A spring Shabbat

Challah, mezze, and tahini chocolate chip cookies

There is something so special about coming together to eat challah, drink wine, light candles, and shmooze on a Friday night with friends and family. Shabbat gives us the opportunity to do just that: to create community, togetherness, and reflect on the past week, while enjoying delicious food. I feel so grateful to have some amazing friends—Jewish and other—who are excited to celebrate this holiday and allow me to cook whatever my heart desires without question. I find so much joy in curating menus for parties, executing them, plating the dishes, and most importantly, watching the people I love devouring it all.

I hosted this Shabbat dinner with my friend, Molly, who feels just as passionately about Shabbat as I do. She told me about a company, called One Table that grants stipends, based on the number of guests, when you host a Shabbat dinner through them. So, for our 10 guests, we received a $100 gift card to InstaCart, which helped cover half of the cost of the groceries. That’s huge when you’re all 20-something-year-olds with only so much expendable income. We ordered almost everything from Wegman’s and anything that wasn’t available, I picked up from Ouri’s, a Kosher grocery store on the Upper East Side.

My inspiration for the menu was none other than: spring. I wanted bright colors, lots of greens, and to use as many seasonal ingredients as I could possibly stuff into it. So, really not much different from my usual cooking style. I decided to do just one course featuring an extensive mezze spread. And then, of course, dessert to finish everything off.

THE MENU

Allium-laced challah

Beet hummus

Whipped feta with ramp oil

Tzatziki with crispy shallots

Smoked eggplant and pepper dip with pomegranate molasses

Fattoush salad with herby kefir dressing

Marinated and roasted baby artichokes

Crudité of snap peas, fennel, carrots, cucumbers, and breakfast radish

Giant cheese and spinach bureka

Herby turmeric chicken kofta

Very green falafel

Tahini chocolate chip cookies

The last time I hosted Shabbat dinner, I made a three-course meal in which the dips at the beginning ended up stealing the show. So, I figured I would lean into that and give the people what they wanted. Plus mezze allows for a more casual, “shmoozy” overall vibe that I tend to prefer with a bigger group of people.

I have to shout out my many sources of inspiration for this menu. I laced seasonal ingredients into many classic dishes, like the hummus. I used what I consider to be the most perfect hummus recipe from Adeena Sussman’s cookbook, Sababa. You have definitely seen me make this hummus before because after the first time I made it, I can never make another recipe again—it’s just that creamy and lucious. I blended in roasted beets along with the chickpeas to give it that vibrant and unreal pink color.

I made quite a few dishes from Eden Grinshpan’s newest cookbook, Tahini Baby, which lucky for me arrived just in time for this dinner. I made her olive oil challah, whipped feta, tzatziki with crispy shallots, and falafel. I took inspiration from her giant burekas to make my own filling with a mixture of cheeses and spinach. Everyone loved the giant coil and had so much fun tearing it apart. I’ve never made an olive oil challah before—it’s traditionally made with a neutral oil like canola or avocado—but this one came out great! It was light and fluffy and laced with chives, sage, and thyme.

Baby artichokes are one of my favorite parts of spring, so I had to include my favorite preparation that I learned while working at King. They’re simmered in a mixture of olive oil and white wine with aromatics until fork-tender. I then roasted them because who doesn’t love a crispy edge?!

For the rest of the spread, I knew I wanted a big salad and there’s nothing better than a fattoush to showcase all the vegetables of the season. I made an herby kefir dressing—think ranch but Israeli—and toasted pita triangles in the oven until golden brown and crispy. The vision for the eggplant and pepper dip was originally a roasted salad of sorts but once I tasted it, I knew it needed tahini. And so it evolved into more of a baba ghanoush with roasted red pepper that’s smothered in pomegranate molasses. It was even more delicious than I originally planned. To finish it all off I made a platter of protein-forward bites, including falafel for the vegetarians (me) and herby turmeric chicken kofta for the meat-eaters (everyone else). True party food!

I kept dessert simple with tahini chocolate chip cookies from the Kismet cookbook. Cookies are quite simply always a crowd pleaser. The tahini added the perfect nuttiness and tied a nice bow on the Jewish theme of the evening.

Molly and my goal is to host these Shabbat dinners quarterly, so basically one for each season. I look forward to more gathering and gabbing with friends over fun and creative menus. I can’t wait to continue to share these parties virtually with you all!

P.S. If you want to see the dishes in action, check out my Instagram or TikTok! If you want the recipe for any of these dishes, let me know and I will make another post featuring them.