Koshersoul (hardcover)

For a limited time we have bookplates signed by Michael Twitty.

What does it mean to be Black and Jewish, particularly in the world of food?

Michael Twitty began exploring this question in his James Beard Award-winning The Cooking Gene, in which he also wrote about the ramifications of being Southern, and gay—an abundance of overlapping identities which were fully his own, even if others who shared them did not always understand.

In Koshersoul, he makes it abundantly clear through not only his own story but those of many others, that these are not mutually exclusive concepts. Though he has often encountered obdurate pushback from many directions, Twitty responds with thoughtful, human accounts of acceptance, insight, and historical continuity that have been overlooked in many other accounts.

Twitty is a passionate writer. There are times when you can see him winding himself up to take on a particularly blinkered viewpoint. But throughout this book he is also demonstrating a remarkable ability to center himself in his faith, to connect with people, and to be a storyteller of uncommon gifts.

There are more than sixty recipes included, Twitty's own or provided by the people whose stories he tells. He offers cachopa, a stew from the Cape Verde islands, as a Shabbat stew or replacement for cholent, and Louisiana-style latkes, as well as menu ideas for Shabbat and holiday dinners.

Hardcover.