Shut Up and Eat A (Late)ke!
December 13, 2015 12:04 PM   Subscribe

Latke Recipe by the Maccabeats! Now you have plenty of time to practice for next year :) Previously
posted by internet fraud detective squad, station number 9 (16 comments total)

This post was deleted for the following reason: Poster's Request -- Brandon Blatcher



 
They're so great!
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 12:06 PM on December 13, 2015


Mine too! Is this still a college-based group? I feel like some of those guys should have graduated already.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 12:09 PM on December 13, 2015


These guys can sing! They dance, tho, just like every guy at every Bar Mitzvah and wedding I've been to.
posted by Frayed Knot at 12:30 PM on December 13, 2015


You could always include a special ingredient too.
posted by bearwife at 12:35 PM on December 13, 2015 [2 favorites]


Unrelated except it's latkes... Everything You Know About Latkes Is Wrong: The shocking true story of a Hanukkah staple.
It’s a shredded Andean tuber, fried like a buckwheat pancake, which was substituted for Italian cheeses, once eaten to honor a mistaken reading of obscure variants of an apocryphal text.
posted by Nelson at 12:56 PM on December 13, 2015 [2 favorites]


One question that article begs is why were they cooking dairy in schmaltz? That's a no-no.
posted by sourwookie at 1:13 PM on December 13, 2015


Is it wrong that I have a favorite Maccabeat?
posted by Ruki at 1:13 PM on December 13, 2015


Anyone else thinking that two eggs was too many for how much potato they had?
posted by el io at 3:34 PM on December 13, 2015


Cute song, but undrained potatoes/onions, 2 eggs for 2 servings, flour instead of matzah meal, and *baking powder*? What in Sheol is this, a potato blintz?!

Aside from peanut butter cookies a la Joy Of Cooking, latkes were the 1st thing I learned how to cook, as my mother thought they were too much work, even with a food processor.

Drain the grated potato/onion in a colander under a heavy weight (I used a 2 gallon bucket of cement and a 10lb barbell weight over my 18" colander this year). I've heard back in the impoverished shtetl the grated root vegetables were wrung out in a piece of fabric, and the starchy onion-flavored liquid was used as a soup base. I once used a bandanna on a camping trip. If you don't drain, have you ever tried to fry something that's more water than solids? Low carb apikorim may use celeriac along with the onions, but even those need draining.

To sop up extra liquid and help bind the vegies together, use matzah meal, dry breadcrumbs (my Japanese cousin-in-law uses panko) or crumbled rice cakes for the gluten-free crowd. Flour with the wet vegies and eggs makes a dense gluey leaky eggy puddle instead of lightly bound fritters with crunchy edges. Dreck, eww.

Oh, and don't press the cooking latkes down too hard into the pan. The latkes need to be slightly loosely structured (here're the crumbs doing their job), or the centers will steam instead of frying along with the edges.

Happy Hannukah to all, and may great miracles happen to you, wherever you are. I'll settle for perfect crunchy latkes with plenty of horseradish and sour cream.
posted by Dreidl at 5:05 PM on December 13, 2015 [3 favorites]


Dreidl: any advice on how make the cooking go at a more reasonable pace? I'm okay with all the prep work (well outlined there, good advice), but I get 4 latkes in a pan; 5 minute per side, and it takes me 40 minutes to cook 16 latkes... And big batches are great (for me) as I can fridge them so they toast up in the toaster oven for easy/quick breakfasts.
posted by el io at 6:42 PM on December 13, 2015


My latkes (cooking from the hip, so don't ask for a recipe) would shank theirs in a cage match. I used to have a lady friend who would go shopping and show up with the makings, then stare at me until I would make them for her.
posted by Samizdata at 7:25 PM on December 13, 2015


Use Korean barbecue grill on the dinner table to keep everyone satisfied with piping hot latkes.
posted by wobumingbai at 7:28 PM on December 13, 2015


I have made latkes in bulk 3 ways over the years, in home kitchens, depending on what batterie de cuisine was available. All 4 methods require using a 1/4 cup measure or icecream scoop, each latke squashed flat with a potato masher, to keep the latke size/thickness as uniform as possible.

