Whether you’ve been noshing on them your whole life at the Hanukkah table or have just recently discovered their fried goodness, most agree there’s something great about potato latkes. It’s why Zane Caplansky of Caplansky’s Delicatessen held the second Latkepalooza event Sunday night.
“Potato latkes have a certain universal appeal,” Caplansky says. “You can’t go too wrong with fried potatoes and a little schmaltz.”
True, you can’t. But everyone has an opinion on what makes a great latke. And it doesn’t always include schmaltz.
Take Jason Rees, who runs Pork Ninjas, a competitive barbeque business. He was the last latke contestant to arrive, and had a table full of Pork Ninja T-shirt-wearing friends waiting for him when he did.
It’s doubtful Rees’ latkes were ever made by anyone’s bubbie. Cooked in duck fat, made with cranberries and topped with crème fraîche, caviar and apple sauce, Rees’ latkes are about as non-traditional as you can get.
“Last year I showed up late, with too few latkes,” says Rees, who made the required three-dozen latkes this year. “There are secret magical ingredients in the apple sauce.”
But non-traditional latkes aren’t for everyone. Lorne Zimmerman came to Caplansky’s to support another Latkepalooza champ hopeful, friend Ronny Shinder.
“There are a lot of things you can put in latkes,” Zimmerman says, biting into one of Rees’ creations. “Caviar isn’t one of them.”
Zimmerman tells his friend and latke virgin Audrey Yates that the size of the latke is always important. At the other end of the restaurant, Rees takes a bite of his magic applesauce and caviar-topped latke and inadvertently agrees with Zimmerman.
“I always say I’ll make them small and they come out big,” Rees says. “That’s the Pork Ninja way.”
Rees has some serious competition. Shinder, for example, has been making latkes en mass for years. Back in the day, he hosted latke parties at his photography studio, making 500 potato pancakes for his nearest and dearest every Hanukkah.
“They change from batch to batch,” he says. “I’m not very good at quantities.”
Shinder saved a special hot sauce he bought in Arizona for the occasion, and had chives and salsa, tamari sauce, applesauce and sour cream as toppings. Despite the wide topping selection, Shnider says his latkes usually turn out better.
“It’s the re-heating,” he says. “If you don’t re-heat them, they turn out crisper.” (It may be true, but Caplansky says it’s too complicated for insurance reasons to have that many cooks in the kitchen frying-up latkes.)
The other contestants were chef Keir Weseloh, who brought in sweet potato latkes, made with the whites from green onions, and Eric Bernhard brought in latkes based on a recipe from his Jewish-Italian great grandmother. “It’s russet potatoes, sugar, and fresh thyme,” Bernhard says.
Customers rated the latkes without knowing who made them. At the end of the day, it turned out that Caplansky’s own latkes were the house favourite.
Or make that second favourite.
“The best latkes are your mother’s,” Zimmerman says. “Well, my mother’s.”
Caplansky’s Delicatessen, 356 College Street, 416-500-3852
