A celebration of food, glorious Jewish food

At his recent wedding, Michael Leventhal and his bride, Rachel, presented the kosher caterer with a list of provisos that was nearly unprecedented in the catering company’s many years of working with an already demanding Jewish clientele: The chicken was to be organic. The vegetables were to be seasonal. Food miles were to be kept to an absolute minimum.

For Leventhal, these principles are not only part of his everyday life but also the foundations of the food festival he founded  — Gefiltefest, a celebration of Jewish cuisine that has been growing since he established it “by accident” in 2010.

This year’s festival, which enjoys the patronage of food icon Claudia Roden, will take place on May 20 in north London.

Gefiltefest was born when Leventhal was given a cooking lesson as a gift and asked the chef if a few of his friends could join her cupcake demonstration. Events snowballed, and within a month and a half he had created a festival with 20 speakers, selling out 200 tickets in two weeks.

“One person offered to deliver a session on Jewish cookery books from 1854 to the present day; another offered to take on food and Jewish fiction, and so it mushroomed,” said Leventhal, 38.

“People are increasingly interested in the provenance of food and fair trade. There was much interest from those who had something to say and those who wanted to listen,” he said.

The first event was held at Moishe House, the London branch of an international network of hubs for Jewish twenty-somethings. The festival raised around £5,000 ($8,000) which was donated to food-related charities.

The following year it became clear that Gefiltefest needed a larger venue, and the event moved to the Jewish Community Centre in north London. Fifty speakers delivered cooking demonstrations and spoke about food to a crowd that had more than doubled since the first year. There was a competition for the best shakshouka and sessions for budding junior cooks.

This year the community center is expected to reach its capacity of 1,000 visitors.

‘Food is so basic, yet so important to us Jews. It is an integral part of our identity’

“There is a Jewish Book Festival and a Jewish Film Festival in the UK,” says Leventhal, who has now left his day job in his family’s military publishing business to devote his time to Gefiltefest and its offshoot project, the Rabbi Relay Ride. “Food is so basic, yet so important to us Jews. It is an integral part of our identity.”

Gefiltefest has become well-known in London’s Jewish community, which includes around two thirds of Britain’s 280,000 Jews. Leventhal said other Jewish communities in Britain and worldwide — including Buenos Aires, Vienna and Paris — have expressed interest in holding their own version of the festival, and that he would agree “providing that they comply with our ethos.” Similarly, Leventhal said the growth of the festival would require more corporate sponsors, but that he would accept only “appropriate food companies which meet our ethical criteria.”

At this year’s festival some of the speakers and cooks remain the same, but organizers are encouraging new speakers to take part.

Food, Leventhal said, is “a brilliant way of building bridges, both among Jews and with wider communities. We steer clear of politics. Our aim is to educate people.”

Food, Leventhal said, is “a brilliant way of building bridges, both among Jews and with wider communities. We steer clear of politics. Our aim is to educate people.”

Last year’s on-site caterers, Spice Caravan, were a group of female refugees from Somalia and Eritrea. Leventhal remembered one Muslim woman telling him she had been terrified of going to cook with Jews but that the festival changed her perception.

This year’s Gefiltefest will include multi-faith sessions, including talks from Hindu and Muslim speakers. There is also a special program for children.

Claudia Roden, the internationally-renowned food writer, is now Gefiltefest’s first founding patron, lending her name and expertise to the festival. Editing of a special Gefiltefest cookbook is now underway, featuring recipes from some 25 Jewish chefs and cooks, all of them using spring ingredients.

The ingredients of this year’s upcoming festival share a social responsibility angle. Sessions are set to include challah baking lessons in which participants will be asked to bake two loaves — one to take home, and the other for donation to the Jewish community’s food distribution networks for the needy.