Mendele: Yiddish literature and language ______________________________________________________ Contents of Vol. 10.009 June 11, 2000 1) farreysht (John Burke) 2) farreysht (Beni Warshawsky) 3) Waiting for Mendele (Martin Green) 4) Another Copyright Question (Bernard Katz) 5) chremslach (Saul Cherniack) 6) chremslach (Abraham J. Heschel) 7) chremslach (Michoel Simon) 8) chremslach (Deb Bailin) 9) slivkes; hitsl (shaya mitelman) 1)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 2 Jun 2000 From: john burke Subject: farreysht Alan Shuchat asks "What does this word mean and how is it spelled?". From the context, I would hypothesize that the word means "enriched," in the sense used by cooks, and is related to German "reich", meaning "rich." John V. Burke 2)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 5 Jun 2000 From: "B&D Warshawsky" Subject: farreysht My father used the word to mean fried until brown and crispy and pronounced the word "farraysht." My father preferred to use onrayshen rather than farrayshen; for example, a brown crispy piece of potato was "an ongerayshte shtikle kartofel." My father came from Zdunska Wola which is near Lodz. My mother who comes from a town near Vilna was unfamiliar with the term until she married my father. Beni Warshawsky 3)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 3 Jun 2000 From: "Martin Green" Subject: Waiting for Mendele In der mittel-alter yohren, iz geveyn in der amolliker Bavel an hekherer Yiddisher amt, der Goyen, vus iz derkennt un untershtitzt gevoren fun der Makhmodenisher Sultan. Zayn oytoritayt vegn der Yiddish din iz anerkent in alle farvorfene Yiddishe kehillos in Ayropa. Iz geveyn a vikhukh tzvishen tzvey ortiker rabbonim, flegt men shrayben a briev tzum Goyen in Bavel, un varten oyf zayn entfer. Six weeks ago, we had a disagreement in my household concerning the interpretation of a passage in Yiddish literature. I wrote a letter, posted it to Mendele, and waited. Two weeks later, my letter appeared. Two weeks after that, the next volume of Mendele appeared, but without any response to my question. So I waited for the next volume of Mendele, which came a few days ago. Although there was still no answer, I still had hope, because this week's volume consisted of letters that were originally posted back in mid-April. Finally, today, I received the two latest volumes of Mendele. Since today's volumes consist of correspondence from the month of May, I conclude that my original question has in fact gone un-answered. It took me six weeks to find this out. The point is, if someone HAD chosen to answer my letter, and done so as soon as he read my original posting, it STILL would have taken me six weeks to get an answer. I subscribe to several mailing lists on the internet. Most of them provide "instant gratification". When a letter is posted, it appears immediately, with no human intervention. In the words of an old TV commercial for the Patty Stacker, "your hands need never touch the meat". Why is this mailing list different from all other mailing lists? Do the subscribers prefer to keep our present system, out of a kind of nostalgia for the days of the Babylonian Gaon? Or do they find it as frustrating as I do? I look forward to hearing an answer to this question some time around August. Martin Green 4)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 3 Jun 2000 From: Bernard Katz Subject: Another Copyright Question Khaye Davis asks whether copyright protection still applies to stories by Leah K. Hofman ("Kleyne in der Groyser Velt") published by Farlag Leben and with a copyright statement: (c) 1920 by Noach Steinberg. Nothing I say should be taken as legal advice, and I'm not as familiar with US copyright law as with Canadian law (I'm the chair of the Ontario Library Association Copyright Task Force and a member of the Canadian Library Association's Standing Committee on Copyright). It is my understanding that any work for which copyright was received (it required registration back then) before 1923 is now in the public domain in the United States and can be freely re-published, translated, etc., etc. Bernard Katz University of Guelph 5)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 3 Jun 2000 From: "Saul Cherniack" Subject: chremslach This is in response to the enquiry from Paul Ilie dated Apr 22 and appearing in your June 2 issue re chremslach which I spell in capitals because I enjoy them muchly. My mother died in 1970 at age 86 and part of my inheritance,in addition to her committment to Yiddish culture and language. was her recipe for chremslach which I made many times since.I also picked up from the Internet a recipe from "Jewish Cooking in America" by Joan Nathan , which naturally is not as good as my mother's,in my estimation, and does differ in that mine puts a filling in a sort of flattened