about a bagel with locks. Wow. Wow. ⁓ Yeah, so you will only hear that on Meet Me at the Deli, folks, the Nova Nix. It is such an exciting moment and I I'm nervous because I think this is gonna air just after, you know, the first game. And I I'm like hoping they don't crap the band here. ⁓ But even if they lose the first game they can still play, right? Totally. So there's few games. Totally. And I I So it's okay. I want you to watch a game with me. No, I told you I would watch the first game with you. Okay, fantastic. Or the second game. We'll see. Yeah. I'm gonna watch a game with you. Okay, okay. Okay. So let's get into this episode. We got some good questions, right? Let's do it. Let's do it. Let's do it. ⁓ all right. ⁓ speaking of questions, I did wanna say and encourage our listeners Submit some questions to us. Get in our DMs. Get on the link in bio. Go to HEB Media. Go to our website. Submit your questions to Meet Me at the Deli because we know you have good questions. People ask us great questions all the time. And we're like, get it in there. Get it in our forum. Get in there. Ask us your questions. No question too crazy. We want to hear from you. And the question can also it doesn't have to be like an amazing insightful question about the history of a dish. It could even be, you know, h you know, why is something the way that it is? I don't know. Wha something about Liz, why do do why do you like soup so much? You know, Right, why do I? Maybe we'll ask that at the next one. So I don't know. If there's preferences, all those kinds of things. I I think that like Have fun with the question, you know? I like that. No pressure. This isn't like an intellectual thing. No one's gonna see you. You only have to put in your city in your last initial. Like no one even needs to know it's your question. Okay. So this first question is one that we had to we had to do this question because it's a question that has come up in our lives together. Now, Jeffrey, you and I have been working together since 2011. We have taught thousands of cooking workshops. We have had a company together. We have catered events. We have traveled the world. And this is a question we get a lot, and it felt only right that it should make it onto the podcast. So I'm going to do this one. Great. My mother used to make a dish she called gala. It was beef bones cooked down with garlic to form a jelly which was cut into inch-high squares. What was that? What are its origins and how do you actually make it? Sipora in San Francisco. Thanks, Sapora. Thank you for this question. So Jeffrey, what about pacha? What about it? Okay, explain. Well, okay, so so th the gala or it's it's often referred to also as pacha, which is ⁓ calves foot jellies. Or cholodets. Holodets is kind of more Russian. Soviet, and ⁓ this is I would say one of the old school dishes of the Yiddish culinary canonic. This is one of the dishes that like, you know, the old guys eating their herring, drinking their ⁓ Slivovits, which is their plum brandy, on Saturday after services at synagogue. These guys, they might also they might also indulge in the little Calves foot jelly squares that ⁓ Sapora referenced here. Yes. Now ⁓ your joke, what about Bachha, comes from the fact that some of the talks we've done, lectures, lectures. The number one most common question we get is the what about insert food? ⁓ so what about You ⁓ rugged. What about babka? It's n ⁓ all it is is just like tell me about this dish, you know. ⁓ it's such a fun question, but the number one question I think we always get is from these from old timers who attend a lecture or ⁓ an event we do is what about pacha? What about pacha? It is like like if we were to get shared tattoos, it would be what about pacha? Tattooed on our ankles or something like that. Or not your bubbies as a right, right. But we hate that. But Another story. Okay. ⁓ so so Liz, what about Pacha? So, so, you know, in French cuisine it would be called an aspic. People are familiar with an aspic, and and this is not an unusual cooking method. In in fact, it's a very resourceful cooking method because what you do is you take bones, ⁓ which naturally will gel when they are cooked down ⁓ and chilled. ⁓ so so you would take any bones, and you can do this with beef bones. You can do it. In fact, the gel in gefilter fish is a very similar thing from a culinary perspective. The gel in gefilter fish is you get those bones, they're breaking down, they cook, cook, cook for a long time. And when you strain it out, you cool it, it forms a gel. This