Darche Noam Recipes

"A Sprinkle in Time"
The Darche Noam Cookbook
A compilation of recipes from staff members and their families

Debra Looks' Challah (Parve) new
Makes 2 large loaves or 3 medium

Two Challot waiting for Shabbat to come to the Looks family table.

Ingredients:
1/3 stick margarine
1 tsp. salt
1 egg
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup boiling water
1 package yeast (or 1 tablespoon loose packaged yeast)
4-5 cup flour

Place margarine in bowl and pour boiling water over it. Add salt and sugar. Stir until well dissolved. Cool then sprinkle yeast over water. Cover with a towel and wait 10 minutes or until yeast is bubbling. Add 2 cups flour and 1 egg. Continue adding flour until you can turn it into a board and knead it. (I knead it very little.) Grease a glass bowl and place dough inside. Cover and let rise until double in bulk. Punch down. Knead slightly. Shape into loaves, paint with lightly beaten egg. Let rise uncovered approximately 1 hour. Bake at 350 F / 180 C. Check at 15-20 minutes. Loaves should sound hollow when tapped.



Lynn Finson's Mushroom Barley Soup (Dairy)
Ingredients:
1 - 2 packages of fresh mushrooms, washed well and quartered
2 large onions, diced
4 tbsps. butter
2 quarts water
2 quarts milk
1 cup barley
1 1/2 tsps. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper

Directions:
Fry onions and mushrooms in butter until onions are clear -- approximately 5 minutes. Stir often. Add 4 quarts water / milk mixture (best at 1/2 and 1/2). Add barley, salt, and pepper. Cook for 2 - 3 hours over low flame.

Sweet Challah
Sarah Deena Katz
Ingredients
1 & 3/4 packets of active (shimrit) yeast (approximately 75 grams)
4 cups warm water
1/4 cup sugar
Mix and let sit until it bubbles.

Then add:
4 eggs
1 & 3/4 cups sugar
3/4 cup oil
2 tbsp. salt

Mix well and slowly add
approximately 14 cups flour
kneading continually.

Add 1 to 2 more cups until you have a soft but not sticky dough. When dough is correct consistency, put in a slightly greased bowl and let rise (while covered with a towel) for 1 & 1/2 hours. Take dough and cut into pieces and reknead into individual balls (3 to 4 per challah). This will yield approximately 8 challot. Form challot (either braid or make round challot) and place on a well greased pan. If desired "wash" challot with egg or sugar and water mixture and sprinkle with sesame or poppy seeds. Bake at 350 F (about 175 C) for approximately 30 to 40 minutes. If you have two racks in your oven, switch the pans from top to bottom and vice versa after 15 to 20 minutes.

Rebbetzin Hirshfeld's Gefilte Fish
A recipe for 15-18 balls or patties

Ingredients for fish balls
1/2 kilo ground carp
2 eggs
2 medium carrots
1 large onion
1 ½ tsps. salt (or more if desired)
2 ½ tbsps. sugar (or more if desired)
pepper to taste
matza meal (as much as needed)

Mix above ingredients together and add matzah meal (enough that you can form balls or patties). Put aside.

In a medium pot 3/4 filled with water prepare:
1 carrot,
1 onion, and
1 1/2 tbsps. sugar, salt and pepper

Bring pot to a boil and drop the fish balls/patties into boiling water. Fish should be about 2/3 covered at the top. Bring to a second boil and then simmer on a low-medium flame with the pot half covered for 1 and 3/4 to 2 hours.

Optional: For the last 10 minutes of cooking, one may turn the flame up to a rapid boil and uncover the pot completely. This helps the liquid turn into a gel when the fish cools. Bones and/or fish head cooked with the fish balls help the water gel afterwards as well.

Rebbetzin Shurin's Lasagna
Makes two 13" x 9" trays

500 grams of no-cook lasagna noodles
3-4 containers of cottage cheese

White Sauce
4 tbsps. margarine, melted
4 tbsps. flour
1/2 liter milk
1/2 kilo grated yellow cheese
1/2 - 1 tsp. salt
pinch of pepper
On a low flame, mix flour into the margarine. Stir in the milk gradually for a thick sauce. Let cook and then add cheese, salt, and pepper. Cook on a medium flame until the cheese melts, stirring often.

Tomato Sauce
1/2 - 1 can tomato puree mixed with equal amount water
1/2 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. pepper
1/2 tsp. garlic
1/2 tsp. oregano
1/4 tsp. sugar (or to taste)
Use no-cook lasagna noodles. Layer tomato sauce, noodles, cottage cheese, & noodles until used up. Top with the white sauce. Bake lasagna for 45 minutes - 1 hour at 350 degrees (F). Can freeze after baking.

Chicken Giacomina Marobella Bellissima
contributed by Donna Zeff
I got this recipe from a friend and I think he may have gotten it from the NY Times, but I'm not sure. He named it after himself.

(photo taken at Tuesday Night at the Rabbis)

Ingredients:
4 cut up chickens, marinated overnight
Marinade
1 head garlic, chopped finely
1/4 cup dried oregano salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 cup olive oil
1 cup pitted prunes
1/2 cup pitted Spanish olives
1/2 cup capers with some of the juice from the battle
6 bay leaves

When ready to cook, arrange the chicken in one layer in a baking pan. Spoon the marinade over the chicken. Pour 1 cup brown sugar and 1 cup white wine over the chicken. Bake for 50-60 minutes.

Chicken will be ready when, if pierced with a fork, the juice that comes out is brown, not pink. To serve, throw away the bay leaves and garnish with finely chopped parsley or cilantro (kusbara). Also excellent when served cold the next day.

Brown Rice Salad -- Rebbetzin Ruthie Karlinsky

(photo taken at Tuesday Night at the Rabbis)
This is Rebbetzin Karlinsky's adaptation of a recipe received from her friend Esther Perel Ranells.

Ingredients:
1 cup brown rice, cooked until just tender. Do not overcook. Rinse rice with cold water
1/2 cup raisins
2 cups scallions, chopped
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
1 large red pepper
4 tbsps. light oil
1 tsp. garlic powder
1/4 cup soy sauce
pinch of pepper

Instructions:
Add raisins, scallions, sunflower seeds, and pepper to rice. Then mix in the remaining ingredients. Let the salad marinate in the refrigerator before serving.

Pkeila (A Tunisian Rosh Hashana Stew)
Deena Nataf, as given to her by her mother-in-law

First Part
Ingredients:
2 bunches of spinach -- leaves only (you can use Swiss chard if you are unable to find spinach)
1 bunch scallions (green onions)
4 cloves garlic, chopped
5 sprigs cilantro (kusbara)
4 sprigs mint

Instructions:
Wash, chop, and cut everything. Put in large saucepan on medium flame. Cook until all the water from the vegetables dries up. When the water is completely gone, add a generous amount of olive oil and cook on lowish flame until everything is cooked but not burnt -- about 1 hour. You must watch it very carefully. Turn the mixture frequently. When done, cool and put in a jar with more olive oil, store until needed. It keeps a long time.

Second Part
Take 3 soup spoons of spinach mixture (results of the first part), a handful of white dry beans, olive oil, about 1/4 kilo red meat (cut into bite size pieces), and a generous amount of water. Add black pepper and salt to taste. Cook covered in a saucepan at least 1 1/2 - 2 hours. The spinach mixture is very concentrated, so be sure that it is sufficiently diluted with olive oil and water. Pkeila is best when it "rests" for a day in the refrigerator before you reheat and serve it.