Living in Israel as a gluten-free foodie, things have been going pretty smoothly. I've found a variety of local chains and some single-location haunts that offer up lots of delicious gluten-free-friendly options. These are some of my picks! I apologize that they're very Jerusalem-centric, but that's where I hang my hat.

I'm slowly discovering that more and more people are starting to offer gluten-free buns and bread, which is a huge bonus, because the truth is that you can eat just about anywhere these days! The places to avoid? Those classic, Israeli-style restaurants with meat patties (bread crumbs) and the heavy use of MSG- and gluten-packed soup mixes. Steakhouses and places that serve fish are always good bets, because the grill is a safe place and the fryer should be avoided. When in doubt, always tell the server that you can't eat gluten, and they will tell the chef and make sure you're set! (It's a very welcoming country!)

Aroma
Yes, I know, not the most exciting place in the world to eat, but they sell gluten-free cakes and bread, so you can get a delicious breakfast with a hot gluten-free roll to go with it. In a pinch, if you want bread, it's a decent option that isn't too expensive.

Ben Ami
With locations around Israel, this restaurant is known for their gluten-free friendly menu, chock full of sandwiches, toasts, breakfast, and even some pretty amazing desserts. This is always my go-to when friends come to town and want to eat out. I highly recommend the polenta!

Black Bar and Burger
This meaty restaurant offers up gluten-free buns and even gluten-free beer for their patrons. I ate here for the first time several years back when I visited as a non-vegetarian, but on days when I am jonesing for meat, I prefer BB&B because it's nice to feel like everyone else in the restaurant.

Cafe Cafe
I don't know if this is normal at all Cafe Cafe locations, but I recently learned that they offer up gluten-free rolls with their meals if you ask! Although most of the options on the menu are not gluten-free friendly, there are plenty of salads, shakshuka, and even a gluten-free chocolate cake for your dining enjoyment.

Falafel
It's next to impossible to find gluten-free falafel in Israel, unfortunately. There is one location that I've found outside the shuk (Mahane Yehudah) where they stay true to the original recipe and use chickpea flour instead of wheat flour like everybody else. I want to say it's called Number 1 Falafel, but I can't remember the name exactly. It's a small cart, outside the shuk, next to the guys who sell the nuts and gummies. Get a falafel plate and avoid the pita!

Morgen's 
Although I haven't eaten here yet, the owners of this restaurant off Emek Refaim used to own the Village Green location. Now, they offer up gluten-free pasta, bread, wraps, and more on their cafe-style menu. I'm eager to give them a try!

Pera e Mela
Say hello to your best Italian friend. This restaurant is owned by two authentic Italians with a sensitivity to the gluten-free community. They offer gluten-free pasta, lasagna, pizza, and more. I ate here recently and the pizza crust was a little soft, but the ability to be able to go out to eat Italian style in Jerusalem? It's priceless, seriously. Try the garlic broccoli starter!

Pizza Hut
If you're jonesing for that classic Pizza Hut taste, the location in Jerusalem on Ben Hillel has gluten-free family-sized pies! I haven't, unfortunately, partaken, but it's on my to-do list.

Sushi Rechavia
The great thing about Sushi Rechavia is that they have lots of gluten-free liquor (try the plum wine) options and they will happily bring out a bottle of gluten-free Tamari soy sauce with your sushi. By and large, most sushi restaurants in Israel seem to be very gluten-free friendly, stocking Tamari!

The Village Green
With locations on Yafo and Emek Refaim (new) in Jerusalem, this vegan/vegetarian-friendly restaurant offers countless gluten-free options every day, from soup to quiche to their amazingly broad variety of options on their hot and cold bars. They also have gluten-free cookies! I always feel so full, but light after eating here.

If you're looking for snacks, sandwich bread, flour, crackers, cookies, and just about anything else under the sun, most health food stores have a healthy stock of gluten-free products. The best out there in the Jerusalem area is a store called L'Lo Gluten on Agrippas near the shuk. The store is full of gluten-free and sugar-free stuff. Oh, they have beer, too! It can be tough to find gluten-free beer in bars in Israel, but most stock plenty of naturally gluten-free ciders, so never fear.

If you want more suggestions from people who have tried out restaurants around Israel, please feel free to join the Gluten Free in Israel Facebook Group!

