BARBERTON — Hanukkah is usually a “do-it-at-home holiday,” Congregation Kol Ami Rabbi Elizabeth Dunsker said Sunday, but her congregation has its own tradition.
Each year on a Sunday during the eight-day Festival of Lights, members get together at Kol Ami, a Reform Jewish community, to light the menorah and feast on potato latkes. The fried mixture of grated potato and onions is a must for many Jewish families celebrating Hanukkah.
About 75 people gathered at the synagogue on Northeast 119th Street for Latkefest. They sang songs, socialized and huddled around a table displaying dozens of menorahs. Sunday was the final night of the holiday, so participants lit all of the menorah’s candles.
“Happy Hanukkah,” Dunsker told the group, adding that it was a “joyful time for bringing light.”
While the candles burned, the group’s focus turned to latkes and other fried treats. At the end of the night, they also had jelly doughnuts to look forward to.
Abbie Spielman of Vancouver got in line with her son, 14-year-old Will Higgins, for latkes and a whole spread of potluck food.
“They’re always really good,” she said of Kol Ami’s latkes. “Not always as good as mine, but …”
“It’s subjective,” her son added.
Families have different ways of making latkes. Some mash the potatoes; some grate them. Some even eat them with ketchup, Will said. Spielman said she uses modern appliances — a food processor and an electric skillet — to ensure consistent grating and oil temperature. She adds a little matzo meal and a couple of eggs to hold things together.
Latke preferences aside, she said her family makes a point to come to Kol Ami’s Latkefest each year. Traditionally, Jewish families spend Hanukkah at the homes of close friends and family, but “it’s nice for all of the little groups to get together,” Spielman said. Deep down, she added, the holiday is “about the celebration of religious freedom.”
Hanukkah commemorates the long-ago rededication of the temple in Jerusalem after Maccabees revolted and regained control of the temple from the Greeks. The Jewish people at that time wanted to reignite the temple’s eternal light, but they had only enough oil for one day and wouldn’t have access to more oil for about a week, Dunsker said. As the story goes, however, that one day’s worth of oil lasted eight days.
That’s the miracle of Hanukkah, Dunsker added.
She said that the story of a light that never goes out is also a metaphor for the survival of the Jewish people and their faith.
“We’re a pretty small community,” she said of Jewish people in Clark County, “but we are proud of who we are, and proud of being ourselves.”
She also said she’s proud of the congregation’s men’s club, which makes the latkes fresh every year.
“The men’s club did the grating and the mixing,” said Vancouver resident Todd Berinstein, one of the latke cooks. The club started with about 25 pounds of potatoes, and in about two hours, they produced hundreds of latkes, he said.
No matter the weather, the men always cook the latkes outside so that the fried potato and onion smell doesn’t stick inside the congregation’s building, Dunsker said.
This year, that meant frying latkes in the rain.
