Features
Do you want a challenge? Try opening a restaurant in Mexico – four different times in six years
By BERNIE BELLAN In December 2021 Myron Love wrote a story for The Jewish Post & News about former Winnipegger Megan Kravetsky.
How I happened to give Myron that particular assignment was an interesting story in itself. I had begun delivering Meals on Wheels for the Gwen Secter Centre in the summer of 2021 – which, if you can recall, was a period when we were still enduing periodic shutdowns due to Covid. As a result, the Gwen Secter Centre stepped up the number of meals that it began producing – not only for Jewish clients, but for hundreds of non-Jewish clients as well.
I wrote several times about the incredible effort that the staff at Gwen Secter put into producing what ultimately became over 600 meals a week, but that’s not the point of this story. This story is about food though, so there’s a connection.
In any event, beginning in the fall of 2021 I began delivering kosher meals for Gwen Secter on a weekly basis to a number of clients, some of whom some have remained on my list ever since.
One of those clients was a woman by the name of Joanne Field. Like most of my Meals on Wheels clients I developed a nice rapport with Joanne. One day she asked me if I’d be interested in doing a story about her granddaughter, whose name she told me, was Megan Kravetsky. According to Joanne, Megan had been operating a popular restaurant in Puerto Vallarta by the name of Blake’s Bar & Grill, and Joanne thought that readers of the paper who might be heading to Puerto Vallarta that winter would be interested in dropping into Blake’s.
As it turned out, I asked Myron Love to do that story instead of doing it myself because we were coming up to our Chanukah issue at the time and I didn’t have time to talk to Megan and write a story – but I did think that the Chanukah issue presented the perfect opportunity to let readers know about Megan and her restaurant.
That was in December 2021 and, even though my wife and I have been to the Puerto Vallarta area several times – and really love it there, what with Covid putting a crimp in travel plans for several years, it wasn’t until this year that I had the opportunity to head back to Puerto Vallarta. While I was there, I thought, I’d like to touch base with Megan and visit Blake’s myself.
Which is how I came to do a completely different type of story than I expected to write.
You see, Megan Kravetsky’s experiences in Mexico can fill a book – and a good part of that would be a horror story. Try this one on for size: Not only was her business badly affected by Covid in 2020 – just after she had moved into what was then the second location for Blake’s – after having moved from the first location because it was just too small – this past October, after having moved yet again into a different location for Blake’s in what Megan thought was going to be a great location – Hurricane Lidia swept through Puerto Vallarta and Blake’s was forced to close down.
Still, Megan persevered. She had opened another small pop-up restaurant last May called Drop Shot Chill n Grill in an area well known to many Winnipeggers who spend time in Puerto Vallarta, near what is known as the hotel zone. But, in another series of unfortunate circumstances, this time having to do with a very nasty landlady (who repeatedly cut off the electricity to Drop Shot), Megan was forced yet again to close down.
Read on and you’ll find out about the long string of unfortunate events that seem to have accompanied Megan ever since she decided to move to Mexico in 2018, but once you finish reading the story you’re bound to have an immense amount of admiration at how resilient Megan has proven to be.
Here’s some of what Myron wrote in his December 2021 story: “Three years ago, the veteran chef and restaurant consultant came across a deal she couldn’t refuse when she took advantage of an opportunity to buy Blake’s Restaurant and Bar, an established operation in Puerto Vallarta. Megan is now happily living year round in Mexico.
“Now, in truth, the former River Heights kid (Brock Corydon and Grant Park) was no stranger to the Mexican resort community. She notes that her parents, Charles (whose mother is Joanne Field) and Vivian Kravetsky, are long time seasonal residents of the city – spending six months a year there and six months in Winnipeg – and she had visited many times over the years.
“ ‘It was perfect timing,’ she says of her move to Puerto Vallarta.
“ ‘The first year was tough,’ she adds. ‘My Spanish was limited – which made it sometimes difficult to communicate with my staff. Now I am fluent.’
“Kravetsky notes that her original career goal was to become a lawyer (like her father). ‘After five years of university (the University of Manitoba), I realized that that was not what I wanted to do, she recalls.
“Instead, she earned a business degree in management and marketing and went to work in the restaurant industry. She had worked in the restaurant trade part time throughout university. Over the next 15 years, Kravetsky worked successively for the McDonalds chain, Moxie’s, the Olive Garden and Montana Steak House.”