is what is this is this is what bones do. and so you can do it with pork, but you know, bones from a pig, you can do it with beef bones, and you could do it with fish bones, you could do it with any bones. ⁓ if you've ever had ⁓ soup dumplings and you wonder how do they get the soup in those dumplings, what they do is they make an aspic, cut it up into, you know, cubes, put it inside of a dumpling once it's chilled, and then when they're steamed, the liquid, you know, it it it goes to a liquid from the from the gel. So this is a very common form of cooking when you have leftover bones. It's a great way to get the flavor. It's Very nutritious. I mean, listen, I I have a hot take here, which is next big food trend. Well, existing food trend. Hey, guess what bone broth is? Guess what bone broth is? Guess what? Collagen-rich foods that you're going to Whole Foods and you're going to do these things. Guess what that is? That is Pacha. It's Pachah. That is that is your your mother's gala sipura. Right. Okay, so this is the trendiest food you can imagine, and it is basically the old school. Calves foot jelly, ⁓ and and you I think you summed it up really well. It really is this ⁓ a very simple yet old technique. But ⁓ I'd say what I think distinguished Pachaw for a lot of people is also very garlicky, super pungent. Yeah the smell of making it because there's also something about calves feet jelly. Yes. ⁓ and even finding calves. If you ever go to a kosher market, like a ⁓ what's the one? Pomegranate, big supermarket. they have calves feet that are kind of cleaned and prepared. That you can get and it's a very unattractive thing to get. I mean, like the same reason people buy chicken feet, by the way, for chicken soup, right? For that collagen-rich experience. Yep. ⁓ and you thickness. And which if something is shared. ⁓ you know, you go to Chinatown and you know Chicken feet. Chicken feet, because they also also use it for making really wonderful Chinese soups. Totally. So yeah. So this is this is like, you know, in some way I loved how you brought it to the French culinary tradition because I always see this this connection between the the high, you know. Voluten French cuisine and the Stettl kitchen. And I always think that like the some of the Stetl basics, the classics, the ways of building flavor, they are exactly what's being done in some of the fanciest French kitchens. So I need to say one more thing about this. Now I think that people ask us what about pacha a lot, like this what about pacha thing, because Pacha is not popular in Jewish cuisine anymore. aspics are not that popular anymore. If you go to Crown Heights Brooklyn at the kosher grocery store, sometimes you can find it. Not not even. Sometimes when I used to go to what was Marketplace, that was over by where I used to live. You could get it like on Fridays. Okay. You know what I mean? And I think they would do it. They would be making some thing and they would have leftover bones and they would make it like for Shabbat, you know? So it's I think people want to ask about it because it really is this like memory unlock. It's a very pungent food and you really don't see it very often. And you might remember when we went to Lithuania together and there was like so many aspects. You know, it was like very popular. And we were like, wow, this is like the what about Pacha people would really love to see contemporary Lithuania. today, you know, like beautiful, layered, very very fancy. Fancy aspects. Or you go to the grocery store. Go to Brighton Beach. I mean go to Eastern Europe. You can get it. Go to ⁓ right ⁓ what is it, Brighton Bazaar or go to Tashkant, the Uzbeki but Soviet market. They've got an entire case of various different aspects, some with ⁓ really beautiful ⁓ like shredded ⁓ meats in them and and like layers. Layers colours, vegetables like like a like a Like a jello mold. What one of the most beautiful gefilterfish I've ever seen was one that was basically a gefilter fish, like structured like a jello mold, and with the a very c a clarified aspic ⁓ where you can kind of see in with the carrot and some and some little vegetable ⁓ pieces in there. So we I I g we do not have the taste for it. Right. But it is alive and well in many cultures. And I would say and yet somehow we're accept we are we are okay with it when it's warm but not cold. Like we're okay with the soup. version of a bone broth, but not the Well it's the texture. It's the texture. You know, let's just be honest. You you either you're either here for that texture or you're not here for that texture. So Zipporah, our advice to you is try it. Try making it. ⁓ you know, I think you should give it a shot. You can find a lot of recipes online. You actually don't even really need a recipe. Get some garlic, get get some calves feet, cook ⁓ down. It's not a big deal. It won't even take that long. Well, it'll take a long time, but you won't have to do much. Yeah. You just wait. It's inactive. Right. Like let it go on a Sunday afternoon. ⁓ give it a shot. And if you ever come to New York, go down to Brighton Beach, give it a shot. You'll you'll find it and you will maybe get that flavor of what your mom used to make. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Great. ⁓ love starting off with Pachah. Yeah. What about it? Okay. Let's go to the next question. Okay. I felt seen in the most recent episode when Liz mentioned ordering a hot dog with ketchup. Delicious. This is my preferred order, even though my Jewish father has bullied me about it about this for my entire life. Which leads to my question What is your most cancelable Jewish food take? Is there a classic food you don't like or a bastardized version of something you enjoy ordering? Please free me from my guilt and shame. From Evan in Queens. Okay. okay. So my number one thing is that as a person who wrote a cookbook called the Gefilter Manifesto with you, in which we make our own matzah and then tell people that the best way to make matzo balls is to crush up homemade matzah and form matzo balls and they're called Rustic matzo balls. And we are like, we like shame people. Like we're like, why would you ever contribute to big matza and buy matzo meal when you can just crush up matzo and make your own matzo meal? Like, what a waste. You know what really is great? Matsubal mix. Matsubal soup mix. The box of the matzo ball soup. Works every time. Delicious, fluffy, great. Love it. Give it to me. I'm here for it. Even with the soup packet in it. ⁓ Evan, I hope you feel good about that. All right, now you go and I have another one for Okay. Do you remember when Cynthia Nixon, ⁓ from Sex in the City was running for governor? And she had the the the raisin bagel with the locks? Yeah. Yeah. I love a raisin bagel. I I I I enjoy a raisin bagel and I like it with locks and cringies. ⁓ and I I don't like She like lost cause of that. That was scandalous. She didn't lose because of that. Yeah. She but there were multiple think pieces. I d I don't you know, Adam Gopnick did write a think piece in The New Yorker where he defended that order. I'm not this isn't like a hot take here. But I I actually I grew up ⁓ but you're coming out, you're telling us the truth. I grew up not knowing that cinnamon raisin bagels were a lender's invention. They were a modern take on the bagel. And I grew up loving like a cinnamon raisin bagel for me was with butter, salted butter. Like that was ⁓ and what a like it's like it's cinnamon French toast. Why not in a bagel form? Cinnamon raisin bagel with butter and you're gonna mix some crannies. And you're gonna toast a cinnamon raisin bagel because if it's it's usually gonna be one that's not like made super crunchy because a good bagel baker isn't always making them. Yeah, yeah. ⁓ but I I I like sweet and savory. And so for me, the cinnamon raisin bagel with ⁓ with a a lox and with a cream cheese schmear isn't it's not my preferred. Don't get me wrong. That was not my bagel order. My bagel order isn't I'm an everything, a sesame bagel, I'll take a poppy. ⁓ It's not really my bagel order. I'm just saying I didn't But I I I felt such sympathy for Cynthia Nixon. Yeah, she got a lot of shit for it. She got too much shit for it. And I actually I actually thought I I I thought it was a bold choice, but not one we should be shaming her for. And I I felt like I was annoyed at the purists. I I respect that totally. I have personally never had a cinnamon raisin bagel with locks, but I see it. You've never you've never been at an event and the only bagels left were cinnamon raisin. And then you had one. And a little bit lo like like like I've been there and like I'm like I would have preferred the sesame or the preferred the everything. What are you gonna do? But like, hey, I'm here and there's bagels and there's free locks. What am I not gonna take the free locks? No, you're gonna take it. You're gonna take it. Well, I'm gonna I'm gonna order tomorrow. Okay. I'm gonna do it tomorrow. Okay. ⁓ what's your next one? Okay. My next one is that the Jewish community has this relationship with tuna