Latkes

When I was seventeen, I was dead-set on the idea of moving back to New York as soon as I finished high school. In my mind, New York would be everything it hadn’t been for me when I was growing up there as a teenager: the bars that people were piling into as I was heading home, the mere rumor that was CBGBs, the rock club I haunted and waited to be let into, the movies and television shows that seemed to know a New York that I had never met… not when I lived there, anyway. But I was sure that as soon as I got into Columbia–a certainty, in my mind–and had moved to the Upper West Side, New York would reveal itself to me, and I would be a part of that scene that I had always craved.

But the story doesn’t have the ending I anticipated, as those of you who have been here awhile know. I didn’t get into Columbia, moving to Toronto for school instead. I tried to make Toronto into the city I had wanted New York to be, but my wanderlust took me elsewhere, bringing me to France, where I tried, once again, to make it my own. And while I always loved Paris, there was something about it that didn’t seem to love me: I had trouble making French friends, trouble getting used to the schedule of a Parisian week–markets in the morning, everything closed on Sundays. I still loved Paris, but I didn’t feel as though it was my home.

I’m not sure exactly when it happened. Last night, I sat at my new living room table with the Artist going through the timeline, trying to figure out how I got from here, three years ago, when my main goal was seeing as much of Paris (and as many of its bars…) as possible, to today, when I’m just another Parisian.

I’m not French; I probably never will be. I’ve come to terms with that. But there’s a whole other group of people here who are Parisian and not French, like my cousin, the Actress, and all of her friends, who come from a hodgepodge of backgrounds–Italian, American, Indian… Perhaps it was getting back in touch with her around this time last year that has made me feel this way… like I finally belong here. That is, after all, how I managed to find myself at a Parisian-American Sukkot dinner Friday night.

I had gone to the Actress’ apartment–my home for all of a month last November–to pick up some of the things that I had left in her cave. She immediately offered me coffee, one of those normal daily tics that I pick up on after months back in the States, just a tiny thing that no one here gives any extra thought to but that I relish, like apéro when French friends invite you to dinner or the bottle of wine that everyone brings as a hostess gift. I saw a boy carrying one as I waited for her by the bus stop later that day, watching as dozens of people just like me, dressed nicely but not overdressed–jeans and a blazer for boys, dresses and boots for girls–walked to their respective soirées and apéros… because that’s what you do on a Friday night in Paris.

“Ouai… je suis là avec ma cousine,” she had said over the phone to a friend as I sat in her kitchen earlier that day, drinking the half-cup of coffee that is standard here–no big Mr. Coffee Makers here.

“From New York. You might have met her…” Conversations with the Actress tend to be conducted in any of three languages, often simultaneously. “Attends, je vais lui demander.” She cupped her hand over the phone and looked at me. “You have plans tonight?”

Which is how I found myself pondering that bottle of wine, that sign that you’re going to someone’s house for a dinner that’s bound to last at least three hours–apéro, dinner, dessert, more drinking, all punctuated with bottles and bottles of wine. The Actress met me and we walked the couple of blocks to her childhood friend’s house, decorated bottom-to-top with menorahs that I gaped at, almost caricaturial. “We just unpacked,” the friend explained as we hovered around the table, ready to sit.

As a displaced New Yorker, I’m more than aware of Sabbath dinner, but I’ve only ever been once, at Hannukah, when I was maybe eleven or twelve years old. The traditions that were around this table are different and foreign to the ones I know from my Catholic background, but then again, I can Baruch Atah Adonai with the best of them after all those Bar Mitzvahs… and I know that it’s a mitzvah to have goyim at your Sabbath table, so I guess I’m ahead of the game as far as most Catholics are concerned.

We were handed papers with the Hebrew written out in a Latin alphabet to follow, and we witnessed the prayers that start the dinner. As soon as we had sat down in front of challah, roast beef and kugle, though, discussion turned to politics–the French favorite–and to me, of course, when I volunteered a few tidbits and my French was brought to attention, as it often is.

After I had answered the requisite questions–the where/how/when did you learn, “But you don’t have French parents?”–I got that one that I have come to relish, especially in the past few months. “Mais en fait… vous comptez rester en France?” Do you plan to stay in France forever?

“Oui,” I say simply, and it’s true. Paris and I have been toying with our love story for a long time–I always think we’ve figured it out until some other place comes calling, and I wonder what it would be like to be elsewhere.

But I finally feel bien here, not just another foreigner who happens to speak the language but doesn’t know what to say. This–more than the New York I had imagined or the Toronto I created–is my home now. My American friends and I still meet around a 12-pack of beer most evenings, and I still get most of my news from the New York Times, but I find myself looking even more towards apéro, to typical French soirées that start with kir at eight and end with racing for the last métro at one. And what’s more, I finally find myself feeling like a part of these evenings. My foreignness will always draw attention, but, as I was told by a Parisian recently, “Vous n’avez vraiment pas une tête d’américaine.” But you don’t seem like an American.

Peut-être. Peut-être pas. En tout cas, I can debate politics with the best of them around the table, and for right now, that’s good enough for me.

Latkes

I don’t make much Jewish food, and out of respect, I didn’t whip out my camera to snap close-ups of this family’s kugle, so I am sadly devoid of photos of the delicious rare roast beef, the meticulous fruit salad served for dessert and the fresh raisin challah fresh from the Marais. I do, however, have a latke recipe passed down, oddly enough, from my Catholic mother who learned it when she was working as an au pair in a Jewish family. Go figure.

5 russet potatoes
1 onion
3 eggs
1/2 cup flour
1 tsp. salt
peanut oil for frying

Peel potatoes and grate them on the large holes of a box grater. Salt and allow to sit in a colander for 10 minutes as you prepare the other ingredients.

Grate the onion on the large holes of a box grater. Beat the eggs and mix them in with the onions.

Press the grated potatoes to remove excess moisture, then mix well with the egg/onion mixture. Add the flour and toss together until well encorporated.

Heat an inch of oil in a heavy skillet over medium-high heat. Drop the latke batter by the 1/4 cupful into the oil and allow to brown on one side. Flip after about 3-4 minutes and press down lightly if needed to flatten the pancake. Continue cooking until golden brown on the other side.

Remove the latkes to a paper towel to drain of excess oil. While latkes, like most fried foods, are best if prepared right before serving, if needed, latkes can be made a bit ahead of time and reheated in the oven.