Before I met with Megan on March 16 – at the location of the most recent incarnation of Blake’s Bar & Grill in the port area of Puerto Vallarta known as Puerto Magico, which is where passengers from cruise ships disembark, I had a chance to see for myself the damage that Hurricane Lidia had done to her restaurant. The interior was all covered with tarp, but I was able to see through a hole in the tarp. I was quite surprised to see that the restaurant itself was largely intact – tables and chairs all in place, dishes, utensils and cooking equipment all in place, but the windows to the outside were all blown out. That piqued my curiosity and became the subject of part of our conversation.
Still, as my wife Meachelle and I sat down with Megan to enjoy a beverage in a nearby coffee shop and listen to her story, I couldn’t help but be impressed by Megan’s very positive attitude. As it turns out, Megan had been in my son Jordy’s class at Brock Corydon School (of which I was not aware. Also, somewhat coincidentally, Jordy, who now goes by the name Jitendradas Loveslife, also lives in Mexico, in a town populated by New Age former hippies known as Ajijic.)
I asked Megan how she came to own a restaurant in Puerto Vallarta?
Megan explained that she had gone about as far as she could as a restaurant manger in Winnipeg. As Myron noted, Megan had worked for McDonald’s, Montana’s (helping to open their Kenaston location where she worked as a line cook), Moxie’s Bar & Grill, Olive Garden, also Famous Dave’s – all before she had even turned 30.
Megan had been traveling to Mexico with her parents and siblings for years, she told me, and fell in love with the country. So, in 2018, she took all the savings she had accumulated and bought Blake’s Bar & Grill in downtown Puerto Vallarta, which had first opened in 2006. Before she was able move to Mexico though, Megan had to acquire a residency permit – which was no easy task, she explained.
You see, in order to purchase a business in Mexico, one needs something called an “RFC” (which translates from the Spanish to Federal Taxpayers Number).
As Megan told us, “without that (the RFC) you can’t purchase cars, housing, anything. I got my residency before I moved down. You have to do your residency out of country.”
I asked her how she could become a Mexican resident while still in Canada?
She said, “You apply, you have to make a certain amount of money. So I applied three times – within a six month period. I went to Toronto twice. Applied. Denied. Both times. Went to Calgary” – and finally got her residency permit.
But, there’s something else Megan explained that made the challenge of buying Blake’s even more difficult: She wasn’t able to finance the purchase – she had to pay cash entirely – something, we were also told, is par for the course for just about any major purchase in Mexico, including houses.
But, just because Megan was able to buy Blake’s, she wasn’t able to work in her own restaurant, she told me, until she had a work permit. As she explained, “…so you get one year temporary residency, then you apply for a three year extension after that, and then after that, then you apply for your permanent residency. But temporary residency doesn’t include a work permit. That’s the biggest thing, so I had to apply for my work permit to be attached to my temporary residency.”
Megan, however, had forgotten to apply for a work permit – which she would have needed to work in her own restaurant. “But,” she explained, “then when my daughter was born (in 2019) – because she’s Mexican, I automatically became a permanent resident. So I didn’t have to wait for four years – I only waited two (to become a permanent resident)” – thus allowing her to work in her own restaurant.
Now, while Megan’s initial foray into the restaurant business was quite successful, the first Blake’s Bar was too small to accommodate the high number of customers it was attracting. As Megan put it, “the place was too small. It was a very small… very small restaurant.”
And then, in 2020, Covid hit. While Mexico had no sort of rules requiring masking in public places, it did institute rules governing social distancing – with a six feet distance required between tables. “We could only have two or three tables in at one time during high season,” Megan said.
So, in 2021, Megan moved to another location in Puerto Vallarta, in an area known as Plaza Santa Maria. Things were going really well in that new location. It had become a very popular spot for Canadians, especially Winnipeggers, as Megan made sure all Winnipeg Jets games were shown there. (Megan was in that location when Myron contacted her and she was brimming with confidence when she spoke to him about how well things were going.)
There was one major problem, however, as Megan explained: “The landowner there didn’t pay her taxes. So when you went to go take out your licensing, you have to show proof the taxes are. And if they’re not paid, then you can’t take out your licensing. And she owed back taxes of almost five years, which was over 300,000” (pesos – or about $22,000 Canadian dollars).
“And she didn’t want to pay it. So I had no choice,” Megan noted. As a result, after only one year in what had been a very successful location – even if only for a short while, Megan moved yet again, in 2022 – this time to the Puerto Magico location.