salad and egg salad. Like There's this like ashkenazi, this like ashka normative assumption that like when it is lunch thing, we have tuna salad and egg salad. These are things that belong in the Jewish world. And I think it's like, it's gotta go. It has got to go. I think tuna salad and egg salad are disgusting. I think things that are made with like scooped with ice cream scoops, I don't want it. Hey, hey, I know you're a chopped liver fan. That's scooped with ice cream scoops. I don't I I don't like chopped ⁓ doing it with an ice cream scoop. It's just there's something wrong about it. I'm like, we got that whole culture has got to go. Like that, a tuna salad sandwich at the you're at some event, you're at a you know, a conference, and there's a spread out, and there's like some bre cold, like crappy bread, and then there's some lettuce and some o out of season tomatoes, and then you get these like These like little individual ice cream scoops of tuna salad and egg salad. And they're like lunch. And you're like, I don't want this food. It's gross. It makes me feel gross. It's not gonna give me energy for the rest of my day. And I just feel sad. And ⁓ it smells bad. So I just think that whole thing has got to go. I think we need to stop claiming it. And I know why it is. It's cause it's par of it's not milk or meat. I get it. It's cold, it fits, it's easy, it transports. Let it go. It's twenty twenty six. We gotta let it go. I never wanna see egg salad and tuna salad at a Jewish event again. I I honestly think this might be a more cancelable take than your first one. Cancel me. ⁓ Yeah. But I you also have a strange and I've always I I don't know if I've ever told you this. I think this is one of the strangest things about you is that you do not like room temperature or cold meals. You only want a hot meal. I know. And like that's insane. It's not strange. It's interesting I am. It's it's my I don't Ayurvedic constitution. It's true. I don't like cold arruints. I think this is your Ayurvedic bias here. And ⁓ Well, cancel me. Like, I I couldn't disagree with you more. but that said, I I respect that you're willing to put yourself out there like this. Okay. Come at me. Okay. Here's my last one. Okay. I'm excited. Humantashin are the worst. ⁓ They are the worst. They stink. I I like I don't know why I'm never I didn't I guess that you were gonna do this. Always Humantasha, by the way, right? This this like triangular cookie that is almost always stale, that's filled with like various different jelly jam things and the the the best that a humantashin can be is always like okay. And ⁓ almost always like the baseline for me is like I'm like moderately disappointed. So that is my ⁓ listen and I know there are a Hamintashin stands out there. I'm sure This people will be very upset. I I I wanted to be very clear, Liz. If you send me a a special gift on Purim, please don't include Hamintosh. Listeners, I think our our show just got cancelled because that is a take that is wow. Okay. It's got more heated than I expected. Okay. Work together so many years and truth comes out. Okay. Great question. Still love you, Jeffrey. and Okay, I think we should go on to our last question. Last question. Okay, I'm gonna ask this one because you got to ask that juicy first one. Sorry. Okay. So this is from Alan in Manhattan. How slash why is Meet Me at the Deli subversive? Hmm. Okay. So this is this is an interesting question because I don't think we've ever said that it's a subversive show. Have we? I don't know. We've said that Meet Me at the Delhi is subversive, but we are part of the HEB media network, and HEB is subversive Jewish media. So I think I mean we can list off a few things. ⁓ there's a there's there's one thing that has always been true of our work together, and we've been working together since twenty eleven. We started a company called the Gefilteria. And while we were as the s as the founders of a company called the Gafilteria, we were doing something very loving. Toward the Jewish community. We were actually very extremely and continue to be mission-driven around revitalizing and reimagining Jewish food. There was a subversive element because we were basically saying, like, there was a subversive element to what we always did. Number one, because we were just doing something so niche. People were either drawn to us or kind of repulsed by us. And I think there is something so niche about Meet Me at the Deli as well, although I think it actually works for people who are Jewish, not Jewish, have all different