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Berkshire Tidbits: Time for Hanukkah, Christmas Foods
By Judith Lerner, Special to iBerkshires
02:17PM / Monday, November 30, 2015
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Holiday Baking & Sweet Treats
at Berkshire Mountain Bakery

Housatonic: Monday through Saturday 8 to 7; Sunday 8:30 to 6.
Pittsfield:Tuesday through Saturday 8:30 to 8; Sunday, 8:30 to 7

Every year, from mid-November through the end of the year, Berkshire Mountain Bakery steps up its fancy baking or, more accurately, its sophisticated sweet-treat baking. Some of their best, most hedonistic breads started as holiday specials.
 
That's the case for their now-yearround unsweetened cherry-pecan bread and their canelé and their chocolate bouchons, both of which are the size and shape of large wine corks. The canelé is barely moist and a bit chewy, antique in style  from honey and beeswax without the trendy addition of rum or vanilla. The bouchons are dry, rich and deeply chocolate all at once.
 
Bread and chocolate and the chocolate ciabatta, both also unsweetened, and the addicting almond croissants are now everyday items — occasionally even left over to the next day for those lucky enough to score them. Fresh apple cakes and pies are always available from the freezer cases. These are not children's sweets.
 
But this time of year, owner/baker/inventive conceiver Richard Bourdon brings in his unmatched, good to the very last crumb panettone in which you can taste the fresh lemon zest and the orange of the candied peel. The holiday bread, essentially a stollen, is filled with the best marzipan, the same that makes the almond croissants so delicious.
 
I'm going out to get a panettone, a holiday bread and some canelé to keep and nibble for the month leading up to the darkest time of the year and all the holidays we celebrate to counteract the coming drear.
 
Berkshire Mountain Bakery, 413-274-3412, is at 367 Park St./Route 183 just south of the center of Housatonic.
 
'Cooking at The Chef's Shop' Series
December Classes in Great Barrington
Thursday, Dec. 3, 5 to 7; Sundays, Dec. 13 & 27, 3 to 5
 
Update: The "Cooking at The Chef's Shop" class for "Chanukah Delights" on Thursday, Dec. 3, has been cancelled because of a personal situation in chef Julie Gale's family.

The upcoming "Christmas Specialties" class of Sunday, Dec. 13, is so far still scheduled.

Gale, chef and owner of At the Table Cooking School in Hillsdale, N. Y., will teach how to cook mustard maple-glazed ham, gruyere popovers and spicy ginger speculas cookies pressed in a springerle mold at the Dec. 13 class.

At her final class of the year, Gale with make New Year's Eve party food: onion-parmesan crisps, mini potato knishes and rosemary-fennel-honey pork tenderloin.
 
Next month, next year, it's on to comfort food, basic food for winter.
 
The Chef's Shop offers class students a 10-percent discount on purchases made on a class day. Cost is $60 per person for a single class, $150 for a series of three. Payment is required in advance with a 48-hour cancellation policy. For more details or to reserve a place in any classes, call 1-800-237-5284 or 413-528-0135 or Email@TheChefsShop.com.
 
 
West Stockbridge Holiday
Farmers Market
Friday, Dec. 4, 3 to 7
 
The lively organizers of the West Stockbridge Farmers Market have chosen to host their own holiday market this Friday.
 
The West Stockbridge town Christmas tree will get lit at 6 p.m. Santa will roll in on his sleigh. Local farmers, artisanal food producers and chefs will all be at the Merritt Building, 6 Harris St., with their wares. And the West Stockbridge Cultural Council has made sure the entire village will be ringing with music during the festivities.
 
 
The Tanglewood Picnic:
Music & Outdoor Feasts
Friday, Dec. 4, 5 to 8, author book signing
 
On Friday, when 34 downtown Lenox shops and galleries will welcome residents and visitors into their businesses for an evening of shopping and merriment, Berkshire-based author Gina Hyams will be at MacKimmie Co., 67 Church St., signing her book, "The Tanglewood Picnic" (hardcover, Muddy Puppy Media. 112-pages, $21.95), as part of this "mallternative shopping party" the town is throwing for its businesses and the public to open the holiday season.
 
Hyams specializes in writing about food, travel and the arts. She continues to be excited about this, her 12th book, which celebrates the long tradition of feasting al fresco at Tanglewood, the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Tanglewood Music Center, one of the county's and the town's major attractions.
 
