Potato latkes are for me intrinsic to Hanukkah, yet here in Israel does one see latkes? No! Just doughnuts, doughnuts, doughnuts.
This is just a small example of the stylization and standardization of Jewish observance that Israel has engendered in so many areas. The delicious, savoury, once-loved latke has been ousted in favour of the far less healthy doughnut, that apparently appeals more to the notoriously sweet Israeli tooth. (Did you know that the Coca-Cola Company make a sweeter Coke in Israel?)
"Why has this been allowed to happen?", asks Barry Newman in his Jerusalem Post article, here.
Could it have originated, as he suggests, in a bolshevik conspiracy to keep women out of their kitchens and in the fields - dependent on bakeries (and the workers) for their household treats?
A sobering thought.
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