Gribenes or grieven (, , "cracklings"; ) is a dish consisting of crisp chicken or goose skin cracklings with fried onions.
Etymology
The word gribenes is related to the German (plural ) meaning 'piece of fat, crackling' (from the Old High German via the Middle High German ), where is lard from which the cracklings have not been removed.
History
A favored food in the past among Ashkenazi Jews, gribenes appears in Jewish stories and parables, for example in the work of the Hebrew poet Chaim Nachman Bialik. As with other cracklings, gribenes are a byproduct of rendering animal fat to produce cooking fat, in this case kosher schmaltz.
Gribenes can be used as an ingredient in dishes like kasha varnishkes, fleishig kugel and gehakte leber.
Gribenes is often associated with the Jewish holidays Hanukkah and Rosh Hashanah. Traditionally, gribenes were served with potato kugel or latkes during Hanukkah. It is also associated with Passover, as large amounts of schmaltz, with its resulting gribenes, were traditionally used in Passover recipes.
Uses
Gribenes can be eaten as a snack on rye or pumpernickel bread with salt,<ref>Amy Scattergood, "Chef recipes: A Recipe From the Chef: Ilan Hall's Gribenes Sandwich," 'LA Weekly, December 23, 2009. Found at LA Weekly website . Accessed January 4, 2011.</ref> or used in recipes such as chopped liver, or all of the above. It is often served as a side dish with pastrami on rye or hot dogs.Frank Bruni, "Quit Kibitzing and Pass the Gribenes", New York Times, February 13, 2008. Found at New York Times website. Accessed January 4, 2011.
This dish is eaten as a midnight snack, or appetizer. In Louisiana, Jews add gribenes to jambalaya in place of (treyf) shrimp. It was served to children on challah'' bread as a treat. It can also be served in a GLT, a modified version of a BLT sandwich that replaces bacon with gribenes.