The owners of the building where Megan opened what by then had become the third location for Blake’s in only four years had induced her to move there with all sorts of promises, she said: “They had promised us numerous things that they never completed. The passport office was supposed to open upstairs two years ago. Still not open. Another restaurant was supposed to be up there. We were just alone up there. There’s nothing. They made it impossible for guests to get up the stairs. They wouldn’t fix the elevator. It still doesn’t work to this day. It’s been three years…and the whole thing with that is they don’t want to pay the electricity to have the elevator working.
“So they just made it impossible for the cruise ship people to get upstairs or any people in general to get upstairs.” On top of all that, the owners of Puerto Magico didn’t allow Megan to have any signage on the street which would have told tourists that Blake’s Bar was there.
Still, Megan might have been able to turn things around were it not for that hurricane last October. She had developed a great reputation as a restaurateur. (Just take a look at the glowing reviews on Tripadvisor for Blake’s Bar). In addition, Megan is a fantastic baker and she had opened a bakery known called Sweet Temptations Bakery Boutique next door to Blake’s in Puerto Magico. That closed too the same time as Blake’s when the hurricane hit.
You’d think, however, that notwithstanding the damage that a hurricane might have caused, it would just be a matter of time before things could have been repaired and Blake’s would have been back in business – but that wasn’t the case.
While the interior of the restaurant was left largely intact, the windows had all been blown out. So, it’s just a matter of replacing the windows – right? Or, so you’d think. But this is Mexico – and similar to the landlady who didn’t want to pay her taxes in Blake’s previous location, the owners of Puerto Magico haven’t moved to replace the windows that were blown out.
Here’s how Megan described what happened: “So, the whole thing here, after the hurricane hit, when you construct a building here, the windows and doors are property of the plaza. Doesn’t matter if you put them in, they put them in, it’s property of the plaza. You can’t leave with them. Yeah. Same with the floor. So when the hurricane came through and destroyed everything, the first thing they said to me is our insurance will cover it, our insurance is going to cover it, it’s our property.
“So we waited and waited and waited and waited and about two and a half to three months in, they said, nah, our insurance actually isn’t going to cover it. At that point, my own insurance wouldn’t cover it anymore. It has to be done within 24 hours. That’s just how it is.” (Note to readers: Anyone from Winnipeg could identify with Megan. A building burns down and a pile of rubble remains for years. A bridge closes because it’s unsafe and it sits there – unusable, but with no plan to replace it.)
Not one to let anything get her down though, Megan still had her pop-up restaurant, Drop Shot Chill n Grill. As I mentioned at the beginning of this story though, just recently that site too had to close down.
This time it was the landlady who owned the area where Drop Shot was located that forced Megan to close. While Megan leased the space for her location from an individual who didn’t actually own the land where Drop Shot was situated, he had tennis and pickleball courts there. Apparently though, the woman who actually owned the land didn’t like the loud music coming from Drop Shot – even though it wasn’t in a residential area at all.
Again, here’s how Megan described the situation: “In our contract it stated that I was allowed to have live music, barbecue, blah, blah, blah. The landowner who owns the land, who I don’t lease from, owns the hotel behind the parking where the tennis courts are. And she doesn’t like noise. She doesn’t like any noise. Yet, they have music and tennis tournaments and fairs and they have the food park and all that.
“So, during our live music, she would complain constantly, even though our music was only from 3 to 6 – that her guests, one guest in particular, couldn’t sleep – it was too loud. We always abided by the decibel restriction limit; it was never over the decibel limit.”
The story continued: “So she cut our electricity off once when we had the live music – but the second time she did it, I had a generator. She didn’t know that I had a generator going. So she had cut the electricity, but the music was still playing. So at that point she would call the ‘reglamentals’ – the bylaw officers, who would come check and she’d say, ‘There’s really loud music going on at Drop Shot.’ They would come, they would check, they’d check my permits, everything would be okay, they’d leave. That’s when I called the police on her. They’re my friends. They had a very long conversation with her… told her that it’s illegal to cut the electricity, she can’t do it.”
But, as you might expect, the landlady wasn’t about to back down. “It got to the point where she threatened the guy who I was subleasing from that if he didn’t get rid of me, she was going to get rid of everybody.
