love BAKING WITH
Eve Rochman is saving a child’s heart, one Purim hamantaschen at a time
It’s hard not to love a sweet story about a community coming together to help save the lives of children who have heart ailments.
And sweet is the operative word here.
Eve Rochman loves to bake. And the Montreal mother of four and information technology specialist wanted to use her baking skills for a good cause.
She had heard about Save a Child’s Heart, an international humanitarian project in which doctors operate on children from countries in the developing world who have congenital and acquired heart defects and who, without the surgery, would have almost no chance of surviving to adulthood in their native countries. The project, established in Israel in 1996, was not yet well known outside the country.
It happens also that Rochman loves the joyful spring festival of Purim, which celebrates the salvation of the Jewish community of ancient Persia after a plot to annihilate it. Observances of the holiday, which starts at sundown Wednesday this year and ends at nightfall Thursday, include the reading in synagogue of the Biblical book of Esther, feasting and the giving of gifts of food and charity. It is also customary to eat three-cornered pastries known as hamantaschen.
Friends had raved about her hamantaschen and encouraged her to sell them.
Moved by the plight of these sick kids, Rochman wanted to help: Save a Child’s Heart became the beneficiary of her hamantaschen baking project.
In co-operation with the Edith Wolfson Medical Centre in Holon, Save a Child’s Heart has repaired the hearts of more than 3,700 children — about half from the West Bank, Gaza and Iraq. The rest include young patients from several African countries, Vietnam, the Philippines and Haiti. Rochman approached local retailers to donate ingredients for the hamantaschen so that the money raised through sales would go directly to the charity. During the project’s first marathon baking session, in the days leading up to Purim of 2009, she and a team of volunteers including her sister, Tali, friends, friends of friends, and students at her kids’ school, Akiva School, gathered in the dairy kitchen of Congregation Shaar Hashomayim — and turned more than 150 dozen hamantaschen.
“And the baking project just took off,” said Rochman, now 44. “People were very happy to buy the hamantaschen.”
Over the next five years, the quantities baked by her and her crew of willing volunteers grew and sales increased. In 2014, they baked 220 dozen hamantaschen — more than 2,600 pastries — and the project raised $5,000 for Save a Child’s Heart. A scheduling conflict kept her from baking in 2015 but she is hoping to top that amount this year.
The local retailers who signed on at the outset have continued to help: R.E.A.L. Bagel provided 15 dozen extra-large eggs this year; Graham Fletcher, franchise owner of Metro Supermarché Fletcher at Sherbrooke St. W. and Victoria Ave., contributed 50 kilograms of
flour, 40 pounds of butter, 14 kilograms of sugar, four kilograms of chocolate chips and two litres of orange juice, as well as cinnamon and baking powder.
“I think it’s a good cause,” he said.
“It’s a community activity; I support as many as I can.”
Asking isn’t easy for Rochman — but she does it. “He is such a nice man,” she said of Fletcher. “I am always so touched that people are so nice.”
Traditional hamantaschen fillings are a prune mixture or a poppyseed mixture; lately, other fillings have gained in popularity — including apricot, fruit preserves, cinnamon, chocolate and even Nutella. Rochman’s project features four kinds of hamantaschen: chocolate- and cinnamon-filled and the traditional prune and poppyseed.
Anyone who has mixed dough knows that it’s not an activity that lends itself to a crowd; Rochman usually does it with help from her sister or, as was the case this year, her mother. This year they mixed 70 batches of dough, more than they have ever made. Depending on the size of each piece, a batch of dough can yield up to four dozen tri-cornered pastries.
The actual making of the hamantaschen began on Saturday night, with Rochman, her daughters, Lia and Dana Boretsky, some friends and her sister working until after midnight in the synagogue kitchen and baking close to 700 hamantaschen. It continued all day Sunday, as waves of volunteers, mostly teenage, crowded into the synagogue’s dairy kitchen to help.
The space thrummed with activity as they worked, kneading and rolling the dough, cutting circle shapes, placing a ball of filling in the centre of each circle and then carefully lifting and pinching the edges together to create the pastries. Everyone was lightly dusted with flour.
The hamantaschen bake up quickly, the cookie-like dough buttery and crisp; the aroma was heavenly as Tali Rochman placed tray after tray into the ovens, checking and pulling those that were ready. “It takes about 10 minutes,” she said. “Once I see the bottom is starting to brown, it’s time to take them out.”
Upbeat music played and a few clear glass vases filled with yellow tulips seemed to be wishing everyone a happy spring. At one end of the kitchen, boxes were being assembled and labels affixed: Several people signed on this year as sponsors: For a contribution of $100, their names are printed on the label and they get three dozen hamantaschen; in addition, two lead sponsors contributed $180 and $360.
By late morning the long stainless-steel prep area was lined with volunteers, including Leigh Zinman and her 12-yearold daughter, Sahra Zimmer; 13-year-old twins Julia and Chelsea Mendelson; Eve Rochman’s 13-year-old daughter, Lia Boretsky, and her eldest, 18-yearold Dawson College student Jonathan Boretsky; he was working alongside a fellow member of an Israeli-Palestinian dialogue group he’d worked to establish at the CEGEP, Rusaila Shakhtur-Alqawasma, and her friend Yassmine Mhouar. I wondered out loud: Is there a better way to try to build community than with food?
Calls rang out — “I need more prune” and “I told them to stop making cinnamon for now.” In one corner of the kitchen, volunteer Aviva Reinitz was filling boxes with hamantaschen. “I love to help the community,” she said.
Meanwhile, Eve Rochman, easily identifiable in a red baseball cap, seemed to be in six places at once, distributing fillings to the bakers, greeting volunteers, ticking names off a master list as orders were filled and sorting boxes. Her IT background helps as she keeps track of customer orders, ranging from one dozen to eight dozen, on a spreadsheet. “It’s a challenge,” she said, “but I don’t think I have left anyone out yet.”