Spice Cupboard

Unlike most other Australian Jews, Elana's parents were born and grew up in Bombay, and her grandparents came from Iraq, Burma and India. Her father’s family immigrated to Sydney, her mother’s to Los Angeles, both in the 1960s. They married in Sydney and raised their family there, alongside the father’s many brothers and sisters and members of their former Bombay community. Despite being Jewish, her upbringing was greatly influenced by the food, language and culture of India, and to a lesser extent, Iraq.

My Mother's Spice Cupboard is the story of what happened to a community which no longer exists, how its members built new lives in a different country, and what it was like to grow up as one of their children. It's also about how much things have changed over four generations in one family.

Underlying the entire narrative is the importance of food and cooking, which goes beyond the mere provision of sustenance to express warmth, love and hospitality.

Praise for My Mother's Spice Cupboard

“This is a story of a diaspora community - in one sense...but one...about whom… the general Australian Jewish community know so little. So it is an important book… [which] also needs to go into the official history of Australian Jewry."

– Dr Ron Weiser AM

"My Mother’s Spice Cupboard is very readable, and makes an important contribution to understanding the everyday life of the Baghdadi community in India.”

- Professor Suzanne D Rutland, OAM, University of Sydney

MY MOTHER'S SPICE CUPBOARD

Praise for My Mother's Spice Cupboard

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