This is something I did once and haven’t done since. I’m reviving the practice for this week, though. Ready? This week’s prizes are…

1) Closest Brush With Fame: this prize goes to me. For getting my first piece posted in The Jew and the Carrot.

2) Most Disappointing Experiment: Injera-dillas. The theory was they’d be like quesadillas but made with injera instead of tortillas. Not as exciting as I had hoped. Maybe it would be better with some berebere-spiked salsa…

3) Sweetest Nosh: The chocolate mousse cake at the Fourth Annual MLK Commemorative Shabbat. This service at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue brought together all kinds of people to honor Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, who worked with Dr. King and said that marching for civil rights felt like praying with his feet.

There were Baptist church-going ladies in their Baptist church-going hats alongside crunchy liberal Jews in their crunchy liberal Jew-wear. And around them was everyone in between. There won’t be many services where I will sing both “L’chah Dodi” and “We Shall Overcome.” This was unique.

When the service was over, the huge throng headed downstairs for a dessert reception. I expected uninspired kosher cake and cookies–institutional tasting, perhaps dry. What more could a synagogue do when it has to buy noshes for hundreds of people who aren’t even paying for the event? But my oh my! I found homemade-quality cookies, chocolate-covered strawberries, and chocolate mousse cake with a hazelnut crust. A delightful end to a delectable meeting of cultures.