backgrounds. But there is something niche about someone who wants to kind of go nerdy deep with us, who wants to explore these questions that like, you know, this isn't this isn't a mainstream celebrity talk show. This isn't ⁓ you know, and and I do think that like doing something or having the having the gall to do something so so particular in and of itself. Has a subversive element to it. I appreciate that. And I think that that's a good point. And I think to set the scene a bit more when we first started the gefilteria, we ⁓ we started with this idea that we were, you know, we we looked at the kosher aisle of the supermarket, we saw these boxes of matzo ball mix and other packaged food items, latkas in a in a box, we saw jars of gefilter fish. And and literally I mean, I remember a friend of mine made fun of Gefilterbisch and called it the sausage of the sea. His family, ⁓ I think his family was from Yemen and he's like, ⁓ your food stinks, you know. And I felt like, Wait, I know that this food can be really amazing when done well. I grew up with a grandmother who was cooking all these foods fresh. She grew up in Poland. She grew up with a cow and f ⁓ in in in Poland in her shedl she grew up with ⁓ plum trees and and ⁓ her everything was made from scratch. And so, you know, when we got started, we're like, you know Let's make I think we first started thinking we were gonna be the hipster manashevitz. We did. Which in and of itself was fairly subversive. Yeah, yeah. So and and we started we called ourselves gefilteria with the idea we're gonna make gefilterfish, which was the most mocked food, perhaps maybe you know, I I I I think you could put chopped liver or pacha up there, gefilterfish was kind of pretty well known. Yeah. Yeah. And ⁓ mocked, and we're like, we're gonna make this cool, we're gonna make it sustainably sourced, we're gonna make it, you know, ⁓ relevant for our generation, and we wrote a manifesto. So there was something very counter-cultural there. Thinking about the counter the the countering mainstream Jewish culture, which was really abandoning any like ⁓ these particular food ways. Yes. Which was really more about its kind of Americanizing, looking eastward and not so much focused on making sure that the ⁓ foods, at least for ⁓ many Americans who have similar backgrounds to us, which is Eastern European Jewish, So there was something about that. We were making pickles, we were going to the market with, you know, we were bringing back fermented beet tonics, kivas. Right, right, right. And every time we found a new niche thing, we were bringing it there. So I think there's something there, but to me to me the deli though, which always d did exist, the delis were closing at the time. The deli itself was still kind of in the mainstream of Jewish life, at least at that time. I think ⁓ You know, I feel like to me, this is a very tricky moment in in Jewish life. Mm-hmm. And I think that there is, you know, there's a lot of, you know, talk about anti Semitism. There's, you know, I I grew up in a family of Holocaust survivors. There's lot of talk about this. And ⁓ and I grew up hearing always about Poland and hearing about these parts of the world where my family came from and only hearing about like the awful things. And I remember Like when we were working on our book, and I I remember talking to my grandmother, and she like loved her sneak, and like and telling these stories about this culture that, sure, it like it was a challenging history, no doubt. But there was a lot of love and appreciation looking through Yiddish literature, looking through this history, coming to America, ⁓ thinking about this this rich immigrant tradition, the Delhi itself grew out of this kind of flourishing Jewish life. Yeah. ⁓ a Yiddish speaking life where there were more Yiddish newspapers in on the Lower East Side than there were in all of Poland in the early twentieth century. And being able to kind of tell that story, bring it to life, ⁓ and doing that in in the in like in doing the kibbutzing of the deli, which is like the Jewish deli was known for people sitting there, friends, community, sitting together, talking, laughing, talking about these foods, talking about life, talking about the nicks. And and we get to and we get to do that. We get to center You know, this kind of more this I'd say this joyful, right? Like love of these food traditions. And there's something to me, right now in this moment, by focusing on that. Right, where that's our center, that's what we're orbiting around. I