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Original Article Published On The Jerusalem Post

The longtime timekeeper for Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, Max Weinberg, talks about his Jewish heritage and his upcoming first visit to Israel.

While his more famous “boss,” Bruce Springsteen, has been out front on international sold-out stages for over 40 years, drummer Max Weinberg has been a powerful anchor, perched on a platform in back, stoically keeping a powerful beat that propels Springsteen’s music.


Max Weinberg on His Future With Conan and Bruce (YouTube/The Rolling Stones)

But don’t be fooled. The New Jersey-born 66-year-old Weinberg, who joined the E Street Band in 1975, is just as comfortable in the foreground as in the background. When Springsteen put the band on hiatus in 1989, Weinberg moved to the front of the stage, serving as bandleader of The Max Weinberg 7 for Late Night with Conan O’Brien, and later for The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien, as leader of Max Weinberg and The Tonight Show Band.

Weinberg’s allegiance to Springsteen proved paramount and when the Boss reconvened the band in the late 1990s, Mighty Max, as he is introduced onstage by Springsteen, was back in the drummer’s seat, where he’s remained ever since. Wrapping up their most recent tour in Auckland, New Zealand last February, The E Street Band is once again on a break and Springsteen has been busy performing his Bruce on Broadway solo show to sellout crowds since October.

But Weinberg continues to keep busy. He has traveled across the country performing as part of the Max Weinberg Juke Box Tour, a fun-filled show in which he and his crack soul-rock band pick songs to play from a long list of classics. He also regularly gives lectures about his life and drumming.

And as a Jew proud of his heritage, he seems to enjoy getting to know synagogues in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. According to Ariella Rosen, rabbi of Philadelphia-area synagogue Adath Israel, Weinberg had so much fun at the synagogue’s annual fund-raiser in 2016 that he came back a second time in 2017.

“There is mutual affection between Max and the congregation,” notes Rosen. “He played drums during havdala as Rabbi Eric Yanoff played keyboards – two years in a row. He enjoyed getting to know members of the congregation and he loved it when we presented him with an honorary member’s certificate.”

Weinberg spoke with The Jerusalem Post after Juke Box Tour twice – after an appearance in Jersey City, New Jersey, late last year, and for a longer interview in January, in which he proudly revealed he will be making his first trip to Israel next month.

I grew up in the suburbs of Newark, New Jersey, in a Jewish family. My grandfather was one of the founders in the early 20th century of our synagogue. My mother and her four sisters were very involved in temple life and the sisterhood and of course I had a bar mitzvah.

Some of my earliest musical experiences took place at the synagogue. In my own personal case, our rabbi was a very inspirational guy who approached the rabbinate artfully through music and poetry. That made a big impression on me. Music in the service itself was what they would call high church – very old school. I really enjoyed that. We had a 15-voice choir that was on the second floor, above the bima, behind a curtain, so you never saw them – with the organist. It was very majestic. And it was my first experience with organized music. These are the Reform Movement’s original hymns.

Our rabbi (Avraham Soltes) was a well-known rabbi in the United States. He had a TV show in the early 1950s – Lamp Unto My Feet. His son (Ori Soltes) is actually a very esteemed professor of Judaica and Hebrew studies at Georgetown University, and he was my best friend as a kid.

So that was very present in my family growing up.

Can you share more about your family? It sounds like the temple was an important place for you and your family.

I have two older sisters and a younger sister. Between Hebrew school, Sunday school and services, I probably spent more time in the temple than I did any place else! My initial musical experiences performing took place there.

What is your memory of your bar mitzvah?

I played at my bar mitzvah! Like most young 13-year-olds, the studying and the struggle to speak Hebrew mellifluously had you practicing a lot.

My bar mitzvah was very modest – a lot of family, a lot of friends – but not a big full-blown affair. My parents didn’t have the resources for that.

I remember fondly getting my first real suit, which kind of started a fascination with dressing up. I still have the tie I wore at my bar mitzvah!

I was confirmed. It was important in my family to appreciate the cultural heritage of our Judaism. My mother’s grandfather, who would be my great-grandfather, came from Russia around the turn of the 20th century and chose to go live around 1910 or 11 in Palestine. He died there in 1916 and is buried on the Mount of Olives. His name was Joshua Mindlin. So when you see pictures of my sister – my younger sister and I – we are the youngest of many first cousins. So it was quite a big extended family that immigrated here [to the US] in the late 1870s.

Where did your family come from originally?

