Collection of previously published articles.

From Nates and Leon's deli to Hutzler's department store, a columnist for Baltimore's "Jewish Times" and the "Baltimore Sun" tells of neighborhoods and landmarks that have been important to the city's Jewish population from 1850 to today. More than 100 nostalgic photos help bring the memories to life.

This entertaining and informative encyclopedia examines American regional foods, using cuisine as an engaging lens through which readers can deepen their study of American geography in addition to their understanding of America's collective cultures. Many of the foods we eat every day are unique to the regions of the United States in which we live. New Englanders enjoy coffee milk and whoopie pies, while Mid-Westerners indulge in deep dish pizza and Cincinnati chili. Some dishes popular in one region may even be unheard of in another region. This fascinating encyclopedia examines over 100 foods that are unique to the United States as well as dishes found only in specific American regions and individual states. Written by an established food scholar, We Eat What? A Cultural Encyclopedia of Bizarre and Strange Foods in the United States covers unusual regional foods and dishes such as hoppin' Johns, hush puppies, shoofly pie, and turducken. Readers will get the inside scoop on each food's origins and history, details on how each food is prepared and eaten, and insights into why and how each food is celebrated in American culture. In addition, readers can follow the recipes in the book's recipe appendix to test out some of the dishes for themselves. Appropriate for lay readers as well as high school students and undergraduates, this work is engagingly written and can be used to learn more about United States geography.

When Jews arrived in the mid-1700s, Baltimore was little more than a backwater port with an uncertain future. As the city grew so did its Jewish community, forming its first congregation in 1830 and hiring the first ordained rabbi in America in 1840. Today Baltimore is home to one of the nation's largest and most diverse Jewish communities, with approximately 100,000 Jews living in the metropolitan area. Through photographs and documents drawn primarily from the collection of the Jewish Museum of Maryland, The Jewish Community of Baltimore chronicles this fascinating history. More than 200 historic images portray the progress of Baltimore's Jews from a handful of immigrants starting new lives in a growing port city, to an established network of clergy, businesspeople, educators, philanthropists, and civic leaders. From the family-owned delis on Lombard Street and the grand department stores on Howard Street, to the majestic synagogues on Eutaw Place and the current epicenter of Jewish life on Park Heights Avenue, Jews have left an indelible mark on Baltimore.

100 Things to Do in Baltimore Before You Die explores the must-do and must-see parts of Charm City for visitors who have a few minutes or a few days and for those who are visiting for the first time and those who visit regularly. It digs a little deeper for residents who have been here for a decade or an entire lifetime, marking such unusual aspects of the usual as the revolutionary layout of the Contemporary Wing of the BMA that set as much a trend in design as Orioles Park at Camden Yards did for retro designs of baseball stadia. 100 Things to Do in Baltimore Before You Die explores the popularity of snoballs, Rheb’s candies, and Natty Boh beer and fuels the continuing debate about where to find the best crab cake and pit beef. There’s also a note about the best places to watch Inner Harbor July 4 and New Year’s Eve fireworks.

"This "album of memories" introduces the reader to the people and places - neighborhoods, restaurants, department stores, parks, hotels, night clubs, racetracks, and theaters - that once put the charm in Charm City."--BOOK JACKET.

A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS' CHOICE A SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE BESTSELLER In AD 70, when the Second Temple was destroyed, a handful of visionaries saved Judaism by reinventing it, taking what had been a national religion and turning it into an idea. Whenever a Jew studied—wherever he was—he would be in the holy city, and his faith preserved. But in our own time, Zionists have turned the book back into a temple, and unlike an idea, a temple can be destroyed. With exuberance, humor, and real scholarship, Rich Cohen's Israel is Real offers "a serious attempt by a gifted storyteller to enliven and elucidate Jewish religious, cultural, and political history . . . A powerful narrative" (Los Angeles Times).