Shannon Sarna, editor of the Jewish food blog “The Nosher,” and author of Modern Jewish Baker, joins us to discuss her new takes on challah, babka, bagels, and more. Shannon makes the case for hamantaschen and talks about some of the unexpected recipes included in her book—from Tomato-Basil Challah to Everything-Bagel Rugelach.

Episode 0170

January 19,2018

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

From pocket-sized Yiddish books to on-my-night-table English-language works, The Shmooze's producer Zeke Levine and host Lisa Newman sit down to discuss and recommend some of the titles from their recent reading lists—it’s an eclectic and surprising handpicked collection that will provide you with some great reads during the winter months.

Episode 0169

January 12, 2018

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

2017–18 Yiddish Book Center Fellows Miranda Cooper, Raphael Halff, and Zeke Levine join us to answer our many questions about the paths that brought them to the Center after college, how they’ve contributed to the Center’s major projects in Yiddish language and Jewish cultural work, and how their experiences as full-time staff members have shaped their future plans.

Episode 0168

December 21, 2017

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

This week, we talk with New Yiddish Rep director David Mandelbaum as he discusses the theater’s current production, Clifford Odets' 1935 masterpiece Awake and Sing!, as well as their past performances of Rhinoceros and Death of a Salesman. He also explains how the theater seeks to “educate a new generation of Yiddish actors and to illuminate for the public the diversity, cutting edge creativity, and universality of the Yiddish theater legacy,” by both creating new audiences and strengthening and satisfying existing ones.

Episode 0167

December 15, 2017

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

This week, we visit with photographer and documentary filmmaker David Kaufman to learn what draws him to the architectural and historic Jewish sites that he’s traveled the globe to photograph. “I see myself working in the spirit of Eugene Atget,” he says when asked about the visual narrative central to his work, “who, before World War One, photographed the Paris that was already old when he was young.”

Episode 0166

December 7, 2017

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

Photographers Janet Russek and David Scheinbaum started photographing New York’s Lower East Side in 1999, chronicling the neighborhood at a time of extraordinary transformation. In the newly published Remnants (Radius Books), Scheinbaum and Russek’s photographs document the remnants of history that have defined the Lower East Side for generations.

Episode 0156

November 20, 2017

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

Der Yidisher Idol stars Leah Reis-Dennis and Michael Yashinsky visit to talk about how they made the cut to perform their original Yiddish songs at the 2017 Der Yidisher Idol—an international singing contest in Mexico City. Leah is a singer-songwriter based in Cambridge, Massachusetts and Michael is currently a Yiddish education specialist at the Yiddish Book Center. Both are alumni of the Center’s Steiner Summer Yiddish Program, and both found themselves on the stage at the Yiddish singing and songwriting competition.

Episode 0164

November 16, 2017

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

Annie Polland, author, public historian, and senior vice president of programs and education at the Tenement Museum in New York, joins us on The Shmooze to talk about “The Jewish Ghetto in Postcards: From Eastern Europe to the Lower East Side”, an exhibition of early 20th-century postcards from the Blavatnik Archive Foundation.

Episode 0163

November 10, 2017

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

Ruby Elliott Zuckerman, a student at Macalester College, tells us about her newly launched Yiddish radio show. An alumna of the Yiddish Book Center’s Great Jewish Books Summer Program, she returned to the Center last summer to attend the Steiner Summer Yiddish Program. The seven-week Yiddish program inspired her to host a live Yiddish radio show.

Episode 0162

November 2, 2017

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts

Drawing from an in-depth oral history interview with Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman, a short documentary film is now in production. Christa Whitney, director of the Yiddish Book Center's Wexler Oral History Project, talks about the film, BEYLE, which explores the life and legacy of Yiddish activist and artist Beyle Schaechter-Gottesman. Born in Vienna in 1920 and raised in Czernowitz, Beyle came to the United States after surviving the Holocaust and was a multi-talented artist, organizer, and activist. A Kickstarter campaign is underway through October 31, 2017 to complete the film.

Episode 0161

October 26, 2017

Yiddish Book Center

Amherst, Massachusetts