Celebrate with Israel! Discover the stories of an ancient nation and a beloved land by making traditional foods and crafts. You’ll eat delicious potato latkes and sweet hamantaschen cookies. Make a mask for Purim and paper flowers for Shavuot. Each holiday, full of fragrances and flavors, also carries a message of hope and light. Follow the joyous celebrations of the year as you get to know the people from the land of Israel.

A New York Times bestseller! A brilliantly modern take on Jewish culinary traditions for a new generation of readers, from a bright new star in the culinary world. When you think of Jewish food, a few classics come to mind: chicken soup with matzo balls, challah, maybe a babka if you’re feeling adventurous. But as food writer and nice Jewish boy Jake Cohen demonstrates in this stunning debut cookbook, Jewish food can be so much more. In Jew-ish, he reinvents the food of his Ashkenazi heritage and draws inspiration from his husband’s Persian-Iraqi traditions to offer recipes that are modern, fresh, and enticing for a whole new generation of readers. Imagine the components of an everything bagel wrapped into a flaky galette latkes dyed vibrant yellow with saffron for a Persian spin on the potato pancake, best-ever hybrid desserts like Macaroon Brownies and Pumpkin Spice Babka! Jew-ish features elevated, yet approachable classics along with innovative creations, such as: Jake’s Perfect Challah Roasted Tomato Brisket Short Rib Cholent Iraqi Beet Kubbeh Soup Cacio e Pepe Rugelach Sabich Bagel Sandwiches, and Matzo Tiramisu. Jew-ish is a brilliant collection of delicious recipes, but it’s much more than that. As Jake reconciles ancient traditions with our modern times, his recipes become a celebration of a rich and vibrant history, a love story of blending cultures, and an invitation to gather around the table and create new memories with family, friends, and loved ones.

France attracts more tourists than any other country in the world. Step inside this colorful book to learn why people love it so much. Then make French-inspired crafts you can keep or give as gifts, and cook some delicious French food for your friends and family. Make a paper stained-glass window for your room, and find out why the real stained-glass windows in one of the world’s greatest cathedrals were taken apart piece by piece. Build a model château, and learn where the rich people made their homes in France. Paint an animal like the ones found in an ancient cave called Lascaux. Then impress everyone by whipping up some dessert crepes or a basket of crispy French fries. As you craft and cook your way through France with the projects and recipes in this book, you’ll come to love this wonderful country, too. Vive la France!

For thousands of years, great empires and armies fought to conquer a small portion of land. Stories and ruins, Roman glass and Byzantine stone are all that is left of them. Then there are the Jews—less than one percent of the world population. Expelled 2,000 years ago by the Romans, the Jews managed to survive persecution and threats of annihilation. With the vision of Jerusalem in their hearts, they rose from the ashes of the Holocaust. They returned to the land of their fathers. They made the desert bloom and changed the face of technology for the whole world. Meet the people of Israel and explore their vibrant country.

Experience the fascination and folklore of Japan by using common household items to re-create traditional crafts like kokeshi dolls and origami cranes. Learn legends that promise good fortune as you sculpt a Beckoning Cat or paint a blind Daruma. Celebrate holidays as the Japanese do by cooking mochi and moon-viewing noodles, or by painting a seasonal sumi-e poem. Japan is a nation that honors tradition, yet it is among the world’s most technologically advanced countries. The Japanese enjoy the longest life spans of any people on earth, a fact believed to be greatly due to their diet. See how the people of this crowded land came to depend on the sea surrounding them for sustenance, then try your hand at making teriyaki salmon and ozoni, a soup that features shrimp. Step into the pages of this book to share Japanese culture, with its love of nature and expression of art in daily life.

Italy is a beautiful country full of artifacts from bygone eras. Architecture, paintings, and sculptures from prehistoric times, from the Roman Empire, and from the Renaissance period can be seen in the biggest cities and the smallest villages. Visiting Italy is like immersing yourself in the history of the last 2,000 years or more in one of the most important countries in Europe. With the crafts and cooking projects in this book, you can learn about the different periods, the customs and life, the artwork, and the culinary traditions of this country. Through re-creating holiday crafts, carnival masks, and cooking traditional sweets and other dishes, get to know more about the riches of Bella Italia!

Germany is a beautiful country with a long and significant history. It also has its own distinct culture that has influenced Europe and the rest of the world. Learn more about the “land of poets and thinkers” by building a letter press or a model car propelled by jet force. Create lanterns for a procession, prepare typical regional dishes, and bake sweets for festivities. Find out how Germans celebrate the holidays and recreate some of their age–old traditions with step–by–step crafts and cooking projects.