“She wouldn’t re sign the contract with him. So he’s had his tennis courts and pickleball courts there for over five years. And she said, ‘if I don’t leave, then everybody’s leaving.’ “
So, once again, Megan has had to abandon what had turned into a successful venture – but after dealing with Covid, a landlady who didn’t want to pay taxes, a hurricane, and a landlady who doesn’t like loud music, you’d have to wonder whether Megan is still willing to enter into yet another food venture?
Not surprisingly, she said she is. I asked her “How real is that? How feasible or viable?”
“Oh, it’s very viable,” she answered. “We’re just waiting on the contract to be signed.” Megan added that she has someone who she wouldn’t describe as a partner in her putative venture, but somebody “that’s going to help me.”
Throughout our conversation I had refrained from bringing up the subject that surely must be in the back of many a reader’s mind when it comes to thinking about doing business in Mexico: What about the cartels? Has Megan had any run-ins with the local cartel I wondered? (And when it comes to cartels, Puerto Vallarta is located in the state of Jalisco. Anyone who knows anything about Mexican cartels would know that the Jalisco cartel has a reputation for extreme violence.)
Megan answered though that “They’re not really that visible here… They keep it very under the table here.”
I said though that “the Jalisco cartel is notorious.”
But, Megan responded, “that’s more towards Sinaloa and Chihuahua.”
Still, given Mexico’s longstanding reputation for corruption at almost every level, I asked Megan, “Did you have to pay off people?”
She answered: No, never, never, never had to pay anybody off. You give back and then, you know, everybody takes care of each other.” She went on to describe the excellent rapport she has had with the local police, for whom she has catered a huge feast known as a “masada” every year, at which over 400 police have attended.
It’s hard to imagine someone coming down to Mexico and, within the space of only six years, opening restaurants (and closing them) in four different locations, yet still remaining optimistic that she’ll be able to open a fifth in short order.
If and when Megan does open another restaurant – I’d sure like to try the food. If the reviews she received on Tripadvisor for each of her locations are any indication, one thing Megan Kravetsky knows is how to prepare great food – and leave her customers with a thoroughly enjoyable experience.
Features
Is Hamas a “treatable” cancer?
By GREGORY MASON If we define Hamas as a cancer, can we devise a strategy to, if not defeat Hamas, at least manage it? Is Hamas “treatable?”
Defining treatable cancer
Although the cancer charities like to promote the notion that we are winning the war against cancer, a reference that confirms the suitability of conjoining cancer and Hamas, the reality is that five-year survival rates are increasing only slowly. While curative therapies continue to improve, early detection —encompassing both greater testing participation and technological advancements in testing —appears to be the most crucial factor in lengthened survivability.
The key treatment condition is the stage at which cancer becomes known. The typical staging has four levels, where the tumour:
- remains entirely within the margins (edges) of the organ
- reaches the margins.
- moves beyond the margin and invades the surrounding tissues.
- move another organ or system.
Sometimes oncologists refer to precancerous growths as “stage 0” when a surgeon removes a skin lesion as a precaution. Progression among the cancer stages is known as metastasis.
Most important is to understand that the five-year survival standard includes no reference to quality of life. Most cancer treatments compromise quality of life.
Patients often assume the word “cancer” means a death sentence. Yet if detected early, the idea of “treatable cancer” invariably creates a sense of optimism since it also implies a course of action leading to a “cure.” Most oncologists are wary of raising false expectations when discussing the nature of a patient’s condition and the options for treatment.
Three conditions mark a treatable cancer. - Treatment options exist.
- Actions are feasible – the patient resides where the technology, talent, and treatments (medications) are available.
- Patients receive no guarantees that exist for a cure (complete remission), extension of life, or improved quality of life.
Treatment outcomes for cancer exist in several dimensions: the extension of life, the quality of that life, and the difficulty of the treatment. Patients and physicians face complex trade-offs, where the difficulty of the treatment versus the expected gain in quality of life may induce the patient to curtail active treatment. The patient submits to the inevitable and enters palliative care.
Setting aside voodoo, cancer treatments include surgery that targets specific tumour sites, chemotherapy that uses a cocktail of chemicals that targets cancerous cells without affecting healthy tissue, and palliative care. Palliative care accepts the inevitable course of disease leading to death.
The final issue is that a systemic cancer, such as lymphoma, stands in contrast to a tumour, which exists at a defined point. Treatment is different for each type. Systemic cancers require chemotherapy, while point cancers require surgery.
Hamas as a cancer.
