How to Celebrate Chanukah Without Burning Your House Down

It’s been my week for trying to do new, unfamiliar things. It took me two days to add a subscription service to this blog. I’ll post something on that in a day or two. Suffice it to say I was a little frustrated when I picked them up from school. And when Delaney suggested that since it’s Chanukah, we should cook something from her children’s “Jewish Holidays Cookbook,” I should have known better. But I said yes. I thought it would be fun.

I thought wrong.

See, the problem with Chanukah is it’s a story about oil. Heated oil. Lighted oil. Lasting longer than it was supposed to. And all of the foods associated with Chanukah are oil based. Potato Latkes (which have always tasted to me like what I imagine a mouthful of hot liquid rubber would taste like), homemade doughnuts, and schmaltz. (It’s a real thing; not just a fun word meaning “corny and melodramatic.”)