They came from Europe through Ellis Island, then to Brooklyn and then to New Jersey. The heritage of being Russian, specifically Ukrainian Jews and Polish Jews, was something I was very aware of my entire young life, especially with a name like Max Weinberg. What is interesting is that it was not my father’s family name when they came here – it was a German name that was given to them when they came through Ellis Island and they never changed it. You know, in show business in the 1950s and ’60s, it was a bit in vogue to Anglicize your name, but I never did that.

I’ve fortunately through the years been very pleased to have support from the worldwide Jewish community, including Israel, and in places I’ve played – as someone who is not only aware of my heritage and my people and where I came from, but in many ways, as assimilated as my family became – I still maintained those ties.

Have you been to Israel?

I am actually going in February! Most of my family has been to Israel. My mother, many times. My first cousin went there in 1962, was on a kibbutz and ended up staying. She met her husband there and she moved back here [to the US] in the middle 1990s.

We had hoped that we would be able to play there. To tell you the truth, I haven’t been anywhere that I haven’t played. I have played everywhere and have traveled so much that I have virtually never taken a trip where I didn’t perform!

I feel remiss in not visiting before. I have many Israeli friends. [Well-known Israeli musician] David Broza is a good, close friend that I have performed with. He’s performed with my band. I have performed with his musicians. So I am very much looking forward to my trip.

My daughter and son-in-law just got back from Israel. I expect to see my great-grandfather’s grave.

I don’t know anyone who has been to Israel and has not fallen in love with it, so I look forward to having a marvelous experience.

Would you want to play on this trip to Israel?

My playing internationally is more related to my playing with the E Street Band. That’s why I haven’t really been many other places. I do expect some day to play there, but not this trip.

This is a pleasure trip and to see friends. Both my wife and I are very much interested in history generally. Whenever I have been on tour with the E Street Band, we have really tried to take in as many historical sites around the world – the United States a little bit, but particularly in Europe and some of the more exotic places we’ve been.

There has been a lot of talk in the musical community about the BDS movement, Roger Waters, for example. I wonder if you have ever spoken with Bruce about Israel, if BDS has ever come up, or is that something you guys stay away from? Have you guys ever talked about playing in Israel?

We talk about so many different subjects. It is good question about why we haven’t played there. I used to get a lot of letters from Israelis when I was on the Late Night with Conan O’Brien Show who seemed to be very proud of me – that here I was with the Max Weinberg name on my bass drum. So I got a lot of support from my Israeli brothers and sisters. I appreciated that very much.

You have been playing with Bruce for so long that you probably overlapped with Suki Lahav, the Israeli violinist who played with Bruce Springsteen for part of 1974 and 1975.

I certainly played with her. She was a brilliant musician. She played violin and her former husband, Louis, who I believe lives in South America now, was our engineer/ road manager/driver. They were both Israeli, of course. He was the first person I met associated with Bruce and the band when I auditioned. Suki was not in the band very long. It was 1974 and 1975 for six or eight months, but certainly made her mark. Frankly, when you hear the intro to “Jungleland,” if you are in the E Street Band, you think of Suki Lahav.

Can you share any stories or memories of being Jewish “on the road”?

We have a very dear friend who is the promoter in Germany. We once had Passover Seder years ago with this friend of ours. That would be something that I would point to as a special experience. He is originally from Berlin.

Have you seen Bruce on Broadway?

My wife and I attended his opening night back in October and thoroughly enjoyed it. It was a magnificent evening. It was very gripping, dramatic, funny, touching and moving – which we of course knew it would be – because that is what he does.

What is it like for you and the band when you have time off?

We have a terribly strong bond, all of us, but again, we all very much enjoy our break from playing, and everybody stays pretty much involved with music in a variety of different things.

I am very busy these days. I work 10 days a month between a variety of venues and bands and public speaking. Also, I did a guest spot on the CBS show Blue Bloods (aired January 19). So I try to keep busy.

Can we look forward to seeing Bruce and the E Street Band back on the road?

We always read the tea leaves. So we don’t really discuss much at all and it seems to always work out that way.

What are the hardest and best parts of being on the road so much?

I love it! I love being out on the road, in whatever capacity I may be doing it. Whether it is with my own group, or certainly with the E Street Band, I really enjoy traveling. I enjoy seeing sites. I like being on the go – that’s my personality. I like meeting people. I enjoy different cultures. We’ve had marvelous experiences around the world, playing in Africa, India, Asia and South America. It is a privilege to be able to work in that capacity when you are traveling – a little like a traveling salesman. What you are selling is your music. The ability to provide for people an opportunity as Bruce says often, “To dance all over their problems.” That is a mitzvah to me. In my own way, and with my background, I have kind of interpreted that as my own way of providing tikkun olam.

