by G.W. Mercure
“I was a wild child punk rocker and I ran away from home.”
So begins the account of Chef Rossi, formerly known as Slovah Davida Shana bas Hannah Rachel Ross, and her New York City origin story. “So the story is, like, I have a really wackadooHow-I-Came-to-New York-Story. Like when I first came to New York—you never meet anyone who was born in New York—so everyone would always say, ‘How did you end up here?’” How she ended up there is detailed in her hysterical, startling, and meshuggah second memoir, The Punk-Rock Queen of the Jews.
Rossi is a dynamic figure with generations of experience climbing surreptitiously or tearing ferociously out of the boxes she ends up in. She is a chef, cook, and caterer; a writer, columnist, playwright, and memoirist; an actress, painter, raconteur, trailblazer, Jew, American, and New Yorker—all of these and, depending on what she wants to do next, none of them.
In the new memoir, we find Rossi in youth and adolescence, chafing against the confines of a culturally-restrictive family and an alienating school experience. “When I was in grammar school—because my parents moved so much—we were always the new kids in school,” she says. “And so the kids always wanted to give me crap—my sister, brother, and I,—they wanted to bully us and harass us… And I discovered that when I would tell the kids stories about my weirdo life, my family, they would laugh hysterically, and they wouldn’t want to bother me or bully me or pick on me.”
No single path in a maze leads to the end. Rossi’s prodigious creative output—food, books, paintings, podcasts, radio shows—isn’t the result or the end of a straight line. In fact, for a long time she perceived her chef duties as an obstacle to her creative ambitions. “I used to think of my life as a painter,” she says. “I came to New York initially to be a painter. And as a writer, I used to think of that as the enemy of my life as a caterer, or I should say, my life as a caterer is the enemy of my creative writing and painting. Especially the first 10 years, when starting a business is just a 24-hour job. I was so busy. I just didn’t have the time and energy to write and paint.”
She found that regardless of her duties and commitments, the enemies worked things out. “One day, I was just building my new kitchen and I was very depressed about how much money it cost to build it. And I made the tasting room white walls and windows, and I realized it was just like a gallery. And so I went home, and I brought in all my favorite paintings and I hung them on the white walls. And then I thought, ‘You know what—these two don’t have to be enemies, they can be like best friends.’” It was her chef’s voice that led to more opportunities to tell stories. “Most people who did not want to publish me initially wanted to publish me because I was ‘Rossi,’” she says.
Rossi’s journey began in an Orthodox Jewish household, where expectations were clear and rigid. Yet, at 16, she chose to forge her own path, embracing the punk rock ethos and running away from home. Her newfound freedom was abruptly curtailed when her parents intervened, placing her in the care of a Hasidic rabbi in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. This experience became a crucible for Rossi, blending the bizarre with the harrowing.
“My mother decided to ship me off to this Hasidic rabbi in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, in 1981 to see if they could straighten me out. It certainly did not work, but it made for a fantastic book,” she explains.
Rossi’s memoir is not only an account of these experiences, but also an exploration of her resilience and humor. The narrative captures her time in the repressive environment, highlighting both the absurdity and the danger she faced. “I did meet some fantastic people there, but I also met some truly horrifying people,” she says. “Lots of people who wanted to rob me and hurt me and kill me. A lot of hypocritical people who were pretending to be very religious in the daytime but at night would be interested in sexually molesting women or maybe little boys.”
Even a sad song is joyful to sing, and Rossi has found the compassion, tenderness, and healing required to make her story relatable, inspiring, and, more than anything, courageous. “I had to have so much love in my heart before I could write it,” she explains. “If I had written it when I was younger, it would have been an angry, vengeful sort of book. Now I wanted it to be more of a metamorphosis, showing how a young girl could go through everything she went through and come out with her heart intact, kinder, and more open and brave.”
Rossi’s storytelling extends beyond her memoirs. Her work as a writer spans various publications, including The Daily News, The New York Post, Time Out New York, as well as this esteemed publication. Her first memoir, The Raging Skillet: The True Life Story of Chef Rossi, was published in 2015 to an eager readership. It is an account of her youth, early career, and ultimate success as a unique and fearless catering impresario. The Raging Skillet paved the way for The Punk Rock Queen of the Jews.
“I don’t think you can write a book and publish a book unless you really have to, unless it’s grinding in your soul,” she says. “In my case, I really felt like that. When I wanted to get my first book published, I was making deals with God, where I said, ‘God, I will let you take me out a year earlier if you get me my book published.’ But then, after my book got published, I said, ‘Can I take that back?’”
As Rossi prepares for her appearance at WOMR for East End Books Provincetown on August 15, she reflects on her journey with a sense of accomplishment and gratitude. Provincetown holds a special place in her heart as the site of her first published piece. “I marched into Provincetown Magazine and said I wanted to write a column for them on cooking.” Her column did not spare her mother, a subject of many of her stories. “After the magazine came out, I snipped it out, and I mailed it to my mother. She called me screaming, ‘Slovah, you’ve immortalized me!’”
The event this week promises to be an engaging evening, where Rossi will share insights from her memoir and her life. For those who attend, it will be an opportunity to hear firsthand the stories that have shaped one of the most dynamic voices in the culinary and literary worlds.
Chef Rossi will read from her newest memoir, The Punk Rock Queen of the Jews, on Thursday, August 15, 6 p.m. at WOMR Davis Space, 494 Commercial St., 2nd Fl., in an event produced by East End Books. For tickets and information call 508.413.3225 or visit eastendbooksptown.com.