The book offers wine and cheese tips and a dozen classic picnic recipes. Some are personal favorites from audience members/picnicgoers. Others are from local chefs who provide picnic fare for their inn guests and shop customers such as chef Arnaud Cotar at Blantyre, chef David Jordan at Cranwell Spa & Golf Resort, Chris Masiero, owner of Guido's Fresh Marketplace, executive chef Brian Alberg at the Red Lion Inn and chef Jeffrey Thompson at Wheatleigh.
 
It is like a miniature coffeetable book, filled with photographs of picnickers feasting and reminiscences about picnics on Tanglewood grounds, from simple to sumptuous, has been well reviewed and popular when it came out earlier this year, won an award for its design and is a finalist for a best regional cookbook award. Fun to while away an afternoon reading, take on a picnic or share with someone who loves Tanglewood or picnics.
 
For more information, see ginahyams.com and tanglewoodpicnic.com.
 
 
Becket Monthly
Free Community Dinner
Friday, Dec. 4, 5 to 7
 
The Yoked Parish of Becket presents its free monthly pasta dinner this Friday. All are welcome.
 
Parish minister, the Rev. Kevin Smail said the meal includes a pasta dish, salad, Italian or garlic bread and an assortment of mostly homemade desserts and beverages. The purpose of the regular meals is to build community, he said.
 
The free dinner will be at the parish house of the Becket Federated Church, 413-623-5217, 3381 Main St., across from the Becket Washington elementary school.
 
 
Hanukkah Latkes/Potato Pancakes
And Where to Find Them
The looong week of Friday, Dec. 4 through Monday, Dec. 14
 
Hanukkah, the Jewish Festival of Lights, starts at sundown on Sunday, Dec. 7.
 
Most Jews light a Hanukkah menorah, an eight-branched candelabra, to remember how one night's worth of holy oil miraculously burned in the temple for eight nights. There is much more and deeper meaning behind the Hanukkah symbols but for Tidbits' purposes, eating is always central to Jewish holidays.
 
Hanukkah is a time to gather at home with family and friends including the children. To sing, dance, gamble a bit with dreidels (four sided spinning tops) for gold foil covered chocolate coins. And, most essentially, celebrate by eating dairy foods like sour cream and fried things: crispy, crunchy potato pancakes/latkes, sweet and crispy doughnuts/sufganyot, buttery cream cheese pastry horns/rugalach and other more exotic dishes well bathed in oil.
Oil is the main thing. The food follows. For Jews of Northern European background, potato latkes are the crunchy fried food of choice.
 
But Hanukkah isn't in the potato; it's in the oil the latkes are fried in. Tasty olive oil or goose, duck or chicken fat. In fact, potatoes, native to South America, didn't come to Europe until the 1500s, after Columbus discovered America; and potatoes were hardly eaten outside of Ireland until the 1800s. The original latkes were made of homemade fresh cheese curds that combined the dairy and the fat or oil into one neat, or messy, package.
 
Here are some of the places you can get Hanukkah treats, mainly potato latkes but also rugalach and even dreidel-shaped sugar cookies, during Hanukkah.
 
A-Frame Bakery, 1194 Cold Spring Road/Route 7, in Williamstown about a mile south of town center, 413-458-3600.
 
Baker-owner Sharon Sutter says she makes sweet things for her bakery so go to her for her buttery, homey rugalach and her crossover invention of Jewish Holiday sugar cookies cut in the shape of a Star of David or a dreidel and frosted like any respectable holiday cookie.
 
Castle Street Café, 10 Castle St. in Great Barrington, 413-528-5244, www.castlestreetcafe.com.
 
Chef-owner Michael Ballon said he will be serving his by-now-famous grandmother's uber traditional potato latkes with his homemade applesauce as a side dish starting next weekend.
 
Ballon grates the potatoes for his latkes by hand, to order.
 
"Of course I make latkes. I have my grandmother's recipe. I do them by hand. My grandmother did not know from Cuisinarts and our recipe includes a requisite amount of knuckle in every batch of latkes," he says.
 
"I grate potatoes with that little four-sided grater, with an onion, a little salt, a little matzoh meal and an egg. It is sautéed, not deep fried. I use just the right amount of vegetable oil. And I serve it with homemade apple sauce. I'm not a sour cream cat.
 
"It's always very popular. Like they used to say in the old Levy's Rye Bread commercials, 'You don’t have to be Jewish to like latkes.' "
 
Great Barrington Bagel Co. & Deli, 777 South Main St. in Great Barrington, 413-528-9055, gbbagel.com.
 