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Well, it's been three months since I hitched my wagon to that of the most wonderfully charming and loving man I've ever met.

Three months ago (on ye olde Gregorian calendar) we gathered with 24 of our closest friends and family for a small ceremony and delicious Moroccan food.


We haven't quite had a honeymoon yet (no, England wasn't a honeymoon), but we've decided to head to the U.S. at the end of August before the High Holidays so that Mr. T can meet my family, I can get a bit of my American convenience fix (hello Target!), and we can do a bit of honeymooning. I know, the U.S. isn't an exotic honeymoon location, but with my love of Colorado and Mr. T's having never been there, I plan on dragging him into the mountains for a day or two. Wish me luck!


How can I describe three months with such a gift? Well, first of all it's funny because we haven't even known each other six months yet. On the other hand, we've known each other long enough to know our biggest hangups, frustrations, quirks, likes, dislikes, and everything else you try to spend forever getting to know and understand. When it's your second go 'round, it's brass tacks in the beginning and then on to the rest of our lives.


If I'd have to guess, I'd say that Mr. T is going to be making me laugh until the end of my days, may they be long and as happy as they are now with him. Here's to dozens and dozens of years of happy moments, Mr. T!

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This past Shabbat, I managed to finish one book and start (then finish) a completely different book of two very different genres and two very different reactions from me.

The first book I finished was Doublelife: One Family, Two Faiths and a Journey of Hope, which is the story of a born and bred Christian woman from Illinois and a born and bred Jewish man from the East Coast. Gayle and Harold fell in love over a mutual love of music deep in Bible country, and the book tracks their adventures from Texas to Boston to Russia to Israel and beyond as they begin to question their outlooks on life, whether they want children, what religion means to them, and the role of Judaism in both of their lives as well as that of their children. The book is written through a series of letters back and forth between Gayle and Harold from when they meet up through the present, with Harold's letters written in regular font and Gayle's in italics (which made it hard to read at points).

I'll admit that the clever way the book is presented as letters was appealing to me, as it didn't feel like you were reading a book so much as a correspondence. The struggle that Harold and Gayle face is interesting because Harold begins his religious adventure before Gayle considers her possible foray into Judaism, and even when she does, it struck me as hesitant. Harold is the driving force as the family becomes more religious and Gayle struggles with adapting to the potential where her music is no longer something that she can practice or experience because of kol ishah and other manners of living an Orthodox Jewish life. I found myself uncomfortable at times, however, such as with knowing that they were sending their child to a certain Jewish school without disclosing that one of the parents wasn't Jewish. I don't want to sound judgmental, but I was always sure -- when I was in-process for conversion -- to not overstep my bounds as a not-yet-Jew.

I think that this book has something to offer couples who are intermarried and curious what the mindset and process might look like when it comes to starting a family and deciding how to raise children, how to choose a community, and whether the non-Jewish spouse should or is able to convert. I do, however, wish that Gayle had gone into more detail about her experiences converting, waiting forever on the RCA, and how that impacted her and the family -- these are the useful things that people like to hear about. As the book comes to a close, it's like a quick sweep through everything that happens after a conversion in a Jewish household. Did life not change that much? How different did Gayle feel? How did being Orthodox impact the family through kashrut and the holidays and language?

The second book I picked up and finished in one Shabbat was a borrowed book from my friend Elisha, Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of a Man Who Rescued a Million Yiddish Books. Although this book was published several years ago, the storytelling aspect of the author, Aaron Lansky is without comparison. The harrowing tales of rain-drenched dumpster dives, endless meals of gefilte fish and tea with aging Yiddish speakers, and his quest to find, save, distribute, and house the world's dying Yiddish book collection will leave you speechless, teary eyed, and wishing you knew Yiddish. I really have to commend Lansky. This is a guy who really put his entire life (and in some cases this is for real as he traveled through some shady places overseas in 1989) on the line to fulfill a mission that he viewed as unbelievably important and culminated in the creation of the Yiddish Book Center. I'm now regretting not visiting it while I was living out in Connecticut during graduate school. If you haven't read this book, stop what you're doing and download it, find it, read it. It'll take you maybe a day, probably less. It's that good.