That is beautiful. If our clergy was half as inspiring as Bruce and the E Street Band, religion might be doing much better. It is really a religious experience going to a concert.

The idea of being useful is something that has always been stressed by Bruce, and within the band, of being of use in doing what you do. To bring joy to people through music has always been in the forefront of the thing we do individually and collectively. It really is a blessing to be able to do that.

It probably, in my case anyway, harks back to the feeling I got of sitting in the synagogue, which was a very imposing architectural edifice, listening to the music. We had the most amazing cantor in my temple, who was a baritone, in credible voice – Cantor Herman Dansker, in the 1950s; he retired in the early 1960s.

Is it true that you were a drummer in a bar mitzvah band at age seven – when you sat in on a bar mitzvah band playing “When the Saints Go Marching In?

I definitely played bar mitzvahs. You name it, I played it. Cruise ships. The Catskills. I played many of the Catskills resorts when I was a teenager. From Grossingers to Kutschers, to the Concord to the Nevele. There was a place that was owned by Neil Sedaka’s family called the Esther Manor – I think Esther was his aunt. It was in Libertyville, New York, which of course was the Borscht Belt, the center of classic Jewish show business from the middle 1930s to the beginning of the 1970s. But I caught it at the end of the 1950s and in to the ‘60s.

How did you get started in the first place in this whole drumming business? You have spoken before about the role of the drummer and you have used the word seder (order).

If you’ve read that concept, then you know it was seeing Elvis Presley on The Milton Berle Show, before Ed Sullivan. I already was pretty musical, singing, which I don’t do anymore. I was musical and seeing Elvis and his band, particularly his drummer, D.J. Fontana, just kind of grabbed me. Then, of course, four or five months later, he was on The Ed Sullivan Show and everything just… well, that was the Big Bang. So my experience wasn’t that different from many other young people my age and older, obviously. I guess I was five when that happened and it really made an impression on me. The beat really just grabbed me. I know it is a cliché, but it was really true. I was just very directed to being in that world. As a teenager, I was actually able to go out and make money and play jobs. It just sort of naturally fit me. I am just glad to continue to do it.

I have always wondered, there is this line in Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band: Live in New York City: “I’m gonna throw a rock and roll exorcism… a rock and roll baptism and a rock and roll bar mitzvah!” Are you the inspiration for the bar mitzvah line? Or is Bruce just being playful?

Sure it is playful, it is also those that he described are all celebrations and that’s what we try to accomplish – a celebration. Whatever the religion, ethnicity or nationality, it is all a human joyful experience. That’s what music does – it breaks down those barriers, which is why we need more of it.

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Original Article Published on The New York Jewish week

At the farewell dinner in Tel Aviv on the last night of our ten day Birthright Israel Amazing Israel Ramah Tikvah trip, we went around the table sharing memories and trip highlights. The 21 participants with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and the six staff members, representing five Ramah Tikvah Programs and twelve states—from Wisconsin to Alabama—spoke enthusiastically about the jeep ride on the Golan Heights, the de Karina chocolate making workshop at Kibbutz EIn Zivan, the Night Spectacular Sound and Light show at the Tower of David in Jerusalem, the Biblical Zoo, the view of Syria from Golan, Masada, the Dead Sea, the Kotel, and shwarma! The participants then asked for my highlight. It didn’t take long for me to share my answer, though my highlight was so much more than a place. “Tefillot and your knowledge of Israel and Judaism,” I replied, as the group asked for clarification.

Each day, our group met for morning prayers, in such places as hotel bomb shelters, banquet rooms, outdoor tents, and the bus. We used a special Tikvah siddur from Ramah camps, we faced east, and south—depending on our location. Some participants wore kippot, tallis and tefillin. And we sang such “classics” as Modeh Ani, Mah Tovu, Halleluya and Shema, and such Tikvah Ramah favorites as the Baruch SheaMARCH, Thank You, God, and The Rise and Shine Amidah Song. (The group had no problem MARCHING to the Baruch SheaMARCH prayer when we were praying in the hotel; they weren’t sure how we could safely march on the bus ride to Masada. We decided it was safer to sit!)

