On the Chocolate Trail

I’m grateful for this story written by Rachel Ringer, published at JTA/NY Jewish Week on December 20, 2023:

(New York Jewish Week) — In 2006, Rabbi Deborah Prinz was on a trip to Europe with her husband, Rabbi Mark Hurvitz, when they wandered into a chocolate shop in Paris. While meandering about the store, Prinz picked up a brochure and read a line that, given her rudimentary French, she was sure she misunderstood: It claimed that Jews had brought the art of chocolate-making to France.

Prinz, who at the time was the congregational rabbi at Temple Adat Shalom in Poway, California, was stunned. That little morsel of information stayed with her throughout her 10-week sabbatical — and ended up being a defining moment of her life: For the next several years, Prinz followed the zigzagging trail of chocolate, from the rain forests of the New World to the cities of the Old World and, from there, to the American colonies, hoping to clarify the role that Jews played in the making, marketing, and trading of chocolate

Prinz, who now lives in New York, was fascinated by the connection between Jews and chocolate, and the overlap between the dispersion of the Jews and the expansion of the chocolate market across the globe. Her research culminated in a book, On the Chocolate Trail: A Delicious Adventure Connecting Jews, Religions, History, Travel, Rituals and Recipes to the Magic of Cacao, which she published a decade ago.

A second edition came out in 2018, with a new chapter about the controversies over chocolate likenesses of deities, as well as updated information about chocolate museums and factory tours around the world.

Now, an exhibit detailing the rich history of Jews and chocolate in this country, “Sweet Treat: Chocolate and the Making of American Jews,” is on view at Manhattan’s Central Synagogue, where Prinz began her career as the Reform congregation’s first female rabbi. The exhibit is a pared-down, American-specific version of an exhibit Prinz co-created in 2017 with the Bernard Museum at Temple Emanu-El on the Upper East Side, ““Semi[te] Sweet: On Jews and Chocolate.” Continue reading at …