"I love the story of the miracle of Chanukah," says the luminous Samantha Garelick, who, with her handsome screenwriter husband, Jeremy, moved in the fall of 2006 from New York to Los Angeles. "For me, though, it's the little miracles of life that are the most meaningful." Whether it's the friends and family who come together around her table to celebrate all manner of occasions or the sparkle in her nieces' eyes as they spin the dreidel by the swimming pool, the small miracles seem to add up to a very happy life. "When I look around my table, after putting so much love and energy into creating a holiday meal, I'm overjoyed," Samantha says.
Those who feast on her new-kosher cuisine are delighted, too—be they her frequent guests or the clients she cooks for as a sought-after chef-for-hire in and around Beverly Hills. Either way, the thing she wants people to recognize is that kosher doesn't mean old-fashioned, and preparing it doesn't have to be a hassle. What it does mean—in California, certainly, and in a growing movement across the United States—is fresh, locally grown seasonal ingredients cooked simply and bursting with flavor. "This is really fuss-free food," she says. "And that strikes people as something of a miracle too."
About Samantha
The daughter of a cantor, Samantha Garelick grew up in a kosher home. At culinary school after a stint in finance, she experimented with a wide variety of cuisines. "Ultimately, my husband suggested that I could apply what I learned to the world of kosher food," she says. "What I initially saw as restrictions on my culinary creativity evolved into a great challenge: how to make imaginative, delicious food within the guidelines of Jewish law. I found my niche and my husband was very happy."
When Jeremy Garelick sold his screenplay for a Jennifer Aniston–Vince Vaughn film called The Break-Up to Universal Pictures, the couple packed their bags and moved, as Samantha says, from "the Upper West Side shtetl of New York to the Pico/Robertson shtetl of Los Angeles."
These days, Samantha cooks for private clients in L.A. and teaches kosher-cooking classes on both coasts. She says she's constantly refining her curriculum, which emphasizes cooking seasonally and buying locally grown produce whenever possible. "Shabbat lunch doesn't have to be about the kugel and cold cuts!" she says.
Samantha is always finding new ways to celebrate "the kosher lifestyle" and contribute to the kosher community. She recently founded the Kosher Wine Society of Los Angeles, and organizes dinners and wine tastings at kosher restaurants around the city. She writes articles and recipes for www.thekosherhostess.com and consults for Wild Pomegranate (www.wildpom.com), a kosher gift company. She just launched her own site, www.thekoshergirl.com.
"I couldn't be happier with my decision to leave the world of finance to enter culinary school," she says. "It allowed me to spend my days doing what I love."