The participants got up early to sing and dance and share this meaningful experience with camp friends—all before eating a sumptuous hotel or kibbutz guest house breakfast. Alexa sat in the back of the room, or at the front of the group, using Hebrew sign language to sign each acrostic prayer—Ashrei, El Baruch and El Adon. She was happy to teach her friends Hebrew the sign language she learned at Camp Ramah in New England.

The California Ramah group recruited their friends to come up and lead the Shema and VeAhavta—making sure all eight members of the camp in Ojai, California were there.

Sam wanted to make sure we left time each morning for Adon Olam–and wondered, “Who will say the Shema with us each night before bed?”

Maddy, a female participant from Camp Ramah in Wisconsin, wanted to make sure she would have an opportunity to put on family heirloom tefillin—at the Kotel. We excused ourselves from the group’s tour of the Jerusalem Archaeological Park-Davidson Center, found a special spot, and had a few moments of special prayer, wrapped in tefillin.

The participants from the various Ramah Tikvah Programs felt a sense of connection to their fellow campers.  They enjoyed the predictability of the daily prayer ritual. And they looked forward to thanking God each day for the many gifts they have received. Isn’t that what prayer is all about?

Maddy asked me before the trip if she could lead birkat hamazone on Shabbat and we had a few takers for kiddush and hamotzi as well.

Our tour educator, Doron, an observant Jew himself, was blown away, observing that this knowledge of and enthusiasm for prayer was not typical of most Birthright trips, or any Israel trip for that matter. He was also impressed with their level of knowledge about Israel and Judaism in general.

When Henry offered a scholarly explanation at Tel Dan in the north to a question about Israel’s water issues, Doron calmly removed his tour guide license from around his neck and placed it on Henry. “You are our tour guide now!” Henry was so excited, sharing his YouTube video acquired knowledge about drip irrigation and desalinization. Doron used this “trick” on several occasions, rewarding participants particularly knowledgeable about the Old City of Jerusalem, Masada and more with the tour guide’s license.

In the Israel Museum, participants found many objects and exhibits to be familiar—including tefillin, chuppah, matzah baking, Chanukah menorahs and the three fully reconstructed synagogues.

In the north, at the Mishnaic village of Kfar Kedem, the lovely guide thought he would be introducing the group to pita making on a taboon (outdoor oven)—like he has done for years with so many tour groups. For this group, pita making was nothing new. Our Ramah camps each bring 40 or 50 shlichim (Israeli emissaries) to camp each summer. Our campers have been making pitot and eating fresh chumous for years!

Our ten day Israel trip was fun and educational for the participants. I too, learned a valuable lesson which we in the Jewish community should take to heart—and fund accordingly: people with disabilities are very capable of connecting in a meaningful way with Jewish ritual, practice, and knowledge, and with Israel. When our summer camps, synagogues, youth groups, schools, communities and Israel trips open their doors to include everyone, the payoff is as clear as the beautiful sky we saw from Jaffa on the last night of our trip of a lifetime.

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Original Article Published On The Jerusalem Post

The blue-and-white is moving its way to the top.

Israel made the biggest jump in the World Baseball Softball Confederation World Rankings in 2017, advancing from No. 41 to No. 19.

The blue-and-white defeated four Top 10 nations – Chinese Taipei, Cuba, Korea and Netherlands – in its World Baseball Classic debut in March of last year.

Team Israel ended the WBC with a 4-2 record, reaching the last eight of the tournament. Israel registered three consecutive victories in Pool A in Seoul, South Korea to advance to the second round in Tokyo.

The blue-and-white then beat Cuba, before losing to the Netherlands and Japan, who both went on to progress to the semifinals.

Elsewhere, first-time winner of the World Baseball Classic, the United States moved to within 321 points of top-ranked Japan, cutting the lead by 450 points. USA Baseball National Teams are the current title holders of three WBSC World Championships: U-12 Baseball World Cup, U-18 Baseball World Cup and World Baseball Classic.

The absence of the US in the first two editions of the U-23 Baseball World Cup (2014 and 2016) has been significant, with Japan, the current U-23 world champion, maintaining the No. 1 ranking by earning 1,236 points in these two events.

Baseball’s world rankings weigh a country’s national team performance in WBSC-sanctioned international competitions (from U-12 to Professional) over a four-year period. Points earned from the 2013 WBC have expired.

