House Herp will offer hands-on reptile experiences at the March 26 festival. (Facebook) Tucson Hebrew Academy will host its third annual free community STEM ((Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) Festival on Sunday, March 26 from 10 am.-2 p.m. At last year’s event, more than 1,500 visitors enjoyed more than 75 interactive exhibits and activities. This year, an art element is being added… Read more »
"Yatra" by Aryen Hart
Tucson artist Aryen Hart’s photos capture distant Nepal, a land of monasteries, monks and the Himalayas. The Tucson Jewish Community Center will present Hart’s photography exhibit, “Inner Yatra: Meeting Nepal’s High Spirit on the LightSeed Path” through April 19 in the Fine Art Gallery. “Yatra” is a Sanskrit word… Read more »
Rice Krispie Treat Hamantaschen (Rebecca Pliner)
(The Nosher via JTA) — As a former chef and pastry chef, I had many delicious sweet and savory treats in mind to turn into hamantaschen for this year. But I wanted to keep it simple enough to re-create in a home kitchen, yet something different to also get… Read more »
Jewish Family & Children’s Services will highlight its book, “To Tell Our Stories: Holocaust Survivors of Southern Arizona” at the Tucson Festival of Books on March 11 and 12. Visitors to the JFCS booth (#244) also can create Passover greeting cards for Holocaust survivors and Matza & More recipients.… Read more »
A scene from "Austerlitz," a documentary that chronicles the tourist experience in two former concentration camps. (Courtesy of Austerlitz/Loznitsa)
NEW YORK (JTA) — How do people behave when they visit a concentration camp or a Holocaust memorial? Do they act as if there are in place of reverence or mourning? Or do they behave as crowds do at any tourist attraction — taking selfies, goofing around, snacking and drinking… Read more »
Brisket tacos. (Gabi Moskowitz)
(The Nosher via JTA) — “Leftover brisket” is something of an oxymoron, since traditional braised Ashkenazi brisket is usually the first thing to run out on most dinner tables. But at my little table of two, it’s rare that my husband and I can finish even the smallest of briskets by ourselves.… Read more »
Eliezer Sobel's mother, Manya, reading his first book for adults with memory loss, "Blue Sky, White Clouds." (Courtesy of Eliezer Sobel)
NEW YORK (JTA) — The book is large and fits comfortably on a lap. The color photographs nearly fill each page. Each image depicts real people doing everyday Jewish things — a young girl eating matzah ball soup; a bubbe and her grandchildren lying in the grass; a man wearing… Read more »
As a young attorney, Linda Hirshman, realized that fighting for the disenfranchised was her calling. “I wanted to do something that was hard, so if you accomplished it, it would be an honor,” says Hirshman, now a political pundit and author. “And there was no honor in making powerful… Read more »
The Tucson Festival of Books returns to the University of Arizona campus March 11 and 12. Now in its ninth year, the festival is the third largest in the country, with more than 300 authors and millions of visitors attending each year. While Jewish authors have always been among… Read more »
The Fox Tucson Theatre will present a concert by Michael Feinstein, the two-time Emmy and five-time Grammy Award-nominated entertainer dubbed “The Ambassador of the Great American Songbook,” on Thursday, Feb. 23 at 7:30 p.m. Born and raised in Columbus, Ohio, where he started playing piano by ear as a… Read more »
The Tucson Jewish Community Center will present a book signing by local artist and author Lisa Kotz Mishler of her new book, “Zalman Ber’s Story: The True Story of the Man the Nazis Could Not Kill,” as told to her by her father, Sol Kotz, on Sunday, Feb. 26… Read more »
Joe Feingold and Brianna Perez in the Oscar-nominated short documentary ‘Joe’s Violin.’
Filmmaker Kahane Cooperman hasn’t written an Oscars acceptance speech yet, but she likely will before the Academy Awards ceremony on Feb. 28. Not to jinx things or appear overconfident, Cooperman told JTA in a telephone interview, but “on the chance it happens, for fear of leaving someone out.” Her… Read more »
Lightened-up kasha varnishkes (Shannon Sarna)
(The Nosher via JTA) — Kasha varnishkes is a much beloved Ashkenazi comfort food dish. Traditionally made with bow tie pasta, onions, schmaltz and kasha (buckwheat), it is filling, comforting peasant food at its best. I wanted to add a little bit of healthfulness into the traditional recipe, so we decided to swap… Read more »
Bryan Davis, executive director of the Jewish History Museum, leads cadets from the Southern Arizona Law Enforcement Training Center on a tour of the Holocaust History Center, Jan. 11, 2017. (Courtesy Jewish History Museum)
Tucson’s Holocaust History Center is raising the consciousness of new law enforcement officers. The “What You Do Matters: Lessons from the Holocaust” program marks a new educational partnership between the Jewish History Museum/Holocaust History Center and law enforcement in Arizona. The classes focus on teaching new cadets about the… Read more »
Local poet Brandon Shimoda speaks at the Holocaust History Center on Jan. 20. (Samuel Ace)
More than 100 people packed the Holocaust History Center at the Jewish History Museum on Friday, Jan. 20 for a gallery chat, “States of Exile: Arizona’s place, and the place of Arizona, in the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans,” with Tucson poet Brandon Shimoda. After acknowledging the ancestors of… Read more »
The Tucson Jewish Community Center will hold a series of four “Celebration of Heritage” concerts beginning Feb. 15. Roza Simkhovich, a longtime community volunteer and former Tucson J board member, will host the series. All performances will be held at 6:30 p.m. and include: Wednesday, Feb. 15 — The… Read more »
David Alexander Johnston, who plays two Holocaust survivors, takes Germany up on its offer of return, as citizens (Lucille Petty and Steve Wood) bear witness in ‘Lebensraum.’ (Tim Fuller)
Invisible Theatre will stage “Lebensraum” by award-winning playwright Israel Horovitz Feb. 7-19. The play is set at the dawn of the 21st century. The new German chancellor invites 6 million Jews from around the world to make Germany their home as a gesture of reconciliation. Three actors play more… Read more »
Two Ingredient Rugelach Recipe (Shannon Sarna)
(The Nosher via JTA) — Everyone enjoys a good recipe hack, and I think you will love this one: two ingredient rugelach! That’s right: just a package of puff pastry, filling and that’s it. You can make flaky, sweet, indulgent rugelach for your next Shabbat dinner, brunch or just… Read more »
Mary Tyler Moore as Mary Richards on “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” Jan. 1, 1971. (CBS via Getty Images)
(JTA) — There are plenty of paradigms in the history of humor for how Jews and non-Jews get along, or don’t: as persecutors and victims, as saviors and saved, as allies against a common oppressor. All these are fraught with the tensions between the powerful and the disempowered,… Read more »
True Concord performs at Lincoln Center in 2015. (Courtesy True Concord Voices & Orchestra)
True Concord Voices & Orchestra will perform Felix Mendelssohn’s “Elijah” at the 5th annual Tucson Desert Song Festival later this month. Mendelssohn’s oratorio retells events from the life of Prophet Elijah in the Books of Kings. “‘Elijah’ is, like its composer, complex,” says True Concord Musical Director Eric Holtan.… Read more »
