They also suggest couscous with saffron and vegetables, and a great spiced pear and almond cake. Every time I've made it, people have just gone nuts over it. The secret ingredient is grated apples. But don't look for chopped liver or cholent. Fiszer and Ferrary, who lives in Belmont, deliberately left them out, eschewing those dishes' large doses of animal fat.
Chopped liver has to be made with chicken fat.
Some have Medi- terranean and Middle Eastern origins, like baked figs with honey yogurt, and pita stuffed with eggplant salad and feta cheese. Contemporary people think of Jewish foods as being time-consuming, when our grandmothers did nothing but sit in the kitchen and cook all day. These recipes are suited to today's lifestyle. Fiszer, who is married and the mother of two grown sons, began her professional career as a teacher of emotionally disturbed children in New York. After moving to California, she decided she didn't want to go through the reaccreditation process.