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Original Article Published On The Jerusalem Post

The kosher world continues to grow and diversify

If your bubbe had been one of the 6,000 members of the kosher food industry to attend the recent Kosherfest trade show in Secaucus, New Jersey, she would have barely recognized a single product on display at the nearly 400 booths. Even staples such as gefilte fish and matza have been updated. Gefilte fish long ago moved from jars to loaves (including tricolor plain, salmon and dill). And Passover matzot are now available with pictures and logos, courtesy of 2017 New Product Award-Winner Matzohgram Printed Matzos.
Two long days of walking the eight long, crowded aisles of the Meadowlands Exposition Center provided a unique window into “kosher in action”: new products in search of distributors; store owners inquiring about case prices; kosher certifying agencies, ranging from Sydney to London, explaining the certification process (the OU even has literature available in Chinese!); caterers and restaurant owners looking for that one new item to add to their menus this year.

And there was the massive sampling. Perhaps the toughest decision for attendees was whether to keep to dairy or meat products on a given day, so as to avoid violating the kosher prohibition of mixing milk and meat.

Exciting kosher products on display included Jack’s Gourmet turkey bacon, GranolaChik granola, Mikee Indian and Korean Sauces and Marinades, FreshBox Farms hydroponically grown leafy greens, Westminster Bakers Co.

crackers (oyster crackers, Sriracha seasoned crackers, and more), La Pastilya Home Style Appetizers (parve Moroccan cigars, kubbeh, empanadas, and more), Asian Star surimi fish (for imitation scallops, shrimp, lobster and crab), Angelic Bakehouse bread crisps (7-grain with sea salt, for example), and Ron Hot Sauces for the Brave – best washed down with Pernstejn Beer from the Czech Republic, or some of the 22 wines from Kosher Winery Argentina.

Visitors are always pleased when booths give out tote bags for carrying giveaways such as pens, pads and packages of Sunrise Popcorn (seven flavors), Jelly Belly jelly beans (blue-and-white, Happy Hanukka packaging), Launch Energy bars, Setton Farms Pistachio Chewy Bites (pistachios and blueberry infused cranberries with coconut) and Hayes Datiles (Medjool dates from Mexico).

Trends at Kosherfest 2017, organized by Lubicom Marketing Consulting since 1987, included an increase in organic, gluten-free and vegan products, a rise in convenience packaging and “on-the-go” products, and countries showing products from Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Canada, China, Costa Rica, the Czech Republic, France, India, Italy, Mexico, the Philippines, Peru, Russia, Sri Lanka and the United Kingdom.

Kosher goes data-driven Kosher is big business, and it is no longer driven by guesswork. Kosherfest kicks off each year with a breakfast and “state of the industry” address by Menachem Lubinsky, president & CEO of Lubicom Marketing Consulting.

“We used to guess who we were targeting – more or less. Now, in the new, digital age, we can find our customers!” he said. Companies are spending more to properly market their products.

Lubinsky went on to explain that kosher is a $12.5 billion industry with nearly 250,000 kosher products in the US.

“Almost all products that can be kosher are now kosher – the US is virtually a kosher country,” he said. Kosher products are now available in stores such as Costco, Target, Walmart and 7-Eleven. “It is not a favor to local rabbis to offer kosher products – kosher products sell!” “If you are an ingredient country in Thailand or anywhere, you are effectively ‘locked out’ if you are not kosher,” reports Lubinsky, who notes that 99 countries now produce kosher-certified products.

Yarden Horwitz, a trendspotting lead for Google, was a new addition this year, invited to deliver a keynote address titled “Using online food trend to develop and market winning products.” Horwitz suggested ways the kosher food industry can use data to better understand their customers and to market and sell products accordingly.

“We are sitting on a gold mine of data about what consumers are searching for, in over a billion searches a year,” she said.
Horwitz identified three main times of the year when consumers search for kosher products, and she pinpointed where they are searching from: April (pre-Passover), searching mainly from New York, New Jersey and Washington, DC; July and August, searching for kosher hot dogs (Nevada is the top search location); and November (Thanksgiving in the US), searching in large numbers from Florida. “We are always looking at risers [water is a riser, she noted] and decliners [e.g., juice], we are asking what is going to be the next Greek yogurt [French yogurt is showing promise], and we follow trends during the week [people tend to be focused more on healthy eating during weekdays and are more indulgent on weekends],” she said.

Israel at Kosherfest While long known for its agricultural exports, and more recently for wines, Israel exhibited a diverse range of products at Kosherfest. Lubinsky stressed Israel’s role as a leader in the worldwide kosher food industry.

