This is Arya Donay:
Arya made aliyah on November 15th, 2010. After months of pushing and prodding from every Californian in Tel Aviv, Arya arrived and the group of friends was finally complete. But even though everyone proclaimed intense adoration of our group's token Persian LA Jew, he was met with this badgering sign when he stepped off the plane:
This is Tina, Arya's beautiful mom:
As Yoav so eloquently explained, "You know Arya's mom's cooking is the only reason he has friends, right?"
When I first heard about this elusive Arya figure last summer, I found out that a) Arya's an idiot, and b) his mom is an amazing cook. During years of friendship with Arya back in California, these hungry Jewish boys were lucky enough to be lovingly ushered into Tina's kitchen, where mounds of Persian Jewish cooking magically appeared for all of Arya's free-loading friends. Her specialty, gondi, has now entered into my weekly routine, as I desperately wait for Friday to roll around and for Arya to bring Tina's gondi to shabbat dinner.
This is gondi:
Gondi is a Persian Jewish specialty. This meat version of a matza ball is made from ground turkey and chicken breast, grated onions, salt, pepper, olive oil, tumeric, cardamon, dried sour lemon, ground chickpeas. The mouthfeel is a little harder than a matza ball, but it similarly sits in chicken broth and is made specially for shabbat dinner. Apparently invented in the ghetto of Tehran, gondi is the most characteristic food of Persian Jewish culture, and we are now lucky enough to continue this tradition in merkaz Tel Aviv.
To get a sense of just how good gondi really is, let's take a moment to listen to the wise words of Mr. David Abraham: "From the moment it enters your mouth, you get the savory taste of the spices from the outside of the ball, and when you take a bite through it, you begin to taste the scrumptious chicken/turkey mix that melts in your mouth with exquisite fluidity."
Tina makes gondi every friday. But even though Arya grew up eating gondi once a week, he never got sick of it. Gondi is surprisingly adaptable; it can even be eaten inside lavash bread with mint, Persian basil, fennel, watercress, and different herbs. It's usually eaten as an appetizer because, as Arya explains: "Persian shabbat dinner is like a Persian wedding- you sit around and drink and eat nuts and eat gondi until dinner, catching up about the week, until about 11:00 when you finally sit down to the meal." This routine makes gondi stand out as a highlight.
Arya, the self proclaimed hottest guy in USY, learned to make gondi from Tina after he moved to Israel. When he was home with Tina, he would help her make gondi sometimes, but it was only when he was in Israel and started to miss Tina's gondi did he finally learn the recipe himself. (Yoav adds, "they're still not as good as Tina's!") Yet despite learning to make gondi from Tina, the goddess of gondi herself, Arya explains that everyone's gondi always turn out different. "I can tell the difference between my mom's, my aunt's, my great aunt's... everyone's gondi reflects their character. Some are bigger, smaller... it all depends on the person." Benji here adds that this quality of gondi preparations means that Arya's gondi are "quiet but out there." What does this mean exactly? Arya's meatballs are just as he is-- maybe not perfectly shaped or executed with particular attention to detail, but always a highlight and never forgettable.
In the two months I've been here, I've already learned to wait with great anticipation for Arya on Friday nights. His gondi never fail. Never dry. Never bland. And since Benji only brings rice to shabbat dinner, I swear we'd all be much worse off if Arya wasn't in Israel.