Some may object to my characterization of Hamas as a cancer since they see Hamas as freedom fighters for Palestinian independence. No comment. No apology.
The origin of Hamas is the Muslim Brotherhood, which started in Egypt during the late 1920s as a labour movement among Suez Canal dockworkers, led by Hassan al-Banna. Its goals were to spread Islam across the Arab world, oppose colonialism (primarily British and French) and promote the Arab mission in Palestine. This movement has spread rapidly throughout the Middle East and beyond.
Hamas (Harakat-al-Muqawama-al-Islamiya or “Islamic Resistance Movement”) was established in 1987 following the first intifada, when Arabs living in Gaza, Judea/Samaria and East Jerusalem engaged in a violent protest against what Hamas and other groups perceived as unjustified Israeli governance over their lands. A core goal was to build support for the Muslim Brotherhood, which had lost support to Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) sponsored by Iran. It is one example of the conflict between Sunni Islam (Muslim Brotherhood) and Shia Islam (PIJ).
Rather than an isolated tumour, Hamas in Gaza is but a derivative lesion of the broader Muslim Brotherhood cancer. Although not part of the Palestinian Authority, it is the most popular movement in the West Bank. It may well have had a hand in the weekend attack in Jerusalem that killed six and injured 13, although many malign actors are available.
Another Muslim Brotherhood lesion is the Hamas leadership that has remained ensconced in luxury Qatar hotels. Israel’s recent attack on the Hamas leadership in Qatar is another attempt to excise the tumour, with a subtle twist. Qatar has operated duplicitously. On the one hand, it has sheltered Hamas leaders and shovelled buckets of money to support their war against Israel while also serving as a “neutral” mediator in the hostage negotiation. Along with Iran and Türkiye, it is a significant funder of the Brotherhood, not only throughout the Middle East, but also in Europe and North America.
Qatar has also opened a series of tumours in post-secondary education, especially in its funding of elite universities. This aligns with the long view inherent in radical Islam and the Muslim Brotherhood. Funding “endowed chairs” enables external funders to circumvent standard academic hiring procedures, placing academics with specific viewpoints in key academic positions. This becomes a critical element in the metastasis of radical Islam. In addition to promoting Islam and an anti-Israel perspective, these faculty members work in partnership with post-modern ideologies that undermine recognition of the past achievements of Western civilization. This is not to defend the past, as much exists in Western history that needs correction.
Defeating Hamas: Tactical win or strategic loss?
Israel’s goals in Gaza have fluctuated, reflecting its extraordinary duration and the existence of the hostages. Many do not want the Netanyahu government to proceed with the final expulsion of Hamas from Gaza. Most opponents to such a campaign within Israel fear it is not possible without massively increased civilian casualties, further hostage deaths, and a prohibitive cost in soldiers’ lives for the Israel Defence Forces.
In addition to the potential costs, commentators such as Andrew Fox believe it is not possible to eliminate Hamas. His essential point is that Hamas has shown a remarkable capacity to adapt. However, he has applauded the attack on the Hamas leadership in Qatar.
The situation has become dire. First, throughout the Middle East, a multitude of cancerous lesions exist in the form of radical Islamic parties vying for control. In the West Bank, in addition to Fatah, the Palestinian Authority (PA) includes other factions such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (a Marxist-Leninist group), the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the Palestinian Peoples Party, and the Palestine Popular Struggle Front. Not part of the PA, but very influential and popular are Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
In Gaza, in addition to Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the major political factions include Fatah (much weakened since 2007), a range of Salafi-Jihad Groups, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, all of which vie for support. Finally, in addition, several clan-based militias are operating, which Israel currently funds and arms, primarily to irritate Hamas.
A multitude of factions may arise to fill the vacuum if Hamas disappears. Indeed, none are anywhere as strong and capable as Hamas was. But deep pockets exist in the form of Qatar, Türkiye, and Iran to rebuild Islamist military capacity in Gaza.
The many points of radical Islam, comprising funding in Western universities, the mass migration that results in multiple Western societies being unable to integrate newcomers, and post-modern ideas infusing government and corporate management, have merged to create a systemic cancer that seems impervious to treatment, certainly to precise tumour excision.
Israel can play a furious whack-a-mole model of surgical strikes to excise the many tumorous lesions originating from the Muslim Brotherhood. And it may succeed in bringing Hamas to the table to release the remaining hostages and cease its Gaza operations. Israel can score a tactical victory.
