Our parents followed different paths to express the universal theme of Rosh Hashana – sweetness.
Pomegranates and dates were served by Yakir’s Yemen-born mother when he was growing up in Israel. In my childhood home in the US, my Polish-born mother usually added sweet potatoes and prunes to the traditional sweet stew, tzimmes.
During the last few decades, Jewish New Year culinary customs from a variety of backgrounds have merged in many households. We’ve enjoyed, for example, rice topped with dried fruit and almonds at so many Rosh Hashana dinners that we almost forgot its Sephardi origins (see recipe). Just about everyone we know ends the feast with a taste of Ashkenazi-style honey cake.
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