Cake

I have always felt that cooking is the time to tell stories. In the sixties, when I learned to make this Passover carrot torte from Ruth Moos in Annecy, we talked about lots of things, but never about World War II. When I cook this torte now, after her death, I tell the story of how brave she was during the occupation. Not only did she help so many Jews trying to flee, but she had a narrow escape herself once. When the Annecy police warned the Mooses that the Gestapo was looking for her husband, Rudi, he went underground, hiding between the pork sausages and hams in a butcher’s smokehouse. Looking for him, the Gestapo went to the hotel where the Mooses had been hiding in nearby Talloires. Ruth, walking outside for a quick breath of fresh air while her tiny daughter was sleeping upstairs, turned around to see the Gestapo agents entering the lobby. In order to sneak past the guards, she grabbed some sheets from a chambermaid and, posing as a maid herself, climbed the stairs, passing the Gestapo. Terrified, she snatched her baby and fled to safety.

During World War II , Claudine Moos’s family hid in Lyon, which was the center of the Free Zone and considered to be a slightly safer city for the Jews. One day, her father, a socialist and Resistance fighter, was distributing leaflets against the Germans at the railroad station. The French police, helped by the German SS officer Klaus Barbie, caught him and others, and they were dispatched on the last train to Auschwitz. As they were escorted away, they sang the “Marseillaise,” the French national anthem, at the top of their lungs. Claudine, who was five years old at the time, has memories of their singing voices fading off into the distance. She was raised by her mother, who had also lost her father at a young age. Despite a difficult life, having lost her father and her husband, Claudine’s mother’s last words were “Life is good.” Even in a good life, food could be a challenge. “During and after the war, food was rationed,” Claudine told me in her kitchen in Annecy. “We got ration cards for the milk and eggs. Of course there was no chocolate. I remember my mother coming home with the first tablet of chocolate she could get after the war. How excited we all were!” Regardless of the shortages during the war, chestnuts still fell from trees throughout France in autumn. This rich uncooked cake would have been made from the chestnuts that were collected on the street. The recipe comes from a handwritten cookbook that Claudine’s grandmother gave her when she got married in 1960. The original recipes were measured in interesting ways, calling for a “glass of mustard” and a “nut of butter.” Peeling chestnuts used to be a laborious task. Her grandmother would collect or buy them whole, score them a quarter of the way down, boil them to loosen the skin, and then peel them. For Claudine, it is so much easier these days to make this cake, because she can buy frozen or jarred chestnuts, already peeled. Best made a day in advance, this rich cake should be served in small portions, topped with dollops of whipped cream.

Kugelhopf, seen in every bakery in Alsace, is the regional special-occasion cake par excellence. The marvelous nineteenth-century illustration by Alphonse Lévy shows how this tea cake, which he calls baba, was also revered by the Jews of Alsace. Kugel means “ball” in German, and hopf means “cake” in Alsatian. This cake is found all over Germany, Austria, Hungary, and parts of Poland. According to food historians Philip and Mary Hyman, a Kugelhopf is first mentioned in German texts in the 1730s, where it is described as a cake baked in a mold shaped like a turban. I suspect that this cake went back and forth throughout the Austro-Hungarian Empire with travelers and cooks, and possibly came back to Lorraine as baba, also a turbaned cake in its original form. Sometimes kugelhopf is raised with yeast; some later versions use baking powder. It may contain raisins, or a combination of raisins and almonds. Kugelhopf molds are as varied as the myriad recipes. You can easily find kugelhopf molds at fine kitchen-supply stores, or you can use a small-capacity Bundt pan. Be careful to watch the cake as it cooks, since baking time will vary depending on the size and material of your pan, and you do not want to let the cake dry out.

No large sign—just a plaque next to a simple security button—tells you that this is the gate to a simple building housing the Cercle Bernard Lazare. The center was named in memory of Bernard Lazare, who, during the Dreyfus Affair, was a left-wing literary critic, anarchist, Zionist, and newspaper editor. He bravely defended Captain Dreyfus, and won over Jewish artists such as Camille Pissarro to the cause. The center sponsors Jewish cultural events, choosing not to advertise its location because of previous anti-Semitic attacks. When I entered this very bare-boned building, it was full of activity. Jeanine Franier came out of the kitchen to greet me, bringing along a waft of the delicious aromas from her oven. Every Thursday, before the center’s weekly lectures, she cooks. She believes that people listen to lecturers more attentively if they know a little food will be served. Regardless of what her staff cooks as a main course, this cheesecake from her Polish past is served for dessert. It has become an integral part of the lectures, and was published in the Cercle’s cookbook, called Quand Nos Boubés Font la Cuisine (When Grandmothers Cook), which she wrote in part as a fund-raising device, in part as a way of preserving a culture that is rapidly being forgotten. The cheesecake reminds me of many I ate all over France, including the one at Finkelsztajn’s Delicatessen in Paris. It tastes clearly of its delicate component parts, unlike the creamy block of cheesecake with a graham-cracker crust we find in the United States.

