In the history of the artichoke, a history of Sephardic Jews By Liza Schoenfein

The glorious vegetable made its way from the Iberian Peninsula during the Inquisition to Sicily and then to the Jewish Ghetto of Rome.

With its multiple layers of sage-green and sometimes purple-tinged triangular leaves forming a stately bud-like cone, the artichoke rewards the patient connoisseur. Photo by Liza Schoenfein

There are plenty of ingredients that warrant the distinction of Iconic Jewish Ingredient — foods that show up throughout the Jewish Diaspora, often appearing across Ashkenazi, Sephardi and Mizrahi cuisines. These ingredients — sesame seeds, raisins, cabbages and eggs among them — help define the flavor and character of a wide array of Jewish dishes.

But what about an ingredient that’s utterly essential to a specific Jewish community but has limited proliferation beyond the region? If, when you think of that locality, the first dish that pops to mind is a beloved specialty embraced throughout the area (and outside of it only to some extent), is its main ingredient worthy of “icon” status?

The locality I’m considering is Rome — in particular its Jewish Ghetto — and the dish is carciofi alla Giudia, Jewish-style fried artichokes.

“There is perhaps no greater love affair on earth than the flame that burns between Roman Jews and artichokes,” Leah Koenig writes in her upcoming cookbook, Portico: Cooking and Feasting in Rome’s Jewish Kitchen. “The ancient Mediterranean thistle  … serves as a totem of the community’s identity.”

Well, if that’s not a resounding vote for inclusion in the pantheon, I don’t know what is.

Artichokes are members of the aster (Asteraceae) family (also known as Compositae), which also includes cardoons, various chicories and tarragon, along with sunflowers, chrysanthemums and chamomile. Originally grown along the Mediterranean and in North Africa, the plant is known to have been eaten by the ancient Romans. For centuries thereafter, though, the artichoke seemed to lose favor, until the Moors began growing and eating them in Spain and the Spanish-ruled island of Sicily during the Middle Ages.

The history of carciofi alla Giudia follows the path of Sephardic Jews who, when expelled from the Iberian peninsula during the Inquisition, made their way to Sicily, where they were introduced to the delicious-if-prickly edible thistle. Exiled once again in 1493 after the Inquisition reached the island, Jews made their way north, bringing artichokes with them. And it was when they got to Rome that the artichoke magic happened.

One wonders who first picked an artichoke and — while carefully avoiding the tiny thorns at the tips of all those tough, tightly packed leaves — thought, “This looks like something good to eat.”

Not that the artichoke isn’t a magnificent vegetable to behold, with its multiple layers of sage-green and sometimes purple-tinged triangular leaves forming a stately bud-like cone. It’s just that it takes patience and determination — and in the case of the OG artichoke eater, imagination — to decide to whittle the thing down to a state of edible glory.

“It took a leap of culinary inspiration — or desperation — to say ‘let’s eat that,’” Koenig told me recently, when I turned to her for information about artichokes in Roman Jewish cuisine. (They’re such a focus of the new book that she chose an artichoke graphic for the cover.) She added that non-Jews in the south of Italy shunned the artichoke, calling it “the Jewish vegetable.” Lacking the financial resources to be choosy, Jews learned a thing or two from the tasty preparations coming out of Moorish kitchens.

So what happened in Rome to turn the artichoke into the undisputed star of Roman Jewish cuisine? The answer is simply this: hot oil.

Romans were experts at frying all manner of foods, and while there are certainly many wonderful ways to prepare artichokes, nothing results in a more pleasurable eating experience than deep-frying them whole. Thus carciofi alla Giudia was born, becoming one of the most popular dishes not only within the Roman Jewish Ghetto but beyond it, in and around Rome.

Luckily, you don’t have to venture to Italy in order to find them. Check the menus of your local Italian restaurants, especially in spring when artichokes are in season. I’ve enjoyed them at New York’s Trattoria Dell’Arte many times, and recently noticed them on the menu at Noi Due Carne, a kosher Italian Mediterranean spot on the Upper West Side.

Speaking of kosher, artichokes are not without controversy. During Passover 2018, Israel’s chief rabbinate declared that artichokes prepared whole — as they are in the Roman-Jewish specialty — could not be considered kosher since small bugs might hide within their leaves. Never mind that religious Roman Jews had been preparing and consuming them for over 500 years.

Con su plato más popular amenazado (junto con el sustento de los restauradores judíos en toda el área y la integridad personal de los cocineros caseros judíos romanos, que se enorgullecen de su capacidad para limpiar adecuadamente sus carciofi), aparentemente toda Roma se levantó en  armas . El rabino principal de Roma, Riccardo Di Segni, no solo rechazó el decreto, sino que grabó un video de sí mismo cocinando  carciofi  alla Giudia  mientras ofrecía deseos de vacaciones a sus electores.

Fuente: forward.com