Hi! I’m Sandy! Welcome to Plantains & Challah. (formerly The Kosher Tomato ) If I had to choose two foods to represent me, it would be Plantains & Challah bread. (I was born to a Colombian-Argentinean-Jewish family)
YES, Latin Jews exist!
I am proud to say I am trained at The Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY and I cooked professionally for over 12 years. I have been fortunate to work with some really amazing chefs in New York City during that time.
Now, I’m a mom of two and I teach home Chefs how to create delicious food without recipes by focusing on technique (and knife skills). My goal is to empower you with knowledge and give you confidence in the kitchen.
Any recipes you find here will follow a kosher guideline, (no pork, seafood or mixing meat/poultry together) but I focus on techniques which can be applied across all foods.
Fun facts about me:
- In 2008, I was featured as one of the “HEEB 100” (Jews doing cool things)
- In 2009, I became a finalist for filming The Food Network‘s Season 2 of “CHOPPED”, I backed out at the end and missed the opportunity.
- I organize my closet by color
- I LOVE to clean and organize. And rearrange. (My husband is very understanding of this.)
- I am terrible at math, but great with knife skills
- I am fluent in Spanish, but my accent is kind of all over the place, prompting Latinos to always ask “De donde eres?”
- love weight lifting, zumba, dance in general, and singing.
- When it comes to music, I love everything from Classical symphonies, to old school hip-hop and most things in between. (But mainly, I am obsessed with 90’s Hip-hop)