Adina Levy shows us how she makes everything from scratch

Job: High school food and nutrition teacher

Lives: London

Family: Husband and six kids aged 8-20

My cooking philosophy
I know a little too much about food and health, because I teach the subject. I don’t know if that actually means we eat healthier, or just that I know what I’m serving.

I bake our own challos and rolls, I make homemade pie crusts, falafel from scratch, and I make my own puff pastry on the occasion I use it (Ladies, it’s easy, it takes like ten minutes and it rolls better than the commercial one. I teach my ninth-grade students how to make it, and they can’t believe how easy it is — and how much margarine it has.)

We don’t use a lot of processed food; all of my kids’ snacks are homemade besides pretzels and crackers, but they do include a lot of cake and cookies. I’m quick in the kitchen; on the three days a week that I walk into the house from work at 4:10 p.m., I make supper in 50 minutes.

Best supper hack

I always cook double of the protein and freeze it for the next week. Nobody notices it’s not fresh. Besides chicken wings, of course.

Something I serve for my family’s health

I don’t think we eat that healthily. But we drink healthy: water, and only water, during the week. Soda and fruit juices are opened for Shabbos.

Go-to kimpeturin supper

Soup. Fried ground-chicken burgers, with some nicer potato dish, like potatoes with green beans and mushrooms. A cake for dessert. I don’t like to get too fancy, because if I would, I’d hesitate to make supper for people.

Cooking theory

A spoonful of sugar can often save a dish. For example, it helps soften and break up the peas in split pea soup. It softens chickpeas and makes them ready quicker. In any acidic sauce, like tomato-based sauces, a little sugar balances the acid.

Sauce and spice

Nothing exotic at all. I go through big containers of the basics: onion powder, garlic powder, and paprika. I make almost all my sauces myself, although I do buy barbecue sauce.

Sunday

Mushroom soup and homemade pizza

prepared in a pizza maker. Homemade means dough and sauce from scratch.
My sauce recipe is from my sister and is made from canned plum tomatoes, garlic, onion, and spices, blended. It’s amazing.
I bake a lot of my family’s bread and rolls (for school lunches), as well as kokosh cake, and my way of getting the freshest yeast is to buy a kilo block of yeast (2.2 lbs) from the local kosher bakery every couple of weeks and share it with my neighbor.

Monday

Fleishigs

I often make a hot dog goulash recipe from years ago in Family Table. This week I did chicken wings.
I put a layer of potatoes in a pan with salt and paprika, topped it with a layer of wings, and then topped it with barbecue sauce and baked it for two hours.

Tuesday

Salmon

with risotto and green beans. (When I don’t make salmon, it’s tuna burgers, which my younger kids actually prefer.)
I bake the salmon as I bake any fish: Sprinkle on salt, pepper, sugar, garlic powder, spray with oil, and bake covered for half an hour.

Wednesday

Spaghetti Bolognese,

my tomatoey-meat sauce with spaghetti. I make it every single week, because everybody likes it. I also serve peas; cooked separately, of course.

Thursday

Eggs

and fries with baked beans. Shakshuka for the adults. One kid doesn’t like fries because he “doesn’t eat potatoes,” so he gets a piece of fresh hot potato kugel. Shh, don’t tell my son that potato kugel is made of potatoes.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 956)