Borekas

For our final Hebrew cooking elective project for the year, I chose a very simple recipe for borekas, a very popular dish amongst Sephardi (Spanish/Portuguese) Jews. It is perfect for a light evening meal and, when filled with cheese (as the ones we made are), is often eaten during the Shavuot holiday, which falls on June 4th this year, and commemorates the giving of the Torah to Moses on Mt. Sinai. It is traditional for Jews around the world to eat dairy foods on the holiday for several reasons. The one I like the most is that the Torah is compared to milk by King Solomon who wrote: "Like honey and milk, it lies under your tongue." (Song of Songs 4:11).

As always, we reminded the students to "leerchotz et ha'yada'eem eem sabon" (wash the hands with soap) before beginning the cooking project. The results were a great success - the students gave the borekas a thumbs-up rating, and their opinions are, of course, the most important.

Here's the vocabulary I used, specific to this recipe

Reisheet kol, leesh'bor et ha'beitzeem b'toch ha'ke'ara ha'k'tana (First of all, break the two eggs into the small bowl)

Az leet'rof otam k'tzat eem ha'mazleg (Then beat them lightly with the fork)

Achshav, la'seem et ha'beitzeem, ha'g'veena, v'ha'b'sameem b'toch ha'ke'ara ha'g'dola (Now, put the eggs, cheese, and spices into the big bowl)

L'arbev et ha'kol b'yachad (Stir everything together)

Since we only have half an hour for the cooking session, I used frozen puff pastry dough, and cut the sheets into 5" squares before the students arrived.

L'maleh kaf eem ha'meeloo'ee v'la'seem et ha'meeloo'ee be'emtza kol revoo'ah shel batzek (Fill a tablespoon with the filling and put the filling in the middle of each square of dough)

L'harteev et kol ha'katzot shel kol re'voo'ah eem k'tzat mayeem, v'az l'kapel et kol re'voo'ah b'alachson (Moisten all the edges of each square with a little water, and then fold each square diagonally)

Lees'tom et ha'katzot shel kol re'voo'ah k'dei la'hachzeek et ha'meeloo'ee beef'neem (Seal the edges of each square in order to hold the filling inside)

Leet'rof od beiza b'toch ha'ke'ara ha'k'tana (Beat one more egg in the small bowl)

V'az l'havreesh et ha'beitza al ha'boreka (And then brush the egg on the boreka)

U'va'sof, l'fazer gar'eenei shoomshoom me'al kol boreka (And finally, sprinkle sesame seeds on top of each boreka)

La'afot et ha'borekas chatzee sha'a, v'az zeh moochan le'echol. B'teyavon!  (Bake the borekas for half an hour, and then it's ready to eat. Bon Apetit!)

If you are interested in any of the recipes we used this year in the Hebrew cooking elective, and/or you would like to practice the Hebrew vocabulary as you prepare the recipe with your children, I've prepared a step-by-step recipe book with all 24 recipes, illustrated with the photos of the children preparing them. The book would provide fun ways to practice the Hebrew any time of year with your children and other family members. The book is called "Ta'am Eevreet: A Taste of Hebrew (subtitled "24 recipes for Building Your Hebrew Vocabulary"), and it will be on sale this coming Sunday, during our "Spring Fling."