love that. And I would say to just like cap that off, is that we are really interested in like in a continual flourishing of Jewish art and Jewish culture as a real mechanism of transmission, right? And that is Something that is not necessarily the mainstream assumption, right? Like we're saying, hey, let's invest in Jewish food, let's invest in Jewish cultural activities, let's do crazy podcast things. Like this is actually what it looks like when we flourish as a community, as opposed to many initiatives that are hyper focused on like Jewish continuity in a more traditional sense, right? Marrying somebody Jewish or going to synagogue, right? And we're saying, Let's look at something else. So I love it. And ⁓ I don't know, what ⁓ what do other people think? Are we subversive? I don't know. Listen, also independent media independent media. That is subversive in and of itself. Yeah. That's true. Support independent media. Become a member of the Heap Guild. Let's do it. Let's do it. Well done. Okay. ⁓ I think we got I think we got it. I think we got it. Okay, and and if we're not subversive enough, listen, if if if P Chaw isn't niche enough. You know what? Ask us some s more subversive questions. ⁓ yeah. We can you know yeah. I challenge us, provoke yeah, provoke us. We're ready to go. We will we will take it on. We are trying to choose questions that will get us fired up if that is not obvious to you. Okay. Okay. So Liz, I think we made it to the kvetch kvell share portion of ⁓ the proceedings. Okay. So we're sliding into the vinyl seats of the deli booth. So we each get the chance to kvel or kvetch about something we've been thinking about or Bring something to the other. So ⁓ Liz. All right, I'll go first. And I'm I'm gonna keep it kinda short. ⁓ 'cause we've really we've said a lot on this episode. When it's just the two of us, we really get into it. Okay. I have brought you a kvetch. Must have been waiting for you to bring a kvetch. I'm I'm the one hold bringing all the kveches. I know, you're always the one with the kveches. So How do I say this succinctly? You know, I have noticed since having a child four years ago, four and a half years ago, that like the world sort of like splits in in the United States in our culture between like adult things and kid things, right? Like you're either like at a kid thing and it's like pizza, or you're at an adult thing and it's like at nine o'clock at night and there's like pasta, you know, pacha. And it's like sure, like places like tr there's a f it I look, like there's definitely like attempts at bringing it all together. But like this is like a it's like a thing. It's a problem that we do not have like a more integrated culture. And I and I am talking about the culture I live in. I cannot speak to all cultures in the United States. I'm talking about like contemporary Brooklyn people with kids who are in their late 30s, early 40s and you know, like like in my milieu, I really feel like this split and it and it came to light in a food way this past weekend for me. And that was really interesting. And I like, I like wanted to rant about it. I was like, ⁓ good thing I have a podcast. Okay, so basically, first I'm at a wedding on Saturday night. Now, gorgeous wedding. Amazing couple. They were like, we want your kid to come to the wedding because they love this our our child. And Shira, my partner, was actually officiating the wedding. ⁓ Perfect. And they this wedding was so great. The hospitality was amazing. The attention to detail was so great. Okay. And there were two children at this wedding. And it's like they were and they had even gotten it so that the caterer made kids food because it was like very fancy. It was like very high. Rhino nuggets. It was pasta and broccoli. But like like like they knew that the food that they were doing was not like appropriate for like a four year old and a seven year old who was at the wedding. But the food did not come out until like nine o'clock at night. Like the main dish, the kids' meal. Like so they had like gone through all of like and I don't blame the couple at all. This is like the caterer, right? The caterer knew there's kids, they're doing service. I get it. They have a lot going on. They're doing a lot. But they like it's like it was like set up to fail. Because you're at a wedding. I get it. Someone is gonna say to me, Liz, bring snacks for your kid. You're going to a wedding, bring your own snacks. But for me, my my like going back to it is like, okay, this couple was so thoughtful in making sure our