But if the West declines to address the systemic cancer of radical Islam and Hamas reconstitutes itself in the West Bank, a strategic victor will elude Israel, and it will return to excising yet another tumour.
Israel’s refusal to wage the information war and Western leaders losing their way and becoming politically indebted to recent migrants may become the strategic errors prolonging the conflict.
Features
Seeking gangsters, must speak Yiddish: Bringing the Hasidic underworld to life in ‘Caught Stealing’
By PJ Grisar September 3, 2025
This story was originally published in the Forward. Click here to get the Forward’s free email newsletters delivered to your inbox.
A duo of burly, gun-toting Hasidic gangsters and their doting bubbe are the breakout characters in Darren Aronofsky’s Caught Stealing — at least, for figures not of the feline variety. To bring them to life, the film had a secret weapon: a Yiddish whisperer.
Motl Didner, program director for the National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, first heard rumblings of the crime caper through a casting notice seeking Yiddish-speaking actors. He didn’t know the notice was for an Aronofsky film, but he passed the details along to members of the company, and even sent in a self-tape to be considered for a role.
Later, the production got in touch to use him as a Yiddish coach.
“That’s when I found out who exactly it was that I lost out to,” Didner said in a phone interview. “I don’t feel so bad about losing out to, like, Liev Schreiber.”
Didner worked with Schreiber, Vincent D’Onofrio and Carol Kane — respectively playing a pair of frightening drug lords and their grandmother — settling on a Hungarian dialect for their dialogue, and even rewriting some of their Yiddish lines. (The dynasty to which the brothers belong is never specified, but their scenes with Kane were filmed on location at a Lubavitcher household in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.)
The duo show up as a threat to the film’s protagonist, Hank (Austin Butler), who finds himself caught in the middle of their quest to recover piles of money from other ethnic gangs in 1998 New York City.
Kane, Didner said, took naturally to the mamaloshen. While she isn’t conversational in Yiddish in real life, her breakout role was as a Yiddish-speaking immigrant in Hester Street, and she more recently had Yiddish scenes in the Amazon Prime show Hunters.
Schreiber, for his part, sang Yiddish songs growing up, and “had an ear for it,” Didner said.
D’Onofrio, who isn’t Jewish, was “really kind of thrown deep into the Jewish world,” Didner said, but was very meticulous in getting his “meshugenahs” on point. Crucially, he nails the pronunciation of his beloved bubbe’s title: For native Yiddish speakers, it sounds more like “boh-beh” than “bubbie.”
Didner was on set for the scene in which Butler’s Hank slurps a bowl of matzo ball soup with the brothers. Somehow, word spread that the Oscar winner was shooting in the neighborhood, something of a novelty for the Hasidic enclave. Evidently the heartthrob has a young Chabad fan base.
“When filming wrapped at the end of the day, there were a couple hundred teenage girls waiting to get a glimpse of Austin Butler,” Didner recalled. It was like the reception of the Beatles or, better yet, Elvis.
Didner wasn’t the only dialect coach for D’Onofrio and Schreiber; they had a separate one for English.
“Darren Aronofsky was very specific,” Didner said of “the boys” — how Aronofsky referred to the characters. “He didn’t want them to speak English with a Yiddish accent.”
Instead, they speak with Hank in a measured, yet still menacing, American aksent. It’s when they discuss how to handle him — and whether he deserves to be roughed up — that they revert to Yiddish.
There were also separate consultants, Didner said, to make sure the customs included in a bustling pre-Shabbat sequence at Bubbe’s house were authentic.
Didner saw the film over the weekend, and was happy to see diverse languages included in it.
“There’s also Spanish and Russian in there,” Didner said, adding he hopes that linguistic richness is “part of an increasing trend that people are looking for that sort of authenticity.”
PJ Grisar is a Forward culture reporter. He can be reached at grisar@forward.com and @pjgrisar on Twitter.
This story was originally published on the Forward.
Features
What led to the complete disappearance of Sabra Hummus from store shelves?
“Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone”
-from Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi” (1970)
By BERNIE BELLAN I wasn’t actually thinking about Sabra Hummus until one day recently when I was sitting together with a group of guys – some of whom were Israeli-born when, out of the blue, one of them asked me if I knew why you couldn’t find Sabra Hummus anywhere in Winnipeg?
