Meet Bryce Gruber,Jewish momand founder of The Luxury Spot. Gruber, besides being a mom to three kids and wife to her wild Israeli snowboarding husband, works as a writer and editor. Besides founding The Luxury Spot (a women’s lifestyle magazine), she writes for magazines like NBC News, TODAY, and Yahoo. As if that wasn’t enough, she was actually on “Millionaire Matchmaker,” you know, the Bravo TV show where you’re supposed to find your wealthy spouse, back in 2010.
Besides that, she’sone of the creators of theMega Kids Challah Bake, one of the largest simultaneous baking classes ever given to children (the Guinness World Records has been invited toobserve the event) taking places tomorrow, January 12th, atthe New York Hilton in Midtown.
READ:I’m Finally Taking My Mom to Her First Challah Baking Experience
We were lucky enough to be able to speak with Bryce about the exciting event and her lifeas a busy Jewish mom, editor, and all around superhero:
1. Favorite Yiddish word: My house is pretty Sephardic, so the Yiddish is sparse, but living in NYC has taught me that you can refer to anything and everything as “schmalzy.” I mean, isn’t that the most fun to say? “Oh hi, Karen! I can’t believe I ran into you at this schmaltzy place!”
2. Favorite comfort food: Challah is my carb of choice, and carbs are my comfort…They turn my hips into pillows of love, sort of literally, so I like to think that brings comfort to my kids, too (otherwise what the heck is the point of having pillowy hips?).
My fave part about challah, other than it being a vehicle for every other food ever, is that it’s the unifying carb of the Jews, which is why I’ve been really excited to work on the Mega Kids Challah Bakewith a bunch of other Jewish moms across NYC. We basically promote the love of Jewish carbs, and train people to make them. Knowing how to bake challah is basically the best set of coping skills I can imagine, and coping = comfort. I’m really hoping everyone can join us on January 12th at the first bake!
3. If you could be anyone or anything, just for one day, what would you be? Wouldn’t it be cool to travel on a soul-level to Moses’ body as he’s parting the Red Sea? Aside from that being the greatest thing EVER to see, I mean, I’m curious exactly how it went down. I feel like I could write a best-selling book if I unearth the secrets to parting huge bodies of water.
4. What TV show have you binge watched? I binge watch everything with a deep historical or factual element on Netflix. Like, if there’s a show about 14th century donkeys, I’ll probably watch it till 2 a.m.and go to work a mess the next day.
READ: Why I Make Challah Every Friday
5. Biggest pet peeve: Bad attitudes are the worst. Life is short, don’t suck.
6. If you were a Jewish holiday, which one would you be? If I could be any Jewish holiday, I know I wouldn’t be Yom Kippur. I love food (especially challah) too much, so I think I’d probably be assigned something like Lag Ba’Omer. It makes the most sense.
7. Favorite Jewish phrase: I don’t have a favorite Jewish phrase necessarily, but I’ll openly admit that my Hebrew isn’t that great, and that’s tricky because I have an Israeli husband and threelittle Israeli kids. Sometimes I’ll be mid-sentence in Hebrew and realize I don’t know how to finish what I’m trying to say, so I’ll just casually be like “ma nish ta na, ha laila ha zeh?” because that was the first Hebrew sentence I ever learned. It never makes any actual sense, but it usually gets a funny look or a smile which diverts attention from the fact that I really have no idea how to say “toilet plunger” in Hebrew.
8. What’s the first thing you do in the morning? As cheesy as it sounds, I kiss my kids every morning, because I usually wake up at 6 a.m.when they’re literally jumping on top of me in my bed.
9. What’s the last thing you do at night? I say the shema every single night. I know that’s maybe not the most common answer for a girl who wears no pants, no wig, and didn’t take her husband’s last name…but, spirituality is everything to me.
10. What was your inspiration for the Kids Challah Bake?
My friend Gillie Shanowitz came to me with the idea of challah being the carb that unifies the Jewish people, and we totally had lightbulb-over-our-heads moment where we looked at each other and just said, “Let’s make this huge.” It’s a weird time in history for the Jewish people (but honestly, when is it not?).
READ:Saturday Morning Breakfast Traditions: Challah French Toast!
We figured the best way to make a positive difference was to unify all the kids of every style and custom of Jewish observance, especially because this is a hakhel (gather) year in the Jewish calendar. The hakhel happens once every seven years, and it stems from the time when all the Jews were supposed to gather at the Temple. We don’t have a temple now, but we can certainly still unite and act as a big, extended family… especially if there’s a delicious carb as a result.
Don’t forget to check out this awesome video with Salt N Pepa talk about challah (and the Mega Challah Bake for Kids!) withJSpace.com:
Joanna C. Valente
Joanna Valente is the former Staff WriteratKveller. Joannais the author ofSirs & Madams,The Gods Are Dead, Xenos, andMarysof the Sea, andreceived anMFA at Sarah Lawrence College.You can follow@joannasaidon Twitter and@joannacvalente on Instagram.
