A Fishy Encounter
Abigail Katzenoff2011ContestsWinter 2011 Contest
My younger sister and I grew up loving gefilte fish. This may be typical for people raised in Hasidic communities, but we grew up in a secular Jewish household in a goyish suburb of Chicago. Our grandparents, however, were from the Old Country, and every weekend we ate the gefilte fish my bubbe served as eagerly as the Hamburger Helper that my mom dished out at our house.
Since I was raised on delicious, sweet homemade gefilte fish, I never understood why people thumbed their noses at the humble dish. Then I moved to New York for college, and during Passover I was served something from a jar in the dining hall of my dorm. The grayish blob didn’t look anything like the beige ball that my bubbe topped with an orange beret of sliced carrot and a boa of red chrain. I was suspicious. I put a tiny piece on my plate and tried to sniff it discretely.
“Are you smelling your food?” my shiksa college roommate asked.
“Yeah,” I replied, and stuck my nose closer to the plate.
Nothing too terrifying filled my nostrils, so I took a tiny bite.
Oy vey.
If someone was unfortunate enough to believe that this was what the dish was supposed to taste like, hatred of gefilte fish made total sense. I stopped eating gefilte fish. No one seemed to make it like my bubbe.
Years later, I found myself in Borough Park. Part of my job was to make grants to community organizations operating child care centers, and a program in the neighborhood had applied for funds. The site visit went well. The little girls seemed happy and well-cared for. The staff was friendly. The women eagerly shook my hand when I arrived and the man who oversaw the operations waved at me. They deemed me a haimishe mensch, which flattered me to no end. I told them they were likely to get the grant.
As I headed back to the subway, I thought about the little girls in that center, and then looked around at the people passing in the streets. Their lives, it seemed, were so much closer to my grandparents’ Eastern European childhoods than to mine. And suddenly I thought of gefilte fish. It had been so long, and I was now hit with a desperate craving.
Ossie’s Fish Market rose right in front of my eyes as I approached the corner. It all seemed so serendipitous that despite a moment of hesitation – me, an outsider, walking into a place of solid fishy tradition – I took a deep breath and entered the shop. I had nothing to worry about, I thought. I was a haimishe mensch, after all. Or so they’d said.
Not everyone got the memo, it appeared. The woman at the cash register wore a black lace kerchief over a blond wig. She looked up from the counter as I entered, and I thought I saw a scowl on her face. I headed to the row of freezers, where octagonal cardboard boxes of Ossie’s Famous Frozen Gefilte Fish lined the shelves. From the corner of my eye I saw the cashier continuing to eye me suspiciously, as if I might empty the entire contents of the freezer into my miniscule blue purse. Perhaps she did have real cause for worry, though: I felt as if I’d encountered manna from heaven. I debated between regular and salmon before going for traditional, and took my purchase to the register.
As I approached, another non-frum woman entered the store and said something to the cashier in Russian. The cashier looked past her.
“Excuse me,” the woman tried again in a thick accent. “You have, maybe, change for the bus?” She held up a dollar bill.
The cashier sneered. “Why’d you speak to me in Russian?” she asked.
The woman began to stammer. “I thought, maybe… you speak Russian… I’m sor–”
I cut her off. “Here,” I said, and opened my wallet. “I have four quarters.”
The woman sighed gratefully and left with the change. Alone with the cashier, I debated whether to hand over my money to a place that employed someone so obnoxious. As I vacillated, I could almost hear a soft voice calling from the box in my hands. “Abigail! Oh, Abigail!” the mushed dead fishes called. “You know you want me!”
I placed the fish on the counter, and the woman punched some numbers into the register. There was no price on the package, so I waited for her to tell me how much I owed. And waited. And waited. I considered walking out, to rush to the nearest traif establishment and getting a ham and cheese sandwich and getting crumbs all over myself, just to spite this woman in her gleaming wig and haughty disdain for me and my non-frum appearance.
But my desire for good gefilte fish was too strong. I leaned over the counter and peered around her at the screen on the register. The woman said nothing as she put my money into the cash drawer, and then she stared over my right shoulder.
