Happy Hanukkah!
While 2024 brought that rare holiday-season convergence — when Hanukkah actually began on Christmas Day (a handful-of-times-since-1900 situation!) — this year looks very different. In 2025, the first day of Hanukkah arrives today, December 14th, a full eleven days earlier.
Why the timing shift this year?
Because Hanukkah follows the Hebrew lunisolar calendar, which blends lunar months with a solar year. That rhythm doesn’t sync cleanly with the Gregorian calendar, so festival dates appear to “move.” Hence last year’s Christmas overlap… and this year’s earlier celebration.
Hanukkah, at its heart, is a season of light, resilience, remembrance, and food — from the oil-kissed classics to diasporic Jewish dishes shaped by centuries of migration, adaptation, and cultural exchange.
And speaking of Jewish foodways… I’m especially looking forward to this February’s premiere of Henry Louis Gates’ new Black–Jewish documentary on PBS, where my dear friend Michael Twitty (see photo carousel in this post) demonstrates his powerful Kosher Soul thesis: that Black and Jewish histories, migrations, struggles, and food traditions don’t just sit side-by-side — they braid together, shaping identity, memory, and meaning across generations. His savory (& sweet!) segment explores how the kitchen and dining tables become meeting places for these intertwined histories and cultures — reminding us that these connections aren’t theoretical; they’re lived, shared, and carried forward
Sending warmth, light, and joyful bites & sips o all who celebrate!
— The Food Griot
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