Only a few days till Rosh Hashanah, and the Jews of Mexico City are making honey cake, chocolate challah and rather more ethnic dishes such as gefilte fish à la Veracruzana (with onions, tomatoes and chillies) before the 10-day holiday kicks in.
"We start early, with a big family lunch before the first evening service," explains Daniel Ovadia, 31 years old and chef-proprietor of an international restaurant empire. "For us, the second day is actually the third day, and all the Jewish schools stay closed until after Yom Kippur."
There are nine Jewish schools in five blocks in Mr Ovadia's neighbourhood, Bosques de las Lomas, the upmarket northern suburb where most of the 55,000-strong community has relocated. "Mexican Jews like to live in the newest places," explains Mr Ovadia. "Bosques was where my mother went on school field trips, but when it opened up as a residential area, nearly everyone moved there."
Condesa, the neighbourhood where Mr Ovadia and his father were born and his grandparents settled, is now the city's hippest neighbourhood. Affluent young Jews are moving back, attracted by regentrified art deco buildings, including the Jewish-owned Condesa DF boutique hotel. The neighbourhood's five synagogues have remained active despite the exodus to the north.
Mr Ovadia retains a foot in the 'hood with his restaurant Peltre, where we discuss his very first-world problems over an authentic Mexican brunch. "My daughter Gaia is only three months old, but I've had to put her name down now for the Jewish school we prefer. Mexican Jews are very wealthy, and we wanted one which imparted strong moral values."
This close-knit community of diverse affiliations - the Ashkenazim, the Sephardim, and what are known as the "Arab Jews", originating from Lebanon and Syria - does not embrace intermarriage but is thoroughly integrated into civic life.
"We have many Jewish politicians - my cousin is the city's Economic Secretary - and sometimes it seems like we are two million, because we make a lot of noise," laughs Mr Ovadia.
He says antisemitism is rare, and the community dwindled only temporarily when economic problems provoked a nationwide crime wave 10 years ago.
"But most Jews who moved then to California have moved back since security improved, and our numbers have been swollen by economic migrants from Argentina."
For 150 years, the country has opened its arms readily to Jews fleeing political unrest. They love Mexico for it: "We have pictures of the landscape in our houses, guacamole and salsa on the table - and we end Yom Kippur services singing the Mexican as well as the Israeli anthem," says Mr Ovadia. "We are thankful to these tolerant people who embraced us, and we don't want to leave."