Danielle Fleischmann bakes this apple cake in the same beat-up rectangular pan that her mother used. Known as a “Jewish apple cake” because oil is substituted for butter, it is called gâteau de Hannouka in France. When Danielle makes the cake, she uses very little batter, and half sweet and half tart apples, a combination that makes a really tasty version of this simple Polish cake. Although her mother grated the apples, Danielle cuts them into small chunks. I often make it in a Bundt pan and serve it sprinkled with sugar.

Gâteau de Savoie is one of the earliest French cakes to use whipped egg whites as a leavener. Savoie is the mountainous area between Italy and France, long used as a travel route, and home to many Jews from the twelfth century on. The area was first integrated into France in 1792. The similarity between the gâteau de Savoie, pan d’España, and Italian ladyfingers (also known as savoiardi) leads me to believe that the recipe may have traveled throughout the Mediterranean with Sephardic Jews and other travelers. This sponge cake tends to dry out after only a day, but it can also absorb a large amount of liquid. Serving it with a homemade fruit syrup, or just fresh strawberries with a little sugar, will keep it moist.

One of the cooks highlighted in a day celebrating Jewish food history and the presence of the Jews in France was Huguette Uhry. I first noticed her intriguing recipe for frou-frou chalet on the Web site www.LeJudaïsmeAlsacien.com. Similar to a light, caramelized apple tarte Tatin, it is traditionally served at the dinner prior to the fast of Yom Kippur. When I called Madame Uhry, she walked me through the recipe and told me that frou-frou means “the rustling of silk” or “to make a fuss,” and a charlotte—or, as she spells it, chalet—means a kind of apple cake. You can substitute Passover cake meal for the flour.

This recipe for chocolate-almond cake is four hundred years old, and was passed down orally in one Bayonne family from mother to daughter in Spanish, Ladino, and then French. The accent of rum was probably introduced in the seventeenth century. My guess is that at first the eggs would have been whole, and later separated, the whites whipped to give it more height, probably in the eighteenth century. This cake can be made with matzo cake meal for Passover.

Recently, a number of stylish kosher restaurants have opened in Paris. One is the superchic Osmose, which calls itself a fusion and health-food restaurant. When I dined there, it was packed with well-dressed young French couples who could clearly afford the steep prices. The food, prepared by French-born Jewish Tunisian chef Yoni Saada, is delicious and sophisticated. Our meal began with a long, narrow plate filled with cumin-roasted almonds, fava beans, and tiny olives, and a tasty carrot-and-mango soup served in a champagne glass. And for dessert: an extravagant plate with that now classic molten chocolate cake and little marshmallow lollipops. Molten chocolate cake began as a simple French birthday cake that everyone’s grandmother made until the Alsatian chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten accidentally undercooked one. To his surprise, the guests loved it. An instant classic was born, now found just about everywhere, even at this chic kosher restaurant in Paris. The beauty of this cake is that the batter can be made ahead, poured into a cake pan or muffin tins, refrigerated, and baked 10 minutes before serving.

This moist, nutty cake soaked in syrup is a modern pastry. Make it at least two hours before you are ready to serve it so that the syrup has time to soak in. You can buy unsalted, shelled pistachios in Middle Eastern and Asian stores.

There are no cracks in this New York cheesecake. A water bath is key for gentle heat during the baking process.

You will need a nonstick Bundt pan to make this awesome cake. Store it in an airtight container and you can snack on it for a week.

This indispensable chocolate cake is perfect for every birthday.

Here is a fantastic coffee cake that tastes like gingerbread: perfect for cold days or nights.

This is a basic recipe for a simple-to-make jelly roll. Instead of spreading the cake with jelly, you can spread it with whipped cream and sprinkle with fresh berries before you roll up the cake. Another option is to substitute a rich chocolate ganache and roll up the cake before the ganache sets.

Long, slow baking in the convection oven produces a beautiful cake, one that has a silky texture. A bit of flour in the mixture makes the cake easier to cut. This makes a large cheesecake, ideal for a party. Top it with fresh berries in season or use one of the variations below.

This popular dessert can be made a day ahead and baked at the last minute. The chile powder adds a mild heat and enhances the chocolate flavor.

This moist, even-textured cake is wonderful served plain with a cup of herbal tea. When raspberries are in season, top slices with the berries. To gild the lily, add a dollop of whipped cream.

This old-fashioned cake is bathed in an orange syrup when it is still hot from the oven.