“Can’t find it?” I thought. Surely it must be available somewhere here. I said that I thought it must be on a grocery shelf at least in Sobeys on Taylor because if any store was going to have a product with as obvious an Israeli name as “Sabra,” it was going to be Sobeys on Taylor.
After all, going back a few years, anytime you went shopping for hummus the Sabra brand was ubiquitous.
So, I said to the fellow who had asked the question that I was now curious to delve further into whether Sabra Hummus had indeed disappeared from Winnipeg store shelves. I added that I would start by inquiring at the Sobeys store on Taylor – where I knew the manager, Dave McDonald, and that I would ask Dave whether it’s true that Sabra Hummus is no longer available at his store.
I emailed Dave asking him that question but, while I was waiting for a response, I began to search on the internet to see whether there might be an explanation as to what had happened to Sabra Hummus – and whether its disappearance from store shelves wasn’t something unique to Winnipeg.
Naturally, I began with a Google search for Sabra Hummus. While the search led me to discover many different things about Sabra Hummus, the one thing that I found most surprising is that Sabra Hummus, despite its Israeli name, is now wholly owned by PepsiCo.
It was when I received a phone call from a Sobeys representative in response to an email I had sent that it also emerged that, as has been the case with many other products that come from the US, Sobeys had decided to stop importing Sabra Hummus (which used to come in 30 different varieties) ever since Trump imposed his tariffs on Canadian exports going back to February of this year. (Sobeys, by the way, owns many different brands of stores: Sobeys, Safeway, IGA, Foodland, FreshCo, Thrifty Foods, Farn Boy, Longo’s, and Lawtons Drugs.)
But, to my even greater surprise, I learned from a representative of PepsiCo that Sabra Hummus is not even being produced any more – at least not in the plastic tubs that had the very recognizable Sabra logo on them. I’ll have more about what the PepsiCo representative wrote in an email to me, but first – a brief history of Sabra Hummus – and the many problems it’s endured over the years.
Most of my information came from – where else? Wikipedia, but it turned out the Times of Israel also had a very interesting article – written in December 2024, that examined the effect that the Boycott Divest Sanctions movement (BDS) had on Sabra Hummus.
Yet, while both the Wikipedia and the Times of Israel articles did talk about the problems that the Sabra brand had been encountering in recent years, it was only when I received that email from a representative of PepsiCo that I was able to verify that, as of now, Sabra Hummus is no longer being manufactured altogether although, as I’ll explain later, Pepsico does plan on bringing it back into production in 2026.
What happened to Sabra Hummus then?
Here’s some of the information about Sabra Hummus that is largely taken from the Wikipedia article about Sabra Hummus:
“The company was founded in 1986 by Zohar Norman and Yehuda Pearl as Sabra-Blue & White Foods. The company was bought in 2005 by Israeli food manufacturer Strauss.
“In March 2008, Strauss entered a joint-venture partnership with Frito-Lay, a division of the multinational PepsiCo corporation. Strauss owned 50% and PepsiCo 50% of the company. In November 2008, the company announced the construction of a new $61 million plant in Chesterfield County, Virginia, expected to employ 260 people and come on line in mid-2010. The company grew over 50% between August 2008 and August 2009.
According to Wikipedia, by 2016, Sabra Hummus had become the dominant player when it came to selling hummus in the United States: “By 2016, Sabra had gained a 60% market share of hummus in the United States, and, through its co-ownership and sales channels with PepsiCo, was close to $1 billion in annual sales.”
The Times of Israel article noted that Sabra’s share of the hummus market in the US grew even more: “At the start of 2021, Sabra Dipping Company — which is jointly owned by Strauss Group and PepsiCo — sold US supermarkets nearly two-thirds of their hummus.”
Yet, it all seemed to start coming apart in recent years. By 2024, according to Wikipedia, Sabra’s share of the US hummus market had dropped to only “36%.”
There are many reasons for Sabra’s rapid descent from dominance of the US hummus market and both the Wikipedia and Times of Israel articles examine those reasons, but it does seem strange that, notwithstanding the drop in sales that Sabra might have suffered in the past few years, PepsiCo has simply stopped producing it altogether.
I wouldn’t have believed that until I received the email from a representative of Pepsico, to which I referred earlier. Here’s what I was told: “Regrettably, we are temporarily stepping back from full-size hummus tubs to improve product offerings. We know that’s a big disappointment since fans like you have been looking high and low for it!