pocket,whereas Nathan's mixes it all together into a pancake. So Fania Cherniack's recipe is:1. mix in the following order to form a pancake; 6 eggs,1/2 cup shmaltz{for which I substitute vegetable oil},1/2 cup sugar, 2 1/2 cups water and Matzah meal sufficient to thicken it to the proper consistency.2. Prepare: 1 lb. cut cooked prunes,1 cup raisins,1 lemon rind & juice ,and grind them all for the filling,and fold the filling into the pocket of the pancake.So now it is a chremsel,which should be browned in a skillet in oil,drained on a paper towel,and then dipped in warm honey and served and devoured as a side dish, at any time but of course at Pesach time. Saul Cherniack 6)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 4 Jun 2000 From: Abraham J Heschel Subject: chremslach Paul Illie has asked for memories regarding Chremslach, to the best of my knowledge it was and is used in the Chasidic community to mean small round "latkes" - potato pancakes made of cooked potatoes which is then fried in oil. (Regular "Latkes" are generally made out of raw potatoes.) It is generally perceived as "a pesachdiche meichel" (since potatoes was an essential staple) though it also would be appropriate on Chanukah. I suppose that "chremslech" like other Yiddish names for various cooked foods may have had different meanings in different times and places. In any case to those that wish to make chremslech I say "ess gezunterheit mit a guten apetit" Abraham J. Heschel 7)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 5 Jun 2000 From: "M Simon" Subject: chremslach In response to Paul Ilie, our chremslach were and still are very much a Pesach only delicacy. The chremslach are round discs of a matzo-meal mixture about a centimetre or two thick and maybe 4cms in diameter, fried on both sides till nicely browned and then served with a topping of cinnamon and sugar. Michoel Simon 8)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 5 Jun 2000 From: "Deb Bailin" Subject: chremslach I love this list! I've been a dedicated lurker for a number of years, and it's great just soaking up the information and trying to remember the little bit of Yiddish I picked up from my grandparents and parents as a kid. Finally, I have something to contribute! My grandmother ran a boarding house in Atlantic City and considered herself a professional cook. If she gave out recipes, she usually left out an important ingredient, but I did manage to get her recipe for chremslach, a delicacy that was only for Pesach. Hers were more like chubby, oval patties than pancakes, and they were about 5 inches long, 3 inches or so wide. The main ingredients are matzo meal, honey and chopped dried fruit -- raisins, apricots, prunes, whatever's available. A real patzkeh (sorry about the spelling if it's wrong)to make because they stick to your hands when you're making them into patties. My grandmother fried them, but they're not bad baked for the health conscious. If anyone would like the recipe, you can contact me at wutmeworry@aol.com. Best, Deb Bailin 9)---------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 5 Jun 2000 From: Serge Mitelman Subject: slivkes; hitsl Lucas Bruyn in Vol.10.005 writes that it would be unusual to use a plural form in Yiddish ("slivkes") where it is singular in other European languages. Slivkes can actually only be plural in Russian ("slivki"; there is no "slivka"), but this example notwithstanding (here it is simply a calque) - as soon as the word is borrowed it can be used in any way peculiar to the borrowing language. Thus, in a recent article by M.Tsanin I encountered the phrase "in di vayte tayges", whereas the word "tayge" (taiga) can only be singular in Russian. Slivkes are not necessarily whipped or sweet, and it is common to use them with either tea or gebeks. Sholem-Aleykhem in "Dos meserl" uses the word hitsl: "A, du hitsl eyner! Krikh shoyn arop, krikh, vest shoyn leyzn! Du, hintshleger, du kolboynik eyner, ...". The Sovetish Heymland edition (#7, 1989) in an explanatory footnote translates: "hitsl; hintshleger - gitsel', lovets bezdomnykh sobak". We called someone of this specific profession "der gitsl" (not "hitsl"), or in Russian - "gitsel'". However, this word is dialectal in Russian (restricted to the so-called Malorossiya) and I met it only once in the literature (A.Kuprin "Yama"/Di Grub) as a description of this profession. V.Dal' in his "Tolkovyj slovar'" explains "gitsel'" as "zhivodyor" (der shinder), which to me is a figurative meaning. Does anyone know where this word comes from? Shaya Mitelman ______________________________________________________ End of Mendele Vol. 10.00 Address for the postings to Mendele: mendele@lists.yale.edu Address for the list commands: listproc@lists.yale.edu Mendele on the Web: http://mendele.commons.yale.edu http://metalab.unc.edu/yiddish/mendele.html