new york | Dressed in a smock, a pinstriped apron with matching pants and a large velvet yarmulke, Yochanan Lambiase raises a large hunk of raw tuna in a classroom at Manhattan’s Lincoln Square Synagogue, where 20 people watch his cooking demonstration.
“How do you know if fish is fresh?” asks Lambiase, the head chef at the Jerusalem School of Kosher Culinary Arts. “When you poke it, it bounces back at you. One time, on a test, one of my students answered, ‘You know it’s fresh if, when you touch it, it jumps back out at you.’ I had no choice but to mark him right on that one.” After a pause, the audience laughs. “Good, you got it?” He smiles and touches his long black beard. “Took you a bit.”
It took time for Lambiase, too, to get to where he is now. With a family that had produced five generations of chefs, Lambiase knew his calling early on. In 1985, he began training at the Westminster Hotel School in his native England. After three years, Lambiase wanted to apprentice for Paul Bocuse, a renowned French chef in Lille.
“I called him up and asked if I could come train with him in his restaurant,” Lambiase explains. “He said, ‘Sure, but there’s a six-month waiting list, and it will cost you $2,000 to spend one week here with me.'”
Determined to bypass these obstacles, Lambiase showed up at Bocuse’s restaurant with a friend, offering their services as dishwashers. Before long, they had convinced the chef to train them in his kitchen. Lambiase didn’t come to kosher cooking directly, either; he worked for years at hotels like the Ritz and the Savoy before London’s Schaverein Kosher Caterers invited him to cook for them.
Suddenly, cooking became “a different world to me. It was a challenge to come up with new recipes. I couldn’t just throw butter in my sauces or sprinkle cheese on my chicken.”
Partly through these experiences, Lambiase became more connected to Orthodox Judaism, and eventually became fully observant. Two years ago, Lambiase attended Kosherfest, the international kosher trade show held annually since 1989 at Manhattan’s Jacob Javits Convention Center. He saw several kosher restaurants, food service providers and products, and wondered why there were no kosher culinary institutes where chefs could train.
To fill this void, Lambiase set up the first — and so far the only — kosher culinary school in Jerusalem. Established in January 2004 without the help of a donor, and operating only on tuition fees, the school now meets in a hotel kitchen.
The school offers 10-month programs for men and five-month courses for women. The men’s program was extended because it provides training in shechita (ritual slaughter) and certification as kashrut supervisors. Twenty-five men and 15 women are now enrolled.
Classes are single-sex because the curriculum includes kashrut laws, and the strictest understanding of Jewish law forbids men and women from studying any religious law together. And in accordance with the requirements of certain rabbinic organizations, only the men are permitted to use their halachic knowledge to receive ordination as shochets (ritual slaughterers). Women cannot receive this level of training.
Lambiase receives the highest level of kosher certification by catering to the strictures of the Israeli rabbinate. “We went a little more Orthodox to encompass everybody,” he says. The school “is a thing for the Jewish people as a whole. By having different people together, everyone can have a good influence on one another.”
The audience gathered to watch Lambiase’s demonstration is a diverse group. Senior citizens, children, women in slacks and women who cover their hair all watch while Lambiase chops, sautes, whisks and fries, using only a portable burner and a few ingredients. Lambiase dips tuna steaks in breadcrumbs and an audience member asks about substituting matzah meal. Lambiase advises against it, saying the flavor will be less tasty.
He discourages making kosher for Passover recipe substitutions. Most Passover ingredients like matzah meal are highly processed, and Lambiase loves fresh ingredients.
“A cook uses processed foods,” he says. “But a chef learns to use basic ingredients, and make his own stocks and sauces from scratch. On Pesach, you just use different basics.” Lambiase even has a solution for dry Pesach cakes: “Add a little liqueur or syrup.”