When Steven Fenves and his family were forced from their home in Subotica, Yugoslavia, they, like many other Jews during the Holocaust, had to abandon their belongings. As they were escorted out of their home, looters lined up, hoping to nab silver and other valuables, shouting and spitting on the family as they passed. Steven, then 12, and his family didn’t know it, but in that crowd was Maris, the family’s non-Jewish cook. Maris wasn’t there to loot, but instead grabbed items significant to the family, including nearly 200 drawings by Steven’s mother, Klara, plus a diary and the family cookbook.

Decades later, and thanks to an unusual friendship with Chef Alon Shaya, on March 21, 100 attendees at the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation in Buckhead tasted some recipes at a Food and Family Ties: Honor Holocaust Memory Through Rescued Recipes dinner. The $1,000-per-person event was a fundraiser for the Museum’s Rubenstein National Institute for Holocaust Documentation, which is responsible for preserving Holocaust artifacts, such as the Fenves family recipe book. Read article

This article won the 2024 Food and Drink Award from the American Society of Journalists and Authors.