Club Med goes kosher
Iris Georlette tries out newly renovated and newly kosher Club Med in Eilat; she sets out to help chef return to his Abu Ghosh roots and avoid shrimp substitutes
EILAT -
Jabber sets his blue eyes upon me and says, “You know they wrote an article about me recently -- how an Arab chef cooks kosher food for Club Med in Eilat”.
And how do you do it, really? I ask pointedly.
“We offer our clients a wide range of food: We have lots of substitutes: sweet soy based cream, and kosher shrimps”.
I turn pale. Parve cream? Fish substitutes? Jabber! How could you? A chef born and raised in Abu Ghosh -- you should be ashamed of yourself!
Jabber laughs: “What do you want from me? That’s what people want."
Our interview takes place in the Club Med dining room in Eilat. Unlike my usual attire for these kinds of interviews, I am not decked out in a suit but rather a swimsuit and a pareo. When in Rome…
The bearded kashrut inspector nods off on the couch beside us. It’s truly bizarre to see a kashrut inspector in a place where I actually learned to eat shellfish.
But Jabber is used to working with kashrut inspectors. He started out in this business in the glory days of the King Solomon hotel in Eilat, and was recently appointed to the prestigious job of head chef at the renovated Club Med in Eilat -- the first kosher Club Med in the world.
I keep at him: “What would your mother back in the village say if you were to cook her kosher shrimps? Or goulash meat? We both know she’d chuck you right out."
He laughs again. “You know those are actually very expensive items."
Keep it simple
I don’t argue, I just try to explain that to me good cooking is not necessarily expensive cooking. You can use cheap, simple products to cook good home cooked treats.
Why not use local products like good olive oil, lamb, high quality kebabs cooked with mutton fat, fresh local fish, labne, tahina (Sesame paste), baklava and knafe?
Jabber at first told me he only has a few minutes to spare, but he acquiesces and stays to talk for an hour.
Jabber buys the olive oil and the olives for the hotel’s kitchen in Kfar Marar in the north of the country. He also flies in fresh Forel fish from the same area. I practically order him to stop using substitutes and go back to basics.
“It’s not easy”, he explains. “I can’t cook Middle Eastern all the time. People want French, Italian, Chinese."
But kosher isn’t the excuse then, I tell Jabber that French food can be cooked Provençal/ Mediterranean style, or a dairy meal can be followed by knockout desserts like on Italian cooking nights. In general, he should be cooking simple, local fare like back in Abu Ghosh.
The smiling chef thinks with yearning of a wonderful carob treat his mother used to cook for him, and promises me that he will think about some of my radical suggestions, including burning all of the shrimp substitutes completely and adding the vegetarian creams and margarines while he’s at it.
He looks a little heavy-hearted by the end, maybe because I reminded him of his village, or maybe because he’s tired -- his day begins at 5am and ends somewhere around 11pm -- or maybe he’s just missing his new bride, who’s waiting for her papers to come through so she can join him from Morocco.
And speaking of newlyweds, I move on to Sophia’s office, “Chef du Village” (hotel manager) for the last two months.
Sophia’s job is not easy. She’s running a hotel newly restored at great cost in partnership with the Fattal hotel chain, while maintaining the unique atmosphere of the Club Med chain hotels, serving a heterogeneous population that includes Israelis, French Jews and others, while running a kosher dining room that must meet the high standards expected of the Club Med chain.
Sophia says that once the Eilat Club Med’s kitchen was considered the best of the entire chains. Today, she must make the recent marriage with the Fattal chain work.
Like most newlyweds, this requires a great effort on both sides. The unkosher restaurant on the beach is still open, and there are a number of other issues to solve.
But Sophia is determined to succeed, and I would bet that she will, if only based on her pleasant manners. Sophia apologizes sweetly and says she has to run, they are planning a big party for Bastille Day, the 14th of July which is the French Independence Day.
Chef Jabber has prepared a special festive menu for the occasion with goose liver, salmon, mallard breast and many other delicacies. I manage to get one recipe out of him in honor of the French celebration.
Goose liver in mango sauce
Ingredients (5 diners):
1 kilogram (2.2 lbs.) excellent quality goose liver, sliced in to 100 gram slivers (10 pieces)
Mango Sauce:
200 grams sugar (about 1 cup)
150 grams julienne sliced onions (3/4 cup)
100 cc brandy (1/2 cup)
Ground pepper to taste
100 grams butter (sadly, Jabber uses margarine here)
300 cc port wine
1/2 liter chicken gravy or broth
1/2 tsp. corn flour dissolved in some cold chicken broth
Preparation:
1. The sauce: Warm butter in a saucepan. Add onion and sugar, cook until sugar caramelizes a bit. Add half of the mango and saute. Add half of the brandy and light on fire (gently tilt pan to fire until brandy catches fire). Add port wine, chicken broth and pepper, reduce slightly over fire. Add corn flour, bring to a boil until thickened.
2. Goose liver: Roast slices of liver in pan, salt and pepper to taste, and at the end add brandy and light.
3. Serving: On each plate pour some of the sauce, arrange two slices of goose liver on top of the sauce and decorate with remaining mango slices.
Bon Appetit!
