By Rabbi Rachel Esserman

I had to laugh when I saw the link to an article about how to make an Israeli salad. It brought back memories of my 10 months in Be’er-sheva (Beersheva), Israel during the mid-1990s, and my three 24-year-old Israeli roommates who had some very different ideas about food.
First, for those who don’t know what an Israeli salad is, according to my roommates, it consists of tomatoes and cucumbers only. No lettuce, no onions, no peppers, etc. Sometimes they put a light dressing on their tomatoes and cucumbers, while, at other times, the vegetables were eaten plain. What was odd was that they made a wide variety of salads with just those two ingredients. Wondering how they could do that? They cut the cucumbers and tomatoes in different sizes and shapes depending on the meal. How did they decide what type of cut was appropriate for each meal? I still don’t know. It was impossible to determine by observation and they were unable to explain it. They seemed to know automatically what kind of salad it should be.
We also differed about teas. At that time, I wasn’t supposed to drink caffeinated tea, but, fortunately, I liked herbal tea. I was particularly fond of several kinds of Celestial Seasonings teas and was lucky to find a store in Israel that carried them. For the most part, my roommates didn’t use any type of traditional tea bag. Instead, they would brew mint leaves in their glass mugs. Instead of an infuser, they just placed a leaf or two into the hot water. My most food-skittish roommate thought my herbal teas were weird. I offered to let her try one, but it took months before she would even consider doing that (and then she didn’t like it). I wonder if she thought I was going to poison her or if the herbal teas – now available in almost every major American grocery store – would make her sick. 
In fact, that same roommate was so conservative in her eating habits that she refused to taste a bagel when a friend and I brought some back from Jerusalem. It didn’t matter that I explained to her that it was simply bread in a different shape; she turned down the chance to try one. That was actually OK, since it left more bagels for me.
I can’t look at tomatoes and cucumbers without thinking about the Israeli salads my roommates made. Since I’m a big fan of salads with lettuce and other ingredients, I don’t make them often. However, I won’t turn down one if it’s offered.