“Our full-size hummus tubs are expected back in late 2026. In the meantime, our Guacamole and Hummus Snackers remain available at many grocery stores across Canada.”
After reading that email, one might be forgiven for thinking that something drastic – something beyond loss of market share, had happened to Sabra Hummus.
But Sabra had had huge problems in the past – from which it always bounced back.
Here’s what Wikipedia noted about problems Sabra had encountered in the past: “On April 8, 2015, Sabra recalled 30,000 cases of its classic hummus after a tub in Michigan tested positive for Listeria.”
Then, the Wikipedia article went on to say: “On November 19, 2016, Sabra voluntarily recalled multiple hummus varieties across the U.S. after Listeria was discovered at one of its manufacturing plants, though the company stated the bacteria had not been found in any of its actual products.
“In March 2021, Sabra recalled about 2,100 cases of 10 oz. Classic Hummus, following a routine inspection by the FDA in the US, due to a possible salmonella contamination. The recall affected 16 states in the U.S.”
Yet, despite all that, as has previously been noted, the Times of Israel article of December 2024 pointed out that, prior to that March 2021 product recall, Sabra Hummus still dominated the US market for hummus, to the extent that nearly two-thirds of the hummus sold by US supermarkets came from Sabra.
To this point we haven’t mentioned one other factor that certainly affected sales of Sabra Hummus, although to what extent is very hard to determine: The concerted boycott campaign which was part of the BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanctions) movement that targeted Sabra Hummus in particular, and which had been started at several different universities in the US, beginning in 2010.
According to the Times of Israel December 2024 article, the “campaign against Sabra hummus started on the US West Coast 14 years ago, when anti-Israel activists began denouncing Sabra for donating food to the IDF Golani Brigade.
However, despite that campaign having “kicked into higher gear”… with “hundreds of supermarkets and other stores in North America and Europe” having had stickers denouncing Israel placed on tubs of Sabra Hummus, the ToI article insists that the BDS campaign which was carried on mostly on US college campuses was not a major factor in declining Sabra Hummus sales.
Instead, the Times of Israel article claims it was the March 2021 product recall that was the decisive factor in Sabra Hummus sales plummeting. According to the ToI article, “a salmonella contamination recall on products made at Sabra’s Virginia factory took a devastating toll on the brand, which lost half its market share in just one quarter.”
And yet – to make matters even more complicated, an article in still another publication suggested that, notwithstanding that March 2021 product recall – which also led to a complete shutdown of Sabra’s primary manufacturing plant in Virginia, sales began to bounce back in 2022!
In a December 2022 article in an online publication titled “Manufacturing Dive,” Sabra CEO Joey Bergstein is quoted as saying that the brand has been “‘consistently climbing back,’ and it has regained its No. 1 position in the hummus category, according to IRI data cited by Sabra. When it was missing from shelves, he said more than half of consumers decided not to buy hummus instead of switching to another brand. Those who did switch are coming back to Sabra, the IRI data showed, and the brand is taking back market share.
“‘When you stop production, you open the door for a competitor,’ Bergstein said. ‘We’ve been able to grow back in a relatively short period following that disruption, which I think speaks to the health of the brand.’”
In the final analysis, there is a combination of factors that have led to the disappearance of Sabra Hummus from store shelves – not, as I first thought, perhaps only in Winnipeg but, as it turned out, everywhere in Canada and, as I learned after reading that email from the PepsiCo representative – in the US as well.
There were multiple incidents of suspected contamination of Sabra products; there was the campaign that was part of the BDS movement to boycott Israeli products – especially Sabra products; and finally, there was the decision by major Canadian grocers to stop importing products from the US.
Although I did like Sabra Hummus, I can’t say that I’m heartbroken to learn of its disappearance. But it is sad to think that a product which had such an identifiably Israeli name is no longer available – even if that product had stopped being manufactured in Israel years ago.
One more note: In 2018 PepsiCo acquired another well known Israeli food company: SodaStream. SodaStream still has a plant in Israel although, again after coming under fire for having a plant on the West Bank, SodaStream closed that plant in 2015 and opened a new plant within the green line. Chalk that one up to a victory for the BDS movement. I wonder whether, in the future, we’ll learn more about how much damage the BDS movement really did cause Sabra Hummus. It still seems strange to me that a product which was, until quite recently, the dominant player in its field, has simply disappeared. It suggests to me that the BDS movement had quite a bit more impact than one might be willing to concede.