“Israel is developing cutting-edge technologies and using new, innovative tools. For example, low sugar and low fat. Just eight or nine years ago, $150 million in kosher products was exported from Israel. Now, it is $246m.,” he said.

There are more than 1,700 plants in Israel that produce food, employing 64,000 workers. The five largest food companies are Osem, Strauss, Unilever, Tnuva and the Central Beverage Company. The export of wine and beverages to the US in 2016 was $32m., a 7% increase over 2015.

Benjamin Bauer, an importer of fine kosher wines, proudly showed wines from Hevron Heights Winery, including a $200 bottle of Ezekiel wine.

“People are looking to support Israel. They will take an Israeli wine over a French wine. And wines from Hebron were especially popular [a few weeks ago], when we read about it in the weekly Torah portion,” he said, pointing to a bottle of Makhpelah wine.

Debbie Smith, associate director of sales and marketing for Marzipan Bakeries, gave out samples of hot marzipan, well known in Jerusalem for 40 years, and available in the US for the past two years.

“So many people love marzipan so much!” she said.
Yonatan Gershon and daughter Keren, owners of Neptune Foods of Beersheba, displayed a wide range of sauces and spreads, including pesto za’atar, sweet harissa and sweet pepper spread. Yonatan’s father was a spice importer from India. He developed blends, and the company now produces sauces, spreads and rice mixes.

“We believe Israeli companies can succeed in America – if we have good items at a good price. The US is the best market for Israeli products, and we are not only selling to the Israeli and Jewish market.”

Mahdi Aralan of Almahdi Sweets came to Kosherfest from Nazareth. He has had a store in Jerusalem’s Mahaneh Yehuda market for two-and-a-half years. He proudly shows off beautiful, carefully packaged gift boxes of baklava.

“Our baklava has 7-12% less sugar than most other baklavas, and we make 100 pieces per kilo,” he said.

Others reportedly make 50 per kilo.

El Nakhleh Coffee of Shfaram proudly displayed ground roasted coffee, with and without cardamom, in capsules for use in Nespresso machines.

Toot Food Industries is a Migdal Ha’emek-based company with a strong social justice connection. The maker of hazelnut date snacks, chocolate-covered almonds and pecans, truffles and marshmallows was in danger of closing and laying off 60 Arab and Jewish workers. American businessman and real estate investor Jonathon Weiner and his wife, Ayelet, bought the factory, hired manager Moti Goldstein and invested in new machinery. They are developing healthier products, for the local market and for export.

Weiner would like to see more Israelis proudly buying made-in-Israel products over often cheaper products made in China and elsewhere.

Shelly’s Natural Best, a three-year-old Israeli company, sells two different products – tiger nut butters, and freeze-dried sprouted legumes (lentils, mung beans, chickpeas). The company aims to “define new standards of quality, taste, aroma and nutritional value for the health-food industry.”

Other Israeli companies at Kosherfest included Al Arz Tahini, Dough’s, Tenta Topgum Sweets, Maadaney Yehiam, Jerusalem Winery, Mahroum Sweets, Matzot Aviv, Bare Juices, Pri-Chen, and J&G Pecans. Bare was one of the winners of the New Product Competition.

The Israeli companies at Kosherfest all expressed appreciation to Carol Nave, manager of food and beverages in the Consumer Goods Division of the Israel Export Institute/Israel Economic Mission, for helping them get to this important show.

“We come to Kosherfest each year,” said Nave. “We have all the latest food trends to offer – gluten-free, sugar-free, lactose-free, lean label.

“The kosher market is our natural market,” she continued. “We are also trying to penetrate the general market.”

The range of quality Israeli products at Kosherfest indicated she and her Israeli companies may be on the road to continued success.

A kosher export with an import twist If Barry Brucker has his way, he will import Aviv matzot and send them back to Israel – once he and his Matzohgram Printed Matzo company are done printing Stars of David, Seder plates and “Happy Passover” greetings on them.
Brucker wanted to do something nice for his synagogue Seder a few years ago. “We had printing equipment, since we are a printing company.”
People were so excited when they saw the matzot with pictures and writing. “People came out with napkins wrapping the matza to take home so it wouldn’t break!” he said.

He test-marketed the matza in Los Angeles delis, and it sold out in four days. “Rabbi Rick Jacobs, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, had it on his table, and it was a hit. I have gotten similarly nice comments from other rabbis!” Brucker now hopes to introduce his matzot to the Israeli market.

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