kid was comfortable, making sure there would be a meal for them. But then Nobody thought about the fact that like kids should probably eat before 9 p.m. Like, let's just do that. No. I and like my complaint about that is that it's not like no one thought about my kid and it's more like look at this culture. Like we have this culture that like doesn't even have intergenerational weddings. Do you know what I mean? Like the caterer is not even used to having kids at their wedding. And then the next day, I actually went to a bot mitzvah. I had a very busy weekend. Amazing bot mitzvah, the most thoughtful people. They had like gorgeous. You know what they did that no one ever else did in their life? They had breakfast before the service. Like a beautiful, gorgeous, locally sourced bagel, pastry, locks, gor local dairy. I mean, it was like the most thoughtful. This is what I'm saying. These are the most thoughtful fucking people. So thoughtful, right? My kid eats, we're so happy. But then you have service like for three hours. But then it's like, okay, then we drive to the thing and you're like, okay, I'm gonna get to the thing and we're gonna like get my kids some lunch. And this is a kids' event. There are tons of kids. But like the venue just like had not worked out efficiency with their food. And like in an ideal culture, there's sort of just like food around for people so that like whoever needs to eat, elders or youngsters, like I don't have a bone to pick with the venue or the caterer. I definitely don't have a bone to pick with any of the people who organize these events who did actually a very thoughtful job. It's more like I have a bone to pick with the general like split in adult and child experiences that we expect to have. You go to a kid's party and there's pizza at eleven AM. And you're like, I don't want to fucking eat pizza at eleven AM, but that's all there is. You know what I mean? And then you go to an adult party and it's ceviche at nine PM. These are your options in life. I I'm sick of it because you know what? My kid did a great job at these parties, but my God, we were like, Where are we gonna get some food? You know what I mean? So that's my rant. Great parties, miles of top to everyone. Truly beautiful and thoughtful experiences with some like frustrations about society. See, I well I I feel for you and I appreciate you fetching ⁓ to me. This is ⁓ a real treat. Okay. Well I, Liz, have something for you. I I brought something. So I I ⁓ so ⁓ was about, you know, ten years ago, eleven years ago we f we started going up to Waltham 'cause we did the summer ⁓ summer class at at Brandeis. Brandeis. And ⁓ our our Jewish food anthropology class and we got to have a kitchen and classroom. It was pretty amazing. We got to teach all about the history of these foods and make them and but when the best things about Waltham, Massachusetts, all the Indian markets. And I were you in Waltham, Massachusetts? No. Okay. But I I I've always loved going into different immigrant ⁓ food markets and ⁓ particularly loved Indian markets. Yes. And and but I I really got to know them on a more intimate level in Waltham. But they we took all the time. And when 'cause there there wasn't that much to do in Waltham, but you could go to go to some good markets and do some fun cooking. ⁓ but I was in Jackson Heights over the weekend. And I went to a market and I saw two things. One I brought kind of more just for a fun conversation piece, and one ⁓ as just a little treat. Okay. So One is this, which Speak of the devil, as they say. You have brought me a box of halal certified gelatin. Yeah. I love it. I'm gonna make so many things with this. Yeah. Thank you. And one of the reasons I I was so intrigued to see this is i so I actually didn't even connect the fact that we were gonna be talking about aspic on and two out of three of our questions on this episode. ⁓ but ⁓ what I loved about it is that I you know, so often I think about You know, the experience that I had growing up. And for those who maybe don't know that gelatin, which can be derived from many different things, but traditionally because of our industrial food system in America, it's often from the hooves of pigs. Yep. And so if I went to ⁓ Jewish Day School, we had to have special kosher marshmallows made from fish gelatin. Everybody knows about the kosher marshmallows. Not everyone does. Not everyone does. So never as squishy as you want. ⁓ and so ⁓ of course there's all these d this different ⁓ thoughts on gelatin and some p some people actually