Best option is a very large (18"x30"?) electric skillet used outdoors. Cooks about a dozen latkes at a time. $$$ and requires some outdoors.
Next best was an all-four-burners heavy steel plate stovetop griddle. It accomodated about 24 latkes simultaneously. It also works on a commercial-size LP BBQ grill on the highest flame setting (but watch out for grease fires!) I think this was custom made at a sheet metal or similar shop, but I was told it cost less than $100.
Least preferred are 2 commercial weight, non-stick, perfectly flat, relatively high-sided heavy aluminum or steel sheetcake pans; and a long-necked watering can for the oil. Each pan holds about 24 latkes. This method is not for the faint of heart or obsessively tidy - oil is going to get everywhere and often slops onto the oven door or kitchen floor below the open oven door. Wear waterproof, heatproof rubber boots (the cheap PVC gardening boots work great) to minimize burns. The cookie sheets are preheated to 400F, the oil is poured in to 1/4" or a tad more, and allowed to heat until almost smoking (use an electronic thermometer to measure oil temp). Then the latkes placed with the above-mentioned measure or scoop and flattened. The latkes are cooked and flipped a bit less rapidly than usual. They cook far better in a venting convection oven, which helps browning by remving steam while keeping the very hot air moving across the cooking latkes.

This year's Latkes & Vodtkes party accreted into almost 20 guests (and only 3 vodka types, but one was a locally-made caraway aquavit). I used a 16" cast iron pan and the 2-burner griddle that came with our electric stove for 16 latkes at a time. And the kitchen exhaust and an extra window fan blowing the entire time. The latkes were drained over crumpled newspaper on baking sheets, kept hot in a 200F oven until served. Unfortunately, the cleanup eventually required hot TSP solution when even Simple Green failed to remove the aerosolized oil from all horizontal surfaces. I don't think I clean that intensively for Pesach!
posted by Dreidl at 7:40 PM on December 13, 2015 [3 favorites]


Dreidl: Holy shit you are hardcore!
posted by el io at 8:34 PM on December 13, 2015


This year I made latkes without flour, just potatoes and eggs really. Total sacrilege I know, but we were away for the weekend and I had to make do with what was on hand. Fortunately, my audience weren't about to pull me up on the details -- they were two lapsed Catholics, a lapsed Anglican, a nine year old, a nine month old and me the only Jew. They turned out pretty nicely, if I may say so myself. (I was actually pretty chuffed, the nine-year old, my nephew, helped light the menorah on Saturday which he's never done before.)

My mother was shocked -- shocked! -- that I hadn't used flour. My nana's (mum's mum) recipe basically consists of finely grated potato, egg (one egg per large potato) and flour (two tablespoons per large potato). We don't strain off the liquid -- we mix it in with the egg. No matzah meal. And no onions either.

My nana's latkes were amazing. She's still alive (keneine hora) but doesn't cook any more. My brother (in England) and I (in Australia) were the latke makers this year. The smell takes me back to my grandparents kitchen -- my nana made latkes all year round not just on Chanukah. Nana is from the east side of Poland and puts tomato sauce on her latkes (she puts tomato sauce in everything) and my Papa was from near Warsaw. He put sugar on his latkes -- I've never quite developed a taste for that.

I haven't watched the video -- yet, I'm at work and forgot my headphones -- will have to catch up at home!
posted by prettypretty at 9:13 PM on December 13, 2015


This Hindu thanks you for the awesome video links! I would love to see more dancey holiday-related filks from all spiritual and religious traditions!

I just watched the America's Test Kitchen about latkes which seemed good.
posted by brainwane at 6:54 AM on December 14, 2015


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