Until now, I haven’t cooked since before the war,” says Sharona Dahan, who left her Sderot home on October 9 having been without electricity for two days. “There were terrorists all over the city,” she recalls, slicing garlic into a pan of hot oil.
Dahan is one of hundreds of Israelis displaced from their homes since war broke out. She is sharing her story in the kitchen of Matan Choufan, senior director of content at culinary institute Asif, while preparing the spicy fish stew she would regularly make for her family on a Friday night.
The Orthodox mother-of-six has been living in hotel accommodation with her husband and children, but has been invited to cook in Choufan’s kitchen thanks to the Home Kitchen project launched by Asif.
Since war broke out, Asif has provided more than 50,000 hot meals to displaced families. But with authorities having created their own long-term solutions, the need for prepared meals has become less pressing. Instead, a need for an alternative means of support for the evacuated families occupying 73 hotels around the city was becoming apparent.
“We realised a few weeks ago that there was a shift,” explains Chico Meneshe, Asif’s CEO. “It was the simple need to cook their meals. To get back into the kitchen and recreate the tastes and smells of the home they left months ago.”
A pilot was launched to see if his organisation together with the Tel Aviv Jaffa Municipality could become matchmakers for Tel Aviv locals willing to assist and the displaced families.
Meneshe explains that while they had no shortage of hosts, the displaced families felt awkward going into other people’s homes to cook.
“We had to do some nurturing and really hand-hold the first ten families.”
When the two parties did meet, however, Meneshe says that they had an immediate connection: “All their hesitation melted immediately.
“It’s amazing — in some cases they come from not only different cities, but from different worlds.”
Mother-of-six Sharona made a Moroccan fish stew with Maton
For example, Dahan, a religiously observant woman would never have visited Choufan — who lives with his male partner and their twins. “This is something you never get – an interaction between these two worlds in Israel — it’s something we never imagined would happen,” says Meneshe.
Their common interest in food was the bridge. “The host was so interested in what she was cooking — he was so happy to taste and to learn.”
Dahan and Choufan work side by side, chopping, stirring and tasting. She admits to really missing her family Friday night meals but says the smells and tastes in Choufan’s kitchen gave her a much-needed flavour of home. It helped that she immediately felt comfortable with him. “That doesn’t happen everywhere I go, but the atmosphere here, the energy and [with] Matan — I feel at ease.”
Sharona's Moroccan fish stew Photo: Itamar Ginsburg for the Jewish Food Society
He agrees — “It’s amazing we can suddenly connect — through the kitchen and through stories of family. We talked about family, home, our roots and, above all, hope. I even received an invitation to a Shabbat dinner at her home when she returns — with my husband and our twins.”
That first pilot was a great success and within the first fortnight, Asif paired up 40 parties to cook together.
Aviv Vaknin cooked in 60-year-old retired educational counsellor Riki Douell’s apartment. Aviv had been working in a hotel in Kiryat Shmona in the far north of Israel, but lost her job when war broke out. Now evacuated, she is in a Jaffa hotel miles from her daughter, who lives with Vaknin’s ex-husband in the Golan. Over a WhatsApp call from her hotel bedroom, she explains that despite feeling lucky to be living in the hotel there’s a sadness at not being able to prepare her own food. When she heard about the project on the hotel’s WhatsApp group she “took [the opportunity] with two hands”.
Early adopter: Riki Douell (left) was quick to volunteer and hosted Aviv Vaknin
“I love cooking — it makes me feel creative. It’s important to smell food cooking in a home. I used to cook for my daughter and me and I miss it.” She took ingredients with her for granola, a cake and spicy baked fish.
“It was a big pleasure to meet someone else in Tel Aviv in a real kitchen. It reminded me of home,” she says, telling me how much it meant for her to be able to make the granola her daughter loves and to cook for her hotel community.
Deouell sees offering her kitchen to evacuated families as a way of helping with the war effort. “I can’t pick cucumbers or work in the fields, but I love being with people,” she says. So she signed up immediately. “I was really excited — I cleaned the kitchen and bought new stuff so she’d feel my kitchen is nice. And I cooked lunch for us.”
They shared their meal before cooking. “She was with me for about three hours; I helped her and learned so much from her,” says Deouell. “We talked, laughed and hugged and I’m hoping she will come back again.”
Asif has recorded the recipes each home cook has used, which are then tested in its kitchens, and uploaded to its web page.
Find these recipes and more stories here.
