Supported by
Front Burner
A Book of Recipes and Testimony From Auschwitz-Birkenau Survivors
This affecting new cookbook includes mostly Eastern European dishes as well as first-person accounts of suffering and survival.
Preparing the dishes in this substantial new cookbook feels like paying homage to resilient survivors. The elegance of this new volume, “Honey Cake & Latkes: Recipes from the Old World by the Auschwitz-Birkenau Survivors,” assembled and copublished by the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Foundation led by Ronald S. Lauder, almost camouflages the horrors until you read the first-person accounts. That starving people think about food and summon rich memories is not surprising, as the book, not the first to cover this topic, explains. The mostly Eastern European recipes, like a simple butter cake, a plum torte, green beans in dill sauce, chicken paprikash and Elie Wiesel’s latkes, are often excellently rendered. Some give copious quantities to serve what were once large, extended families, and might require adjustment. Proceeds from the sales of the book will benefit the Foundation.
“Honey Cake & Latkes: Recipes from the Old World by the Auschwitz-Birkenau Survivors” (Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial Foundation, Melcher Media, $45).
Follow New York Times Cooking on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok and Pinterest. Get regular updates from New York Times Cooking, with recipe suggestions, cooking tips and shopping advice.
Florence Fabricant is a food and wine writer. She writes the weekly Front Burner and Off the Menu columns, as well as the Pairings column, which appears alongside the monthly wine reviews. She has also written 12 cookbooks. More about Florence Fabricant
More on Food and Dining
Keep tabs on dining trends, restaurant reviews and recipes.
Flamboyant displays of fake flowers at restaurants have turned into a maximalist design movement, with one man as a chief trendsetter.
Perloo, a supremely comforting one-pot rice dish, is a Lowcountry staple with roots in West Africa.
Some of the greatest meals pair exalted wines with foods considered humble. Exploring beyond the conventional can be joyous, like the timeless appeal of Champagne and fried chicken.
For many Jamaicans, spice bun is a staple of Lent. But there’s nothing restrictive about this baked good, so named for its bold seasonings.
For Ecuadoreans, fanesca, a labor-intensive lenten soup served just during the lead-up to Easter, is a staple of Holy Week festivities.
Sign up for our “The Veggie” newsletter to get vegetarian recipes for weeknight cooking, packed lunches and dinner parties.
Eating in New York City
Once the pre-eminent food court in Flushing, Queens, for regional Chinese cuisines, the Golden Mall has reopened after a four-year renovation. A new one in Manhattan is on the horizon.
At Noksu, dinner is served below the street, a few yards from the subway turnstiles. But the room and the food seem unmoored from any particular place.
You thought Old World opulence was over? A prolific chef gives it a new and very personal spin at Café Carmellini, Pete Wells writes.
Eyal Shani’s Port Sa’id challenges the conventional wisdom that you can’t get good food in a restaurant with a turntable.
Advertisement