Koshersoul: The Faith and Food Journey of an African American Jew

Twitty stuffs his follow-up to James Beard Award winner The Cooking Gene with wide-ranging ideas as generously as he fills kreplach with collards. “You don’t have to be Black, gay, or Jewish,” Twitty writes at the book’s outset, “but if you are, we have a little something to kibbitz about before we nosh.” What follows is a rich call-and-response between the academic and the personal as Twitty explores the shared customs and cuisines of his African and Jewish roots. In conversations with everyone from teenagers he teaches at a Hebrew school to scholars like T.J. Tallie, author of Queering Colonial Natal, he meditates on Black queerness, the tradition of gathering in both Jewish and Black culture, their continued “gestures toward true inclusion” in American society, and the Black Jewish community’s “resistan[ce] to engaging in the flashpoints and crises of identity that other people have against us.” Evocative descriptions of food provide a rich through line: A rundown of an African American seder plate suggests a chicken bone in place of a lamb shank bone, while Southern selections are given for tashlich, the tradition of sprinkling crumbs into the water to symbolize doing away with sins before Yom Kippur (with peach cobbler to atone for gossiping). Serving up a hefty helping of heart and wit, Twitty’s narrative is thrilling in its originality. (Aug.)