Most people refer to breakfast as the meal that starts their day with eggs, bacon, ham, hash browns & OJ but I’ve just gone through 25 hours of fasting for Yom Kippur- the High Holy days, (the start of the Jewish New Year). Not to get too religious (this is a food blog ya know) but Yom Kippur is the Day of Atonement, the holiest day of the year for Jews around the world.

Once done, we have a Break-Fast gathering at my mother-in-Law’s home to consume mass amounts of food. She explained that as a young girl, her family would go home and have breakfast-type foods but what I’ve come to know is the following:  Bagels smeared with lots of cream cheese, sliced garden tomatoes and sliced onions. We then pile high with an assortment of smoked fish and salads including- Kippered Salmon,  Whitefish (filets and salad), Lox (sliced and salads), Sturgeon and Pickled Herring with plenty of assorted olives and deviled eggs all in buffet style.

Whitefish

Lox

Sturgeon and Pickled Herring

Olives

Deviled Eggs

And just when we think we’re stuffed, the dessert table is ready to go with Blintzes, Schnecken (raisin & honey pastries), Rugelach (similar but made with cream cheese dough) assorted fruit Kugel (noodle pudding) Halava (a sweet ground sesame pastry) and lots of piping hot coffee.

Pistachio-Cranberry Rugelach

Hey, I just found a couple of wonderful Jewish recipes for the holidays at tasteofhome.com that I’ll be making today as a thank you for Terry (my mom-in-law)for the wonderful meal she made last night. The Pistachio Cranberry Rugelach and Dairy Kugel are great ideas we’ll be sure to include next year.

Best Loved Recipes

Better yet, get to shoptasteofhome.com and pick up a copy of our “hot off the presses” new cookbook, Best Loved Recipes and tell your mom she’s special with a mouthwatering selection from this incredible cookbook. It has over 1400 recipes with 100 all-time best loved recipes from our readers at Taste of Home.