Meet Debbie Prinz a Rabbi Who Shares the History of Jews & Chocolate
Debbie Prinz
The story is a familiar one in the world of chocolate: a food enthusiast travels to Paris, eats a European-style truffle or bonbon, then returns to the US to start a chocolate business. Fran Bigelow, for instance, was inspired to launch the famed Fran’s Chocolates in Seattle after discovering the simple, elegant flavors of French chocolates in Paris in 1982. In Oakland, CA, chocolatier David Upchurch conjures the memories of a year in the French capital to create European-style confections and pâtes de fruits.
When Rabbi Debbie Prinz discovered chocolate in Paris, she didn’t expect her professional life to change. However, a serendipitous stop at L’Atelier du Chocolat prompted her to research the intersection of Judaism and chocolate. The result? On The Chocolate Trail, a book whose 2nd edition came out in 2017.
This fall, Debbie Prinz and her co-author Tami Lehman-Wilzig released The Boston Chocolate Party, a children’s book set during the Jewish festival of Hannukah in 1773. The first day of Hanukah is coming up (December 19), giving us the perfect excuse to sit down with the rabbi and author to discuss her work.
What place did chocolate take in your childhood home? Do you have a specific memory to share?
The glittery chocolate coins called gelt signaled Hanukkah’s arrival in my childhood home. I didn’t know anything about their history until decades later after a serendipitous experience in Belgium with St. Nick’s chocolate coins that I discuss fully in [my book] On The Chocolate Trail.
That led me to consider Christian and Jewish chocolate-filled golden coin stories and inspiring accounts of courage and liberation that melt together in December holidays.
Chocolate surfaced again at Passover, the spring celebration of the biblical Exodus from Egypt. Our religious school, like many others, ran a chocolate fundraiser sponsored by Barton’s Bonbonniere. That introduced me to Barton’s chocolate lollypops. On the Chocolate Trail features a chapter about the inspiring story of the Barton’s company founded by immigrant Steven Klein, along with other refugee chocolate stories.
Who knew that those holiday childhood experiences would expand into full chapters in the book?
I love that, Debbie.
A lot of people associate cacao with Aztec and Mayan, then chocolate with Belgium and Switzerland, but few people realize Jews have likely played a role bringing chocolate from Spain to France. Do you remember when and how you found out about this piece of history?
Yes, very clearly.
It started with my “choco-dar,” my radar for chocolate experiences. Choco-dar kicked in at L’Atelier du Chocolat in Paris where I happened to pick up the company brochure and I happened to be able to read an astonishing passage in my high school French that Jews, exiled from Spain, brought chocolate making to France through the city of Bayonne at the beginning of the seventeenth century.
Oh la la! I had never heard anything about Jews bringing chocolate to France in all my years of Jewish studies as a child, at seminary to become a rabbi, and or during my years of teaching adults and children. Until Paris, I knew nothing about historical connections between Jews and chocolate, or even religions and chocolate.
Your book, On the Chocolate Trail, explores the intersections of Judaism and chocolate. What prompted you to write this book?
That passage from the Parisian chocolate store stayed with me. With more detective work I learned that in their Western relocations from Spain and Portugal, Jews played a critical, if not unique part in the cocoa business. The 15th century Expulsion of Jews from Spain created a trail of Jewish business interests in chocolate that continues today. Its chronicles of nourishment, sweetness, and resilience bypass the worn, tragedy-themed view of Jewish history. This universal comfort food of chocolate has migrated with persecuted refugees and has fortified resourceful minorities, both Jewish and non-Jewish. Further, Mayans/Aztecs, Jews, Catholics, Protestants, and Quakers converge on the chocolate trail; their stories make up the second section of the book. On the Chocolate Trail is the first-ever book about Jews, religions, and chocolate.
I’m particularly interested in how your knowledge of chocolate informs your work as a rabbi. For instance, do you bring up the topic of child slavery in cacao farms during Passover?
Absolutely. And, not only at Passover. At Hanukah and as often as possible when I speak about chocolate. I continue to be deeply troubled by the underside of the chocolate industry that depends on cacao beans sourced from small farms in West Africa, where over 2 million children work in hazardous conditions, some of them enslaved. The economic disparities between cacao farmers and consumers in the developed world also disturb me.
These issues are especially striking at Passover when Jews celebrate liberation from Egyptian slavery in biblical times. Through my writing and teaching, I encourage people to avoid chocolate with the “ingredient” of child labor/slavery. So, I encourage people to buy the only fair trade chocolate brand that is also kosher for Passover.
I also developed A Haggadah for a Socially Responsible Chocolate Seder which unwraps themes of ethical kashrut, worker equity, and food justice. It elevates Passover’s underlying messages of freedom, dignity, and fairness through chocolate.
In addition, the last chapter in On the Chocolate Trail discusses religious values in our chocolate choices. Finally, the book’s Appendix includes “A Consumer’s Guide to the Ethics of Chocolate: Selecting the Best” which rates a lot of chocolate companies according to ethical values.
You’ve just released The Boston Chocolate Party (Behrman House, October 2022), a children’s book (and great Hanukkah gift idea!) which “melds themes of Jews in the chocolate trade, the American fight for independence, and Hanukkah’s message of freedom.” What inspired this book?
The book started with a brilliant association made by my co-author, Tami Lehman-Wilzig. Tami read On the Chocolate Trail and read the chapter titled, “Jews Dip Into Chocolate in the American Colonial Period,” about Sephardi Jews in the chocolate business and how chocolate drinking supplanted tea after the Boston Tea Party, the phrase “Boston Chocolate Party!” popped into her head. That title stayed with her. She also checked the Jewish calendar for the date of the Boston Tea Party (1773) to find that the last night of Hanukkah coincided with the Tea Party. The book, in part, illustrates the parallel stories of freedom sought by the American colonists and the Maccabees.
I met Tami when she was looking for content for her children’s calendar project. She recalled On the Chocolate Trail and reached out to me for material. A few weeks later, I reached out to her to see if she wanted to collaborate on a children’s book since I like to share the stories of Jews and chocolate with as many audiences as possible. That’s why I co-curated the exhibit “Semite Sweet: On Jews and Chocolate” for the Bernard Museum of Temple Emanu-El, NYC (now available to travel around the world).
Similarly, I thought, a children’s book about Jews and chocolate would expand the Chocolate Trail. That initiated our own writing ‘party’: Tami focused on plot development, and I contributed my chocolate expertise. There was plenty of brainstorming. Now we get to toast The Boston Chocolate Party! and, we encourage readers to create their own chocolate parties with online resources:
Now for the fun part: what are some your chocolate favorite? Any brand of gelt you’d like to recommend our readers?
Truthfully, any chocolate I’m about to eat is my favorite. I do tend to like bars in the 70% cocoa range, sometimes with orange or coffee elements.
Thank you for asking for gelt recommendations. Fortunately, a couple of companies make a flavorful, non-waxy tasting and fair-traded chocolate gelt, maximizing enjoyment through guilt free gelt. Check out the coin products from Divine Chocolate and Lake Champlain Chocolates.
Wishing everyone much joy on the chocolate trail!