French-Kosher Cuisine, Comfort Food & Heart-Shaped Ravioli with Chef Olivia Ostrow

On this episode of Taste Buds with Deb, host Debra Eckerling speaks with chef Olivia Ostrow of Miami's Ostrow Brasserie. Her restaurant is the only kosher-French restaurant in the United States.    As a French person and a chef, Ostrow’s love language is food. “This is how we express ourselves,” she says.   Ostrow - who was born in Paris, moved to the States with her family in the 1990s, and spent time in Israel - grew up surrounded by a love and knowledge of food.    While she has helmed both kosher and non-kosher restaurants throughout her career, a few years ago, Ostrow decided it was time to go back to kosher. It turned out that the owner of the building happened to be Jewish and religious, so they decided to become partners.   “It was faith and fate,” she explains. Ostrow Brasserie opened in August 2023.    Most people do not associate kosher with French food, and there’s a reason: It's difficult. Not only is French cuisine butter based, everything needs to be made from scratch in order to actually execute a dish. There are so many kosher laws, besides not mixing milk and meat.   Also, French is usually associated with fancy. However, Ostrow calls her cuisine “fine comfort food.”   “The reason people outside of France don't associate it with [comfort food] is because they're not French,” she says. For Ostrow, beef bourguignon - a stew of short rib and braised with wine - was made from leftovers of the meat of the week. She would eat in front of the TV with mashed potatoes or pasta.   Olivia Ostrow talks about her restaurant and love-of-food background, along with kosher-French cooking and comfort food. And, since Ostrow’s restaurant’s Valentine's Day menu is inspired by the most romantic cities in the world - Paris, Venice, Rome and Kyoto - she also shares her recipe for Heart-Shaped Raviolo (ravioli), which you can get at JewishJournal.com/podcasts.    When you celebrate love, it “should be said in every language and in as many ways as possible,” Ostrow says.   Learn more at OstrowBrasserie.com and follow @OstrowBrasserie on Instagram.   For more from Taste Buds, subscribe on iTunes and YouTube, and follow @TheDEBMethod on social media.