On my way home, sitting among strangers on the D train, watching black teenagers listen to hip-hop music blasting from their earphones and old Russian ladies chatting away in their native tongue, I thought about the Hasidim: the friendly ones at the school; the rude one in the fish store, the mildly indifferent ones on the street, and wondered about these people and their strange ways. I also wondered what my grandparents would’ve thought of them. All I knew about their old world was a smattering of Yiddish words. And, of course, the taste of homemade gefilte fish.
At home, I cooked the fish according to the instructions on the package. When it was done, I topped it with a slice of cooked carrot and placed it on a plate. My bubbe, I thought, would’ve been proud. I took a nibble, then another, and ate two slices before I ever make it to my kitchen table. I wouldn’t ever go back to Ossie’s Fish Market, but for that little slice of nostalgia, that modest serving of that old sweet flavor, it was all worth it.
26 Responses
Fish is never so good as homemade gefilte fish. And it’s never so bad as the gray glop in jelly that comes out of a jar
Cute and sweet. But, beware: the rabbis say that even more than ham with cheese, is the danger of mixing schmaltz with fish!
Great story!
My grandmother’s gefilte fish had no sugar and produced no yucky gel. It was naturally sweet since she used fresh fish she cleaned herself. Sadly, my family has lost her recipe. We’ve tried to concoct it a number of times , but it’s just not the same. Sometimes I wonder… did we fail to recreate it accurately , or is it the loving hands and heart of Grandma that are missing.
The aweetness might come from onions…
I live in a place called “Wesley Chapel”, Florida. It’s just north of Tampa. Gefulte fish out of a jar isn’t bad if you put enough FRESH horseradish on it.
But where, out in this place, can I get schmalz herring? If it’s possible to get horny for schmalz herring, that’s what I’ve got.
Great story! Every few months I make the rounds to my favorite BP food places to stock up. My kids and I get plenty of stares, but it’s part of the fun I guess….. SkepticalYid: I add sugar to the water that I boil the gefilte fish in, which makes it sweet. I know you said your grandmother’s fish didn’t have sugar, but I wasn’t sure if that includes the cooking water as well.
A very nice essay/slice of life. I personally enjoy gelfilte fish on shabbos, but can not look at it the second shabbos is over, the only exception is when my mom would fry it and make gefilte fish patties which are actually pretty good.
Grandma used no onions and no sugar water. She did add some ground carrot, which we do as well. She cleaned and ground fresh caught Carp and Perch.
“Gefulte fish out of a jar isn’t bad if you put enough FRESH horseradish on it.”
Ummm, the heilige Chazal in their infinite wisdom have alluded to this phenomenon when they stated that אפי’נותן טעם לפגם, חורפי’ דצנון מחליא לי’ לשבח.
מאי נותן טעם לפגם, לאו היינו נונא ממולאי, דמטבלין לי’ בצנוני רטובי, ולא סגי דלא טעים ולא מרגיש להאי בשר מת דנונאי, אלא דגם איפשר ליהנות מיני’ ואפשר לקדושי בי’ איתתא.
kafhakela: Unfortunately, my highly dependable translator is no longer with us, Baruch Dayan Emet. Hence, some assistance would be welcome.
Of course, she claimed that reading Yiddish “broke her teeth”, as she was kind of translating into Hebrew, and then into English. But your assistance would help, if you were quoting the heilige Chazal in Yiddish. And if not, then directly from Hebrew would work for me.
I’m sure that the comment of the heilige Chazal wold add much to the discussion, but I’m unable to penetrate it, whatever language it is in.
kafhakela, thanks for that little Hebrew lesson. I like to keep in touch with my Yiddish and Hebrew language roots. How nice to wake up and read that slice. Got every word! But I’m running to a funeral so I trust you’ll do the translating for Dirtlawyer ;).