think that it's so d it's so disconnected from the source that it's actually not technically ⁓ unkosher, you know. ⁓ but ⁓ but all these things, like I grew up not eating Lucky Charms because of those little marshmallows so that the cereal and there's all these other things, s'mores ⁓ like a campfire. This could also be a rant, by the way. Yeah. I everything's a little bit of a rant. ⁓ but then I here I was in this market thinking about the the the concurrent Muslim in America, you know, experience of similarly feeling left out from a ⁓ a bonfire and from feeling like they too cannot eat lucky charms and all of the other ⁓ Malamars or some of those other classic American things that have gelatin in them. And so I was my heart was actually warmed seeing this 'cause I I felt a kinship. ⁓ a connection here and and coincidentally ⁓ a few months ago I ha I met up for coffee with this ⁓ really amazing woman. Her name is Sarah Klugage, I think is how her last name is pronounced, who was writing a book about the history of Jell O and she was so excited to talk to me about my experience growing up with gelatin. And I'm like I'm like talking all about like gelatin derived from like fish bones and versus ⁓ really. You know, calve hooves and Agar agar. Yeah, we're talking about ⁓ she I learned from her about ⁓ What is it called? ⁓ it's like ⁓ it's a particular gelatin that was used to clarify ⁓ foods in Europe. There's made derived from fish. ⁓ so and then yeah, and then the more plant based gelatin. So I I had a lot of thoughts on gelatin and ⁓ and and ⁓ but I hadn't actually considered the halal gelatin experience. And so I was just really like delighted by that. And so I wanted to bring you some gelatin for our very gelatin forward episode. Just shaking the box. Just trying to hear the contents. The interesting thing is I actually couldn't find out from this package, and I even used Google Translate because the back is all in Arabic, what ⁓ what is the source of the what is the source of the gelatin? It just says it doesn't say it's halal gelatin. But nowhere is there an ingredient. It just says halal gelatin. So I don't know if this is from fish or from cows. One thing I learned in that conversation with that jello expert was that often hides are quite c most common source of gelatin. It's actually Not pig hooves, but it's pig skin is the most common source of gelatin in America. But ⁓ but I found this intriguing. Okay. Thank you. Right. Okay, so listen, I I I got you to gelatin, but I figured I instant gratification, as we've discussed, ⁓ is important. So I had to get you a snack. And I I lived with this Indian roommate ⁓ from Gujarat, ⁓ who used to always say to me, It's snack time, let's have some snacks. Yeah. And I just like loved eating snacks with him and ⁓ and he always had these really crunchy ⁓ peanut y snacks. And so I got you one that looked like ⁓ one of my favorites of his. Okay, I want to shake this one too. Okay, let's hear the shake. Yes. Can't wait. So I figured let's get a little bite for our out and then we can do our outro and you know, we we talked about a lot of funny things. But yeah. ⁓ so the I just wanna say ⁓ this is a beautiful bag. It's it's really showing the contents, you know. ⁓ this illustrative peanuts and and and crunchy things, bombay sweets, and it's Namkeen ethnic snacks. Love it. Yeah, let's pop it up. Thank you, Jeffrey. I'm gonna try not to make a mess. Mm. So good. Got a little heat. Got a lot of heat. When we were in Waltham, I used to snack on these kinds of snacks. Nonstop. I'd go like on the set Almost every day I'd go to the Indian markets. I don't even know if you know this. I honestly don't. I went to the Indian markets, I just bought all the snacks. And like I this particular kind with all the like the thin crunchies, the thick crunchies. I don't know what h most of the things are called. A lot of them are lentil based, chickpea based. So good. ⁓ and there's nice and he nice heat to it. This is a great snack. This Namkeen Ethnic Snacks. Shawnagore. I have one more. Yeah, please. One more. These are yours. ⁓ thank you, Jeffrey. Okay. Love a treat. So now. ⁓ and that's a nice like the peanuts are like That's what I wanted to get in I didn't get a peanut. ⁓ that's a ⁓ a lot of like nice curry flavors on that peanut. And it's small, crunchy, it's the right flavor and it's a lot of heat. My mouth is kind of on fire, but in the exact right way. Okay. Okay. So, Liz, we did it. We made it. Here we are at the end. 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