When Stephanie and I were chatting, I was immediately taken with her voice and her descriptions. So I decided that, for this narrative, I would simply pull together her words, structured to form a story that only she can tell.

I always grew up with a gas stove.

I have images of my grandmother putting an eggplant on one of the burners to roast it, and fire coming out of it because it was oily, and her turning it with her hands until it blackened. While it was still hot, she would stand there and peel it with her bare hands, and the stove being a mess afterwards. She would just go for it. The smell of the burnt eggplant and the sight of it exploding and shooting out flames was really very funny to a kid. 

And she always had this big wooden bowl with a chopper—I don’t even know what the English word for it was, it looked like a half moon—and it had to be stainless steel or plastic, because metal would apparently turn the eggplant a funny color. 

I’ve made this dish many times over the years, although not as willing to be messy as she was. It’s one that my kids like me to make, but won’t cook themselves. 

If the children or the grandchildren do make their own version, that’s fine. They don’t have the same images in their minds as I do. They might see me cook it, but they don’t have the prior taste in their mind. But to me, it’s just not the same. 

I know that people might want to blend it, for example, but that’s the wrong texture. If you chop it by hand, you get chunks, but if you blend it, you get soup. That doesn’t do it for me. 

I mean, it’s not only the food itself, but also the ritualistic way of doing it that makes this dish special. Food isn’t just for the sake of calories and nutrition, you know. It represents other things… my grandmother; my family. So it has to be made a certain way, otherwise you don’t have the picture in reality that matches the picture in your mind. 

I never really cooked before I left home, because my grandmother never let me do it. The kitchen was her kingdom. So I watched, and I kept mental images of everything. This recipe, along with many others, was memorized not only in my mind, but my taste buds and my feelings. 

Oh, and I still have that bowl, by the way. The one that my grandma had. I use it for Passover, and it brings back memories every time.