Shofar Sound Off: Rosh Hashanah Recipes

Apples, honey, a slow-cooker simmering all day long… sounds like a perfect fall day, right? Switch up the champagne toast for some shofar blasts and you’ve got yourself a Jewish New Year!

Rosh Hashanah is next week and for me (a lover of all things food and family) it’s one of my favorite holidays. This “Feast of Trumpets” marks the first day of the High Holy Days, ending with everyone’s favorite day: Yom Kippur. I like to joke that you know it’s the holiest day of the year for Jews because only then do we restrict ourselves from food!

Rosh Hashanah is the “fun” holiday. You spend some time in services listening to the shofar sound off and mark the end of the year. The best part comes at the end when you return home and dive into a fall feast! To celebrate the “sweet new year” you have a meal typically with some sort of tzimmes (a stew of meat, potatoes and spices), a round challah (need something to soak up all the stew’s sauce), and various things made with apples and honey.

I’ve rounded up some of my favorite holiday recipes and things I’ll be making for my family’s feast. This year we’re doing things a bit differently, making a BIG dinner for my mom’s co-housing community. Instead of a meal for 5 this will now become a meal for 15. It’s going to be quite an adventure but thanks to Costco, extra hands, and some strategical meal-prep I think we’ll be alright. Now dive in and get ready to celebrate Rosh Hashanah and a sweet new year!

Challah

There’s no better way to start your meal than with warm challah! For the holidays we make them into round loaves – a little more difficult but it looks so impressive! You can even get creative flavor-wise by adding fruit, like this scrumptious apple one from Smitten Kitchen. And the next morning… French Toast!

Apple Pomegranate Brussels Sprout Salad

We make some sort of salad to balance out the heavy meal, usually incorporating some of the holiday foods (apples, pomegranates, etc.) along with some fall flavors. This one is going to be a new dish at our dinner table this year – I’m excited to try it out!

Lettuce and Beet Salad with Walnuts

Another great salad, combining fall veggies with some sweetness from the candied nuts. We made a variation of this last year (swapped pecans for walnuts and used feta instead of goat cheese). It’s such a breeze to put together and can be adjusted based on your preference (or what you find at the farmer’s market)!

Roasted Butternut Squash and Fall Veggies

In the fall spirit, why not buy a bunch of veggies and roast them! This recipe is again very accommodating to your tastes and availability. It makes great leftovers and can start getting you excited for Thanksgiving!

Tzimmes

I’m anticipating devoting a whole post to our family’s recipe so stay tuned! This is a dish I grew up with every year and can’t wait to share it with you. It is basically a meat stew with various root vegetables, warm spices, honey, dried fruit and matzo balls (we only add this for Passover).

Honey Cake

It’s not Rosh Hashanah without apples & honey and honey cake! Growing up, my family would make at least 20 loaves of this and send it to friends, relatives, co-workers, schoolmates, neighbors… basically anyone we could think of! In college my parents would mail me a loaf and now, living in DC, when I don’t make it home for the holidays I can be sure to get one in the mail!

For years our loaf was always dense and sunken in the middle. It wasn’t until I read on Smitten Kitchen that it was too much leavener that caused the problem! We changed our recipe (very similar to the Smitten Kitchen one with a few different spices and no whiskey) a bit last year and lo and behold, no sinking!

Apple Cake

And last but not least… this amazing apple cake (see the trend yet?)! This cake is stuffed to the brim with apples and the best part: it tastes better the next day. When cooking for a crowd and during a holiday when you spend part of the day in services, recipes like this are a lifesaver!

I hope these recipes inspire you for your holiday or for your fall baking and cooking adventures. I know we will be eating well for our new year… and that’s not only because I’m the one making the food! L’shana Tova and have a sweet new year!