Bob Climo worked at Great Barrington Bagel for eight years before buying it with his wife, Karen, last year from original owners Judy and Marvin Lieberman.
 
"The recipes are the same," Karen Climo assured me last week.
 
Judy Lieberman had her mother's recipe in her head. A simple one  with a little onion and matzoh meal. She used to hand-grate her potatoes, drain out the liquid and return the starch to the batter. She'd fry little round 3-inch latkes in a nice bath of vegetable oil. And serve them with applesauce or chive cream cheese.
 
Bob Climo said, "We will start having Judy's latkes starting next Friday, Dec. 4, and we'll have them through Hanukkah."
 
Connecting with Community, at Congregation Knesset Israel, 16 Colt Road in Pittsfield, 413-442-2200.
 
The Jewish Federation of the Berkshires will serve its freshly made kosher Hanukkah celebration lunch for seniors 60 and older on Monday, Dec. 14, at noon.
 
The menu will be chicken noodle soup, rye bread, oven-roasted beef brisket, fresh broccoli and, of course, potato latkes with applesauce. There will also be dessert and tea.
 
The kosher meals are part of Elder Services senior nutrition program. You do not have to be a member of the synagogue, kosher, Jewish or a senior. All are welcome. Non-seniors just pay a higher price for the meal. The suggested donation for adults 60 and older is $2. The cost is $7 for adults under 60.
 
The morning's free program, which starts at 10:45 a.m., with be Chabad representative Sara Volovik speaking about her work in the Berkshire community. Call anytime before 9 a.m. on Monday, Dec. 14, to make reservations.
 
Martin's Restaurant, 49 Railroad St. at the top of the street in Great Barrington, (413) 528-545.
 
Owner and hands-on chef Martin Lewis will start making his potato latkes next weekend. He hand-grates them with onion and matzoh meal and serves them with his homemade applesauce.
 
"I do it pretty much every year," he said. "I'll do it on two weekends and for the whole of Hanukkah from my grandmother's recipe."
 
Naturally Catering & Takeout at Berkshire Organics, 813 Dalton Division Road, Dalton, 413-822-7736 or 413-442-0888.
 
Chef/caterer and former owner of Café Reva in Pittsfield Aura Weiss, will have latkes, both traditional and more unusual, in her takeout cases and for pre-order.
 
She makes her potato latkes, "heavy on the onions 'cause I like them," she said.
 
She has also made them with grated parsnip added to the potatoes or a little butternut squash or even from those attractive purple potatoes.
 
Ask what she can do for you this year.
 
Pleasant & Main, 1063 Main St. in Housatonic, 413-274-6303, pleasantandmain.com
 
Owner Craig Bero said he and the chef had worked on their latkes. "We tried out our potato pancake recipe last week and we're gonna run it!"
 
Rouge Restaurant, 3 Center St. in West Stockbridge, 413-232-4111
 
Co-owner Maggie Merelle said she and her co-owner/chef husband William are adding potato latkes to their tapas menu from Wednesday, Dec. 9 through Sunday, Dec. 13.
 
A simple, simple version this year: shredded Yukon Gold potatoes and onion fried in butter and olive oil and served with applesauce and crème fraîche.
 
Haven Café & Bakery, 8 Franklin St. in Lenox, 413-637-8948; or 235 Stockbridge Road/Route 7 in Great Barrington, 413-528-5433.

Owner Shelly Williams said, "We will be serving sufganyot and Hanukkah cookies and maybe a few other things."
 
 
Railroad Street Youth Project
Culinary Arts Apprenticeship
Monday, Dec. 7, 5:30 p.m.
 
Next Monday, young chefs and their professional chef mentors will make and serve a five-course dinner plus hors d'ouvres and wine. This annual celebration is the culmination of intense of food preparation and presentation training for the most recent group of interested South Berkshire young people.
 
Five local master chefs have taught their culinary students for the last eight weeks. This season the chefs include The Red Lion Inn’s Brian Alberg, John Andrew’s Dan Smith, Mezze Catering’s Daire Rooney, The Williams Inn’s Adam Brassard, and Firefly’s Zee Vassos.
 
After the meal, the apprentice chefs will be given certificates and there will be a live auction of locally donated goods and services. All proceeds from the dinner will go to support RSYP activities.
 
Tickets are $125 per person; $1,000 for a table of eight. They can be bought by calling 413-528-2475 or buy online here.
 
The dinner takes place at Crissey Farm, 426 Stockbridge Road, in Great Barrington.
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