Apples & Honey Press

Mr. Mintz was exactly the kind of neighbor everyone wanted.

He had a friendly word and a smile for everyone.

Plus, he was awesome at: remembering birthdays, raking leaves, carrying groceries, shovelling snow, giving bike-riding lessons, filling bird feeders, and putting out milk for cats.

And oh, what a marvelous cook Mr. Mintz was!

He'd measure and mix and chop and pour. He'd add a sponful of this and a pinch of that. He'd fill and fry and bake.

And in no time at all there'd be a dish of something so mouth-wateringly delicious that the aroma reached into every house on the street.

Mr. Mintz is famous in the neighborhood for cooking up cheesy, gooey, and delicious blintzes. He shares them each spring to celebrate the Shavuot holiday.

But something happens to Mr. Mintz this year, and he can't make his sweet treats.

Oh no! Can

We recently received a letter from “Concerned Citizen,” an anonymous 8^th grader from Boston, who noticed that in the Hebrew series Z’Man L’Tefilah (Time for Prayer) “every single illustration in the book depicts white people,” and urged us to do better than to present “a singular image of Jews.”

The student is right. This series, developed in the 1980s by the publishing company A.R.E., is illustrated with small line drawings that present what could be called an Ashkenazic world view, a view that North American Jews are exclusively descended from the Eastern European Jews who immigrated during the late 1800s and early 1900s as they fled pogroms and other atrocities.

Behrman House took over distribution of this series in the early 2000s, and while we regularly review already published titles, as a small independent publisher we do not often have the budget to go back and

May is Jewish-American Heritage Month, which pays tribute to the generations of Jewish Americans who helped form the fabric of American history, culture and society.

Open a window to the American Jewish experience with these storybooks from Apples & Honey Press.

American-influenced Tall Tales 

If I saw a big fish,

twice the size of a ship,

and she swam by my boat in the sea,

if that fish opened wide

showing Jonah inside,

I would holler,

"Hey, fish, wait for me!"

What would you do if you met Jonah and the big fish? Would you make them a seaweed snack? Join them for a swim in the sea?

Maybe you'd show Jonah how to help others.

If I Swam with Jonah, by Pamela Moritz and beautifully illustrated by MacKenzie Haley, is a new picture book for ages 3-6. It includes a note for families with a brief explanation of the story of Jonah, struggling with doing things we should but don't want to do, and helping others.

If I Swam with Jonah is now available

With Passover just around the corner, show students how the humble matza - the cornerstone of the seder - comes into being. 

How It’s Made: Matzah, by Allison Ofanansky, explores all the materials and activities involved in creating a matza, when and why we eat it, and why we celebrate Passover in the first place. 

More than 100 full-color photographs by Eliyahu Alpern provide a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the people who make matzah — by hand or in factories — and see how they keep to the strict 18-minute limit, mirroring the Israelites' race

Books make for fun and playful gifts that the entire family can enjoy while growing together in their Jewish learning. Here are some holiday-themed stories from our children's imprint, Apples & Honey Press.

In

Reprinted from ReformJudaism.org

By Rabbi Leah Berkowitz

A few years ago, on the morning of Purim, I woke up with a rhyme in my head: I am not in the mood to dance, for I am in my comfy pants!

I had been wanting to write about Queen Vashti for a while. A big part of my rabbinate and my writing focuses on uplifting the stories of women in the biblical narrative, especially those who do not get enough attention.

Queen Vashti only gets a few sentences in the first chapter of the book of Esther, yet she has captured the imagination of rabbis, modern feminists, and fiction writers because she said "no" to a group of powerful men - including her husband.

No

On March 19, Jewish communities across North America will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the first bat mitzvah ceremony of an American girl.

In the 1920s the world was changing for women. They had recently won the right to vote and were working at jobs once held only by men. Women were even driving cars. Maybe it was time for things to change in the synagogue as well.

Rabbi Mordechai Kaplan told his 12-year-old daughter Judy that it was time for her to lead services, to be become a bat mitzvah. It was unthinkable. Or was it? Judith Kaplan became the first bat mitzvah, making history and marking the beginning of a new synagogue

Coming March 1, and in plenty of time for Passover, are new picture books Apples & Honey Press. 

I live in a teeny tiny matzah house.

It is so crowded and noisy in here that I can't hear myself meow.

Where will we put all our guests for the Passover seder?

A cat made of oranges and its veggie family is wondering how they will be able to fit all the Passover guests into their teeny tiny matzah house for the seder. The husband-and-wife team of Bill and Claire Wurtzel have

A lot of chocolate is purchased in Feburary, whether as gifts or personal consumption. It's also not too early to decide whether to host a chocolate seder this year.

However you enjoy chocolate, there's a lot of backstory to how chocolate came to Europe, and eventually, the United States, via Sephardic Jews. 

The Chocolate King by Michael Leventhal and illustrated by Laura Catalan "tells the sur­pris­ing sto­ry of Jew­ish refugees from Spain who brought choco­late to France in the sev­en­teenth cen­tu­ry. Weav­ing togeth­er fairy tale ele­ments and his­to­ry, the intergenerati