Large audience eats up ‘Noshing Around Rhode Island’

More than 60 people attended “Noshing Around Rhode Island,” a lecture sponsored by The Rhode Island Jewish Historical Association and the Rhode Island Historical Society on Oct. 17 at Aldrich House, in Providence.

Speaking at the free program were Alisha Rudacevsky and Audra Mena, of Rudy’s Delicatessen, Murray Kaplan, of Rainbow Bakery, and Rabbi Raphie Schochet of Rhode Island Kosher.  

Rudacevsky and Mena said their grandparents first opened Rudy’s Place on Broad Street in Providence, “across from the fire station and Martinique” (as we say in Rhode Island), and later moved to Garden City in Cranston. After the death of their grandfather, the family continued to run the restaurant until the 1980s, when the family sold the business.

Having grown up hearing stories of how much fun it was to run a restaurant, in 2015 the sisters opened Rudy’s Delicatessen, first on Dyer Avenue, in Cranston, and now in the old Tasca building at 1300 Pontiac Ave. They use their grandmother’s recipes for traditional holiday foods, such as rugelach, noodle pudding, hamantaschen and much more.  They also cook their own deli meats, including corned beef and New York-style pastrami, and make their own chopped liver, as well as offering catering and delivery in the Cranston area.

Murray Kaplan explained that his great-grandparents came to the United States around 1907 from Europe, where they had been millers. His grandfather opened a bakery on Black Street in Providence’s North End in 1917, but was forced to move when Route 95 and a Marriott were built.  The bakery relocated to  Prairie Avenue. 

Over the years, some family members retired while others left and then rejoined the business. In 1954, the formation of a partnership, and an homage to “The Wizard of Oz,” led to the business being renamed the Rainbow Bakery. After the partnership was dissolved, it became Kaplan’s Rainbow Bakery, but most people continue to call it Rainbow Bakery.

Kaplan uses the same recipes as his father did, which he learned as a child, when working at the bakery before and after school.  He explained how important it is to keep the dough at the proper temperature and humidity. While rye bread is Rainbow’s specialty, they also make bagels that are chewy and crusty, unlike mass-produced bagels. On holidays, they bake honey cake, kichel and round challahs. Only Kosher ingredients are used, although they do not have a heksher.  Rainbow Bakery also distributes to Rudy’s Delicatessen, Eastside Marketplace and Dave’s Marketplace.

 Many Kaplan family members also ran bakeries.  The former Kaplan’s on Hope Street in Providence was run by Murray’s half-brother, Stanley; when he died, the family decided to shutter the shop.  Barney’s, on East Avenue in Pawtucket, was run by a brother, and used the Kaplan family’s bagel recipe.

Rabbi Schochet is the mashgiach of Rhode Island Kosher (formerly Vaad Hakashrut of Rhode Island), which certifies about 25 businesses in Rhode Island as Kosher.  He said that the Kosher food industry is big business, with three nationwide certifying companies: OU Kosher, the biggest, which works with food producers as far away as China and India; STAR-K, in Baltimore; and OK Kosher Certification, in New York.

Schochet emphasized that Kosher is “the consumption of food according to Jewish legal sources; it has nothing to do with healthy.”  It was mentioned that Muslim halal dietary laws are satisfied by Kosher laws, but not vice versa.

Schochet discussed bugs – while Sephardim eat a type oflocust, Ashkenazi Jews are prohibited from eating all bugs, including those lurking in herbs and vegetables such as parsley, leafy lettuce, Brussels sprouts and asparagus. He also cautioned that some food coloring can be made from a non-Kosher animal: purple food dye, for instance, is often made from snails.

In answer to a question, Schochet explained that “glatt Kosher” refers to the health of an animal.  Glatt means smooth, and after an animal is slaughtered, the lungs are inflated and checked for lesions and bumps; if there are none, the animal is considered glatt Kosher. 

After the presentations, the audience enjoyed samples from Rudy’s Delicatessen and Rainbow Bakery.

RUTH BREINDEL is president of the Rhode Island Jewish Historical Association.