The Holocaust Survivor Cookbook

[Sub Atomic]

http://www.aish.com/f/r/48943701.html

Florence Tabrys Submitted by her daughter Susan Karr
Rockville, MD

I am a first generation survivor. I was born in a small town called Szydlowiec, near Radom in Poland. My family consisted of my parents and six other siblings. The Nazis occupied our town in September, 1939. At that time I was 14 years old.

For three years, we continued to live in our house along with the other people in the town. A fence was not erected and a formal ghetto was not created because the entire Jewish population lived in the center of the town, and was surrounded by the Polish people and the Nazi SS.

We were forced to do various jobs and were fed miserable food rations. We were without any nutrition, calories, or vitamins. My father was a shoemaker and was able to stealthily barter shoes for food with the Polish people—and that's how we were somehow able to survive.

Florence Tabrys Beef Stew

4 lbs. lean beef cut-up into little chunksM
1 medium size onion
4-5 medium size red potatoes
4-5 carrots
3-4 stalks celery
A handful of thin spaghetti
1 can of baby peas
Salt and pepper

1.Dice the onion.

2.Slice the celery and carrots into small pieces.

3.Place beef, onions and celery into a pot. Add salt and pepper and bring to a boil. Let simmer until meat becomes soft.

4.Dice potatoes and add to pot.

5.Add broken spaghetti.

6.When all ingredients are soft add peas.

7.Add salt and pepper to taste.

[elleng]

1. Thanks. Sounds like my beef stew,

which I'm making for Day After Thankgsiving dinner.

Mazel

[Zoigal]

2. Thanks for the aish.com site....and the

recipes. I have a wonderful apple cake recipe that was
given to me by a lovely woman who got out of Russia on
a cattle boat.....z

[Sub Atomic]

4. Please don't horde that recipe for yourself.

I think that these stories and these experiences and these family treasured recipes should be spread to anyone who loves food.

The true enjoyment of a dining experience transcends the food on the plate. It's about the camaraderie of sharing food and humanity and life's experiences.


As a commercial baker and chef, I would love to have the option of recreating that cake with her name in honor of her life and strength.

Will you please post it for us?

[Zoigal]

6. Will try and dig it up and then will post...

Gave some of my older cookbooks that i often stick recipes
in away recently. Hopefully it wasn't in one of them.....z

[blaze]

3. Wow. Very moving stories.

Thanks for the link!

[Sub Atomic]

5. I wept when I first read the passage that I posted.

This cookbook is truly a keepsake for anyone interested in either ethnic cooking or the plight of humanity.

[blaze]

9. None of this is in my personal history

But my first and only roommate in NYC... it was very much her history. When I first visited her folk's home, I was incredibly struck by the family tree posted, modestly, in a study. So many black boxes marking the death of loved ones. I had no idea. It was such an eye opener for me as a youth.

Fast forward many years.... the "anniversary" of the holocaust... And a coworker, during lunch, opened up for the first time ever. She was 8 years old in Latvia. They rode the train... escaping... but if planes were overhead, the trains would stop and all would run for cover. Asta, my coworker, was instructed by others to run through the fields with her (bare) feet close to the ground. "You want to bend the grain stalks, so they don't pierce your feet. Keep your feet low and bend the stalks."

Holy crap. Eight years old. Welcome to the world.

Asta almost froze to death. She remembered it as a welcoming blanket. She remembered being very cold... and then not so much... a warmth enveloped her...

It all boggles my mind.

[Warpy]

7. The mock chopped liver recipe (the last on the page)

is very much like one I do, only I use 3/4 button mushrooms and 1/4 dried mushrooms, either shiitake or generic Costco. It's actually fooled a few people, probably why I eat only enough to adjust the seasonings.

[Sub Atomic]

8. How is that anyway?

I love liver and can't equate mushrooms to that flavor profile.