Fried Cauliflower Frittata (with Potatoes)

A gift, a choice, and a role model for difficult times...

Years ago, in a stunningly prophetic act, my aunt gave me a gift that would become, years later, part of my research and passion in studying food history. That gift was a cookbook that seemed more of a curiosity than anything: The Vilna Vegetarian Cookbook by Fania Lewando, in translation from the original Yiddish published in 1938.

Fania Lewando's vegetarian restaurant in Vilna was a sort of intellectual salon, serving writers and thinkers and even a visiting Marc Chagall. The guests were vegetarians and not, yet even the meat-eaters begrudgingly acknowledged in the guest book that the food was good-- even if there wasn't any meat in it.

As a historic document, the cookbook is fascinating--Lewando was the first Jewish woman in Europe to publish a cookbook, and her writing is confident and matter-of-fact. If she tells you to serve it with potatoes, you serve it with potatoes. You can tell she's run a restaurant and expects us to honor her expertise- the last step of her introduction orders us to "Prepare everything precisely as instructed in the recipes, and do not rely on any others." It's her way or no way.

But a Jewish vegetarian movement in Poland? In the 1930s?

Knowing now what would follow, it might seem strange, almost absurd, that Jewish vegetarianism was on the rise on the eve of the Holocaust. As an American Jewish girl whose ancestors arrived around 1900, I've always imagined food "back" in Europe to be frozen in time about 1901, never innovating or trend-setting. This book is a humbling correction to my imagination.

Lewando lays out the case for Jewish vegetarianism in her introduction. First, she points to advice from "the highest medical authorities" about how preferable fruits and vegetables are to meat for health, which she backs up with many vitamin-related dishes. Next, that "in these unhealthy times there is almost no house in which you will not find one or more family members who cannot eat meat and must follow a special vegetarian diet" (so strange to hear that from 1939!). Next, she cites tsar baaley khayim, the core of the Jewish vegetarian movement: to "avoid suffering of living creatures."

But Lewando then addresses her audience's most pressing concerns. She and her contemporaries lived in urban Polish society. New antisemitic laws and taxes in Poland restricted the availability of kosher meat. Vegetarianism was a practical way for Jews to confront their situation. She writes:

We hear housewives speaking among themselves, however, about there being "no meat to cook." This is a sign of how we Jews think of not eating meat as a hardship, a sign of mourning (as in the case of the nine days in memory of the destruction of the Temple)" [the fast of Tisha B'Av]. p.3

Lewando meant to prove to other Jewish cooks that they could still cook and nourish themselves and their families despite their circumstances.

Now it's 2020. I've been quarantining with my family, revisiting all the books I couldn't take along to grad school, and I spied the Vilna Vegetarian. Something about it resonated with me like it hadn't before. Thus this recipe is my first foray into cooking from her charming, unusual cookbook. While translated and adapted skillfully by Eve Jochnowitz, Lewando's book still leaves some steps to the imagination, so this and a series of recipes to follow are a work in progress with what is available to me in 2020, just as Lewando worked with what she had in the 1930s.

I hope you'll also find some solace in the fact that, in another time and place, in the face of terrible news and an uncertain food supply, someone else was thinking about how to make food taste good, and how keep nourishing the spirit as much as the body.

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Fried Cauliflower Fritatta

By Fania Lewando, adapted and translated by Eve Jochnowitz

Adapted again by Scarlett Andes, 2020

Original:

"Cook 1 small head cauliflower in salted water. Break into pieces, and sauté in a pan with butter. Meanwhile, beat 3 eggs, add some salt, and pour over the cauliflower. Cook until it becomes a frittata."

Adapted:

Ingredients:

1 small head of cauliflower

Salt

Butter

3 eggs

(We doubled it and split it into 3 servings, and still only needed one cauliflower!)

1. Put a pot of salted water on the stove to boil, using enough water that the cauliflower will float without touching the bottom.

2. Preheat your oven to 450°F and set it to broil.

3. Prepare your cauliflower by cleaning it, cutting away the outer leaves, and trimming down the stem.

4. Boil cauliflower on a medium boil, with the lid on, for about 8 minutes, 10 if you want it very soft. Keep in mind that it will cook more later in the pan. When it is cooked to your liking, lift it out of the water, set it on a heat-proof surface, and let it cool enough to handle.

5. Gently pull the cauliflower apart into small florets, removing excess stem and small leaves that you encounter. You will likely have way too much for one frittata; Lewando's cauliflowers may have been much smaller than the ones available today.

6. In an oven-safe frying pan over medium-high heat, melt some butter and sauté the amount of cauliflower florets that suits your taste, adding more butter as needed. Save the rest for future frittatas or creative leftovers.

7. When the cauliflower is browned to your liking, crack the eggs into a bowl and toss in about a half teaspoon of salt, then beat the eggs and pour over the cauliflower. Turn the heat to medium low and quickly redistribute the cauliflower into any barren areas. Let cook until the edges have begun to set, then transfer the whole pan to the oven to broil.

8. Broil for about 3 minutes, until it has puffed up and browned just slightly on top.

9. Serve hot, with roasted potatoes and any dairy toppings you like. The crème fraîche I had on hand was lovely, but Lewando may have preferred the sour cream that she frequently recommends in other recipes.

For simple roasted potatoes: split fingerling potatoes lengthwise, toss with enough olive oil to coat, salt, and fresh herbs (such as thyme), and roast on a sheet pan at 425°F for 15 minutes. Turn them over and cook for another 15 minutes or so until browned and tender.

About The Vilna Vegetarian Cookbook, from YIVO (Institute for Jewish Research): https://www.yivo.org/The-Vilna-Vegetarian-Cookbook