sandor katz
sastyk | May 11, 2012I get a lot of books for review, and for the most part, they are wonderful surprises. Because I receive and read so many books, I rarely sit around saying "Hey, where's my review copy of...X?" Generally I've got a giant pile of books that I need to get to anyway, so I'm much more likely to say "Oh, I didn't realize X was out." So let us first note that I was so anxious for my review copy of Sandor Katz's _The Art of Fermentation_ that I actually sent emails to beg for a copy - only to find that UPS had stuffed this book and another in a really weird place and it had been waiting for me…
sastyk | August 12, 2010"Sauerkraut!"
She said it with an absolute certainty, as though it was an order - get yourself some sauerkraut! It was said kindly, but as though I should have figured this out already for myself.
And she was right. The woman sitting next to me on the bench outside my synagogue was a Russian woman of late middle age, the mother of five sons, the survivor of all most of what was thrown at the Russian Jews. She knew things, and wasn't shy about telling me, although her English and my poor Russian made the conversations challenging at times.
I was pale, greenish and pasty from the epic morning…