The best way I can explain the joy of an oneg is by sharing the opposite feelings that are had on Yom Kippur. I remember sitting in the social hall of my synagogue as a kid, squinting to make out who was leading services. I swung my legs beneath the seat and flipped through the siddur, but the excitement of the High Holiday season had worn off.
Services finally came to an end, and everyone meandered into the lobby. Usually, kids would run around from table to table gleefully stacking sweet treats on napkins or shoving cookies into their mouths. But today, kids were tugging on their parents’ clothes, wondering where the cookies were and when they could go home. On Yom Kippur, that emptiness reveals how important the dessert table really is. A Jewish dessert table is like taking kids to a candy store and letting them go wild: large, colorful sprinkle cookies, plates of crumbly chocolate babka, and my friend’s grandma hovering over a silver plate of kichel labeled “sugar-free,” but with sparkles on top, trying to make the least-wanted food seem desirable. Leah Koenig expresses this so beautifully in her new cookbook The Dessert Table.
Koenig begins the cookbook by diving deep into the diversity of the Jewish dessert table with a two-page map showcasing images of Jewish foods in the locations where they originated. This visual representation of the global Jewish dessert table is a great interactive introduction to the book. She also has a wonderful way of busting myths that makes you curious about the recipes to come. For instance, she explains how Ashkenazi cuisine actually has roots in western Germany and eastern France. And if you thought Entenmann’s founder was Jewish… well, consider that myth busted.
Beyond showcasing the global reach of Jewish desserts, Koenig also makes the cookbook approachable for home cooks, with strategies for baking with kids, dietary-restriction guides, and menus for each Jewish holiday. The instructions for each recipe are easy to follow, so don’t let their length discourage you.
From Curacao Crisp Sephardi Sponge Cookies to Venetian Pumpkin Cake to Hungarian Chocolate Pull-Apart Cake, so many parts of the world are represented in this collection, yet I still felt like something was missing. While recipes from Sephardic and Mizrahi communities are represented, the cookbook felt more heavily Ashkenazi than I expected, with non-Ashkenazi recipes appearing less frequently. Even more so, I felt that the recipes leaned heavily toward foods that were not specifically Jewish, such as the Fig-and-Lemon-Scone Cookies, which “while they are not a traditional Jewish pastry, their flavors feel directly pulled from the shores of the Mediterranean,” (page 100).
Of course, that brings up the question of what is a Jewish dessert? And that answer is very subjective. I don’t think a dessert has to follow a strict definition of what makes something Jewish. But the Mediterranean is not, in my opinion, a quality that makes a food Jewish or not, so the inclusion of this recipe felt somewhat disconnected from the book’s focus. Yet, many recipes were like this, starting with lines such as “There is nothing traditionally Jewish about this cake recipe…” (page 161).
I don’t think this is necessarily a problem with experimentation, but rather with how closely the recipes connect to the Jewish traditions the cookbook sets out to explore. Some people like to adapt old recipes into new flavors, while others prefer to stick to the script because of the nostalgia that comes with biting into something that hasn’t changed for generations. Koenig says it best herself: “With all due respect to culinary experimentation, sometimes you just can’t beat a classic,” (page 202).
The accompanying photography is so stunning that it makes you want to eat something you otherwise wouldn’t (I’m not a jam person, but the Strawberry Cloud Meringues on page 93 are swirled so perfectly that the jam looks like it is resting on a fluffy pillow of meringue, I considered trying it anyway.) If you’re a visual learner, keep in mind that not every recipe in the cookbook has a photo, although I certainly wish every recipe did.
In the same way that Koenig masterfully transports us to a synagogue oneg anywhere, she also transports us to Jewish bakeries in different communities, bringing the recipes on the page to life. But despite recipes coming from all around the world, The Dessert Table continually brings us back to what is familiar, serving as a reminder that sometimes, the most meaningful food is the food that simply feels like coming home.