ALL ABOUT FOOD: For some, food can be a way of life

As the Jewish holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur approach, Recky Maltenfort is busy in the kitchen, preparing for the upcoming high holy days with traditional recipes handed down to her by her mother, her aunts and especially, her mother-in-law,

Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish New Year. On the Jewish calendar, this year will be 5768. It is the beginning of 10 days of penitence, when Jews ask forgiveness from those they have wronged and symbolically throw away their sins in flowing water. The final day of penitence is called Yom Kippur, a day of fasting, contrition and cleansing.

And because these are Jewish holidays, they also involve lots of food! Here comes Recky, a passionate cook with a vivacious personality and a delightful sense of humor. A daughter of Holocaust survivors, she appreciates the significance of continuing tradition. Although she has a high food IQ and dines frequently in the finest restaurants in the world, including her Laguna favorites, The Studio, French 75 and Tabu Grill, her recipes are of the classic, people-pleasing Jewish variety.

Recky admits that while she was growing up her mother wasn’t a very good cook, except for her chicken soup, which she made every Friday night. When Recky got married, she says that she could barely boil water. Her husband, Ken, was used to the excellent food his mother, Sylvia, prepared and he sweetly suggested that she call her for some recipes. She gave Recky her favorite cookbook, “Thoughts for Buffets,” published in 1958, which Recky still uses. Her other favorite is “Jewish Cookery” by Leah Leonard first published in 1949.

These are her bibles, containing recipes for borscht, blintzes, kreplach, challah and chopped liver to mention just a few. She received a lot of support from her husband for her efforts. As her cooking improved, he encouraged her to have dinner parties for his insurance business clients because he liked to cultivate friendships with his customers. Since she was given 12 wedding showers, they had all the china, silver and crystal that anyone could possibly need for entertaining.

During one summer, she learned to bake bread from two young farm girls who came to the city to be mother’s helpers. This inspired her to take a class and learn the art of baking. Nowadays, her challah with raisins (a braided egg bread) is famous and she makes it for all occasions.

A devoted cook and a Jewish mother, she prepared elaborate breakfasts for each of her three children, getting up very early to make whatever they wanted, be it steak and eggs, pancakes and waffles or jelly omelets. She jokingly warned them, “If you don’t eat a good breakfast, you’ll be stupid!” She must have been right because they ate well and got straight A’s. Now Lorne is a lawyer, Debra is a doctor and Jody is an executive.

Tragically, Ken was killed in a motorcycle accident. As time passed and Recky was ready to date again, she went to the Internet as people do these days and met her current husband, Bob, online. They shared the fact that they had lost their spouses in devastating accidents. Strangely, they both had died within the same month.

Now Recky and Bob live half the year in Scottsdale and the other half in Laguna because all their children have ended up in Southern California. Blending their families has resulted in five children, five grandchildren and one more on the way.

For High Holiday dinners, the count runs from 18 to 22 people. She becomes the de facto caterer at her brother’s house in Pacific Palisades where there is a large, beautiful kitchen, as her Laguna kitchen is quite small.

Recky says she is very focused when she cooks, “I’m not nice in the kitchen” (although we find that hard to believe). She also claims to be a terrible teacher. If you want to learn from her, “”¦you’ll just have to watch,” something her son the lawyer must have done because he is quite the cook. Lorne appeared on the cover of USA Today as a bachelor famous for throwing amazing dinner parties.

It is no surprise that this warm and generous lady views cooking as a gift to make people happy. She says, “Cooking is so much of what you are. It is nurturing and giving,” a perfect description of Recky herself.

She has graciously shared with us two delicious recipes, one featuring seasonal prune plums and the other, a rich side dish, a completely different take on mac ‘n’ cheese, that you can serve any time with anything.

RECIPES

ZWECHEN KUCHEN

Crust

?1 stick cold butter, cut in 8 pieces

?1 cup unsifted flour

?1 egg yolk

?3 tablespoons + 1 teaspoon sugar ?1 lemon rind grated

Topping

?½ cup sugar

?5 tablespoons butter in pieces

?¾ cup unsifted flour

?22 to 25 prune plums washed and dried

1. Preheat oven to 375°

2. In food processor mix butter and flour for 10 seconds, add yolk and rind. Process until dough forms a ball. Press into 10-inch spring form pan.

3. Halve plums, remove pits, cut in half again but not all the way through. Spread flattened plums very close together, concentrically around pan until dough is covered.

4. Mix topping ingredients by hand to form crumbs. Sprinkle on plums. Bake 1 hour or until done.

?

LUKCHEN KUGLE

?8-ounce package Manischewitz wide egg noodles (no yolk, if desired)

?½ pound unsalted softened butter

?½ cup + 2 tablespoons sugar

?1 pint sour cream

?½ pint lowfat cottage cheese

?1½ teaspoons salt

?2 teaspoons vanilla

?5 eggs

?1 to 1½ Granny Smith apples, peeled and sliced thin

? 1/3 cup raisins

?cinnamon and sugar for sprinkling

1. Preheat oven to 350°

2. Cook and drain noodles.

3. Beat butter and sugar together in mixer. Add sour cream, cottage cheese, salt and vanilla. Beat in eggs one at a time.

4. Stir in noodles. Add apples and raisins

5. Pour into buttered 8-by-8-inch glass baking dish.

6. Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar. Bake for 50 to 55 minutes.

ELLE HARROW and TERRY MARKOWITZ owned A La Carte for 20 years. They can be reached for comments or questions at [email protected]