Join schol­ars Bar­bara Kir­shen­blatt-Gim­blett and Dar­ra Gold­stein as they wax poet­ic about cook­book dur­ing a voyeuris­tic look at their prized cook­book col­lec­tions. Bar­bara has been col­lect­ing out of print trea­sures and books from over­seas for decades. The two will pore over a few choice selec­tions from Bar­bara’s impres­sive col­lec­tion and Dar­ra will share a few of her own favorites from her spe­cial col­lec­tion, as well.

This event is co-pro­duced with The Jew­ish Book Council

BAR­BARA KIR­SHEN­BLATT-GIM­BLETT is Chief Cura­tor of the Core Exhi­bi­tion at POLIN Muse­um of the His­to­ry of Pol­ish Jews and Uni­ver­si­ty Pro­fes­sor Emeri­ta and Pro­fes­sor Emeri­ta of Per­for­mance Stud­ies at New York Uni­ver­si­ty. Her books include Des­ti­na­tion Cul­ture: Tourism, Muse­ums, and Her­itage; Image before My Eyes: A Pho­to­graph­ic His­to­ry of Jew­ish Life in Poland, 1864 – 1939 (with Luc­jan Dobroszy­c­ki); and They Called Me May­er July: Paint­ed Mem­o­ries of a Jew­ish Child­hood in Poland Before the Holo­caust (with May­er Kir­shen­blatt). She has con­tributed entries on Jew­ish cook­books and Jew­ish food to the YIVO Ency­clo­pe­dia of Jews in East­ern Europe, Ency­clo­pe­dia Judaica, and Ency­clo­pe­dia of Food and Cul­ture, and arti­cles to Gas­tro­nom­i­ca. She received the Officer’s Cross of the Order of Mer­it of the Repub­lic of Poland and was elect­ed to the Amer­i­can Acad­e­my of Arts and Sci­ences. She cur­rent­ly serves on Advi­so­ry Boards for Jew­ish muse­ums in Vien­na, Berlin, and Moscow, and advis­es on muse­um projects in Lithua­nia and Albania.

DAR­RA GOLD­STEIN is the Found­ing Edi­tor of Gas­tro­nom­i­ca: The Jour­nal of Food and Cul­ture, named the 2012 Pub­li­ca­tion of the Year by the James Beard Foun­da­tion, and the lead schol­ar for YIVO’s online course ​“A Seat at the Table: A Jour­ney into Jew­ish Food.” She is the author of six award-win­ning cook­books, includ­ing The Geor­gian Feast (the 1994 IACP Julia Child Cook­book of the Year) and the recent­ly pub­lished Beyond the North Wind: Rus­sia in Recipes and Lore, a New York Times best cook­book for Spring 2020. Dar­ra serves as Series Edi­tor of Cal­i­for­nia Stud­ies in Food and Cul­ture (Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia Press) and has been hon­ored as Dis­tin­guished Fel­low in Food Stud­ies at the Jack­man Human­i­ties Insti­tute, Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to, and as a Mac­ge­orge Fel­low at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Mel­bourne. She sits on the board of the Julia Child Foun­da­tion for Gas­tron­o­my and the Culi­nary Arts and is a mem­ber of the advi­so­ry ​“Kitchen Cab­i­net” of the Smith­son­ian Nation­al Muse­um of Amer­i­can History.