having purchased and schlepped back Israelward enough weird herbal tinctures and Tom’s of Maine products to last me the remainder of my year here and probably 3-6 other people’s years, as well. I also bought tortillas. Tortillas, dude! Not available here, no no not at all. Burrito Shabbos will be mine once again!
Also got some decent scotch at the duty-free, natch.
Have also discovered–oddly enough–that I really love John Denver. Who knew? But I’m listening to him right now and he’s making me feel happy happy. Rock on John Denver.
Scotch and John Denver and tortillas. What else does one need at the end of a chilly Jerusalem December, really?
Answer: Long johns. But I got those, too. Hah.
Hmm. I’ve found that those Arabic pitot (you know the really thin supersize flat ones) make a reasonably adequate substitute for flour tortillas – yes you can make burritos from them. The thing I could never get right was the cheese. I love Israeli cheeses (and miss them dreadfully here. Oh, I sigh with the memory of my corner market with its amazing selection of wonderful dairy, and the young pleasant Israeli cute-dude who would find me exactly the right kind of cheese every week, whether I knew I was looking for it or not. Also his dad, who puttered amongst the vegetables. Brookville market is nice, but it ain’t Israeli!), but they don’t go well with American (in the broad sense) cuisine.
After living in San Francisco, the thought of going mekiel on the tortilla issue–that is, trying to substitue something else–seems impossible. But don’t matter, ’cause I have tortillas now. 😉 The cheese is in fact a real potential problem, but if I can’t find a proper Mexican food cheese after scouring the town, I’ll have to figure something out. For some reason, subbing in a different cheese offends my sensibilities less than using a not-really tortilla. No idea what that’s about, really.
Torillas are most certainly available here in Israel! Not sure where you can get them in J-town, but there they can be bought in food specialty stores. There is also a Mexican food supply store on Dizengoff in Tel Aviv where they can be bought fresh.
Oooh, that is SO good to know about, thanks, Harry. Another reason to get to TA more often.
Tortillas are also available in the Gush. My wife had someone in her ulpan bring her some.