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Tonight after Shabbat, Mr. T asked me to take the car to the gas station at Tzomet ha'Gush (the sort of central point where there's a grocery store, some restaurants, electronics shop and more) while he and iBoy ran the compost down the street. Not feeling a 100 percent but needing some fresh air after spending most of the day in bed, I zipped down the 60 to the well-lit gas station and pulled into the full-service lane.

Israeli gas stations still make me very nervous, I don't know why, but they're different than in the U.S. while living in New Jersey, I had to get used to the mandatory full-service fill-ups because it was state law that you simply couldn't get out of your car and fill yourself up on your own. But there, it was a simple process. You handed them your card or money, they filled it up, that was that.

Here, they ask you if you want them to check your oil (and even if you don't, they will), and tonight the attendant, Ishmael, asked if I wanted something to drink or maybe purchase something to eat. It was a slow night at the gas station -- the only people floating around were IDF soldiers, both those dressed down with guns slung about their backs and those dressed in full military garb, including a medical vehicle with an Ethiopian troupe in it.

I thanked the man, signed my receipt, and as I started to turn the car on, he shocked me.

Shavua tov!

I responded, stuttering, with the same greeting. It was surprising and completely unsuspected. I smiled and pulled away.

This, folks, is what I love about the Gush. This man, Ishmael, clearly not Jewish, offering up the classic Jewish Saturday night greeting. It makes me want to learn something worthwhile for my Muslim and Arab neighbors, something to say in response to show a "thanks" for caring enough to notice who I am, how I live, and the state in which we live.

That is the Gush, in a moment.

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For this installment, we have two great questions about issues that fall under modesty or tzniut in Judaism. (Note: tzanua or anav is the adjective form, meaning modest.) We'll start out at the head and end up at the toe!

Hair covering - do you cover all the time? At home alone? What about at home with just the family? What if you were hanging out with just a bunch of women, with no chance of a man interrupting you?

I can count on one hand the number of times I've gone around my house alone without my head covered, and there are zero times countable that I've been at home with the family or in a group of women and not covered my hair. A good example of this is earlier this week at the Pre-Shavuot Sushi Night here in Neve Daniel -- not a dude in sight, and plenty of women were taking off their tichels to try on new scarves to buy, but not me. I'm the kind of gal who will try a tichel on on top of other scarves. It's just my way.


Consistency allows me to feel completely comfortable when I am covering all the time, and the truth is I really do love covering. For me, the sentiment from Micah 6:8 to walk humbly with HaShem is something that I try to enact at all times, and it shows that it really isn't about the involvement of a man in my hair-covering experience.

Hi Chaviva. (Great blog btw.) I live in a charedi community in Eretz Yisrael where the custom is for us to wear stockings outside (in the 36 degree Celsius heat) all year round, and most of us also in the house also. I have seen that some communities do differ in this opinion - what is the stance of your community?  How do you find tznius and Eretz Yisrael in your time here so far?

This writer (thanks!) also included a link to an interesting piece from the Rav Kook perspective on stockings, which says the following,

... in regards to the part of the leg below the knee, the halacha depends on the custom of the place: if it is the custom to cover it, it must be covered. If not, it need not be covered. In practice, since the majority of ‘poskim’ are stringent, it is preferable to act in this way. A woman who chooses to be lenient is permitted, for she has reputable sources to rely on.

To be completely honest, the entire concept of stockings isn't something I've thought much on in the past, mostly because where I grew up (non-Jewishly), stockings were meant for two things: winter and dressy occasions. For some reason, my mental place for stockings and tights is still in that place. Where I lived in Teaneck, Denver, and now in Neve Daniel, the standard of the community seems to be stocking-less in the summer and various observances in the winter. Some people wear leggings and others wear tights. Until very recently, I couldn't find a comfortable pair of tights so would often wear leggings under a long skirt or leggings with heavy socks over it.

So far, there is definitely a much more clear community dividing line than places I've lived in the U.S. as far as what people wear. Looking around the room at the Sushi Night earlier this week, I realized how very similar everyone in Neve Daniel dresses. It's very flowy, simple casual but put together, and the hair-covering style is up my alley (tichels, tichels, tichels). Although there is a certain set of women who wear pants and short sleeve shirts, it doesn't seem to be the norm here.

What do you think about stockings in the dead of summer and covering all the time? Have a related question or something off the wall? Just ask!

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