Latkes

Miscellaneous was the first grown-up word I learned when I changed schools at 11. And I learned how to spell it aswell as its meaning. I'd never heard of it before then and now, 38 years later, it's cropped up as the theme for this week's Recipe Shed from Reluctant Housedad. So, as I'm not doing Christmas Dinner this year (it's the Cinderella thing), I thought I'd give you a recipe for latkes and tell you a bit about them.

Basically they are potato pancakes and, along with sufganiyot (doughnuts), are the traditional food for Hanukkah. The theme is food cooked in oil to remember the miracle of the eternal light in the reclaimed Temple lasting a full eight days instead of only one. The story is that they found only a small amount of oil and it took eight days to get a fresh supply.

Latkes is the Yiddish name, in Hebrew they are called levivot, they are also, as I said, potato pancakes. But whatever language you use, they are delicious, full of calories, and very easy to make.

Latkes

potatoes
onions
eggs
flour
salt and pepper
cooking oil

Grate the potato and onion into a bowl. Mix in some eggs and flour. Season with the salt and pepper.
Put tablespoons of the mixture into the hot oil and fry on both sides until golden brown.
Serve warm with... and here opinions differ.

Traditionally we ate them with meat (corned beef) and pickled cucumbers. Then people started getting trendy and serving latkes with apple sauce and sour cream. There are no rules except to enjoy!

PS We ate ours before I had time to get the camera out so the illustrations are from Google images.