Actually, that quote is neither Hebrew nor Yiddish – it’s Talmudic Aramaic – though I searched and could not find that particular quote (it is similar to a Gemara (that’s Talmud for you Modern folk) in Chullin 112, but not exactly). The general idea is that even bad tasting fish can be “saved” to taste good by some sharp radishes…
Yea, it’s Talmudic Aramaic. The first part is from the gemara chullin, although it’s not quoted exactly. It’s actually a composite of two different gemaras, and the Rishonim argue whether the halachah of מחליא לי’ לשבח applies by צנון too, or it is not considered a דבר חריף for this issue. ע’ יו”ד סי’ צ”ו ק”ג וקכ”א
The second part is totally made up. No such gemara. I am learning in Yeshivas Chipas Emmess under the tutelage of the great “goyn” Rabbi Pinky Shmeckelstein, and it is under his guidance where I learned to delve the depths of the unwritten Shas, the true toireh shebaal peh.
My translator (my late wife) could do Aramaic also. I once watched her translate fragments of Isaiah at sight. It’s amazing what learning is contained in the Talmud.
Thanx for your learning and your effort.
And J, how do you put a smiley face after anouncement about a funeral?
Isaiah is written in Aramaic? You learn something new every day, though those new things you learn aren’t always correct…
“And J, how do you put a smiley face after anouncement about a funeral?”
Ah, I suspected I shouldn’t have done that, too late, it went through. Didn’t mean to be insensitive to my friend’s mother. The smiley face was intended for kafhakela, who was now tasked, in my absence, to translate :).
“And J, how do you put a smiley face after anouncement about a funeral?”
Ah, I suspected I shouldn’t have done that; too late, it went through. Didn’t mean to be insensitive to my friend’s mother. The smiley face was intended for kafhakela, who was now tasked, in my absence, to translate :).
J. I hope that Chay Nobody’s short explanation will suffice for now, until I have a chance to explain it at length. It involves some minute legalistic details which you’re probably not even interested in… Winky right back at ya!
Dirtlawyer, you should be able to get gefilte in a kosher supermarket in Tampa… just in case you get realy horny for gefilte.
Moe; It’s schmalz herring I crave. In fact, there must be an eleventh commandment against the way I feel about it. Something about, “thou shalt not covet the deli’s herring”. Or does that make 614?
Abigail, sweet piece on Old World. I don’t live in the New York area but I visit Boro Park because I have close family there. And you touched on a dichotomy I always experience. On the one hand, delicious Old World, sweet and sacred. Quaint, home and hearth, a museum.
But there’s always something, several a day sometimes, that throws cold water in your face and bursts the reverie. The rude brother in law, the obnoxious sales clerk, the kids who stare and stare you down, the Chassidic shopkeeper in the apron behind the counter who averts his gaze and puts your change on the counter.
I used to love herring. Then I went to the deli around closing time and got herring in sour cream. It was a little picked over, but it would probably be okay. Right? Wrong. I managed to crack a rib throwing it up. Since then the sight or smell of pickled herring causes queasiness and intense physical aversion. And I will never go back to that deli.
Let’s not reveal my age, except to say that it is advanced. So much so that I have abused my stomach to the point that nothning causes an upset stomach any more. I can eat schmaltz herring without fear of anything. Herring in sour cream? Feh. It must be pure schmaltz herring. Pure, I say. And anything else is “feh”, as my dear departed grandmother would have said. Another problem. No one says “feh” any more. Except maybe in Boro Park.
You may try and try to re-create the things that your bubbie made with love, but unfortunately it really does not taste the same. The endless pots of chicken soup that, although tasty, pale in comparison to the soup that came out of the pot that my bubbie made. Lost to the ages are her kreplach (chicken & onions, mmmmm)and home made kishke.
My mother was a business person, and did not replicate my bubbie’s recipes. My children have grown up knowing my mother-in-law’s cooking, and I urge them to learn her recipes, as they will always be a source of comfort, and evoke memories of warm times.
Teppy1954, you left out the feet with the toes pointed up. Also the small tea pot sitting over the pilot light. Other than that, I’m with you.
Also, by sons (4) still remember my mother in law’s kreplach. We could destroy two day’s output in one sitting. Gone to the ages.