Reflecting on Fairfax District’s beloved Jewish bakery, shopping sustainably for Christmas

Reporter Robin Estrin:

I first visited Diamond Bakery in LA’s Fairfax District last year during Hanukkah, when owner Doug Weinstein was churning out traditional, jelly-filled donuts called sufganiyot. Weinstein regaled me with tales from the bakery’s 77-year history, and let me taste-test some donuts. They were delicious.

Early this month, when the bakery closed, I can’t say I was surprised. The Fairfax District is better known today as LA’s streetwear capital, rather than the city’s Jewish heart. Plus, a lot of businesses haven’t recovered from the pandemic. Still, I was heartbroken. Many of the bakery’s original recipes were carried to LA from Europe by Holocaust survivors. Wrapped into the bakery’s history are stories about family, tradition, and cross-generation connection. Would it all be lost?

Iconic Diamond Bakery closes, but rye starter lives on

Many of the original recipes at the Fairfax District’s Diamond Bakery were carried to Los Angeles from Europe by Jewish immigrants and survivors of the Holocaust, who launched the bakery in 1946. It became an LA institution, serving challah, rye bread, and rugelach to generations of Jewish families.

But December 3 was the bakery’s last day in business — after struggling during the COVID pandemic and facing a changing Fairfax District.

Besides fewer customers, “it’s an 80-year-old building,” says owner Doug Weinstein. “The plumbing is leaking, the electrical is old, the ovens need major repairs. In order for us to grow, we would have to refresh the whole bakery, and that’s a lot of money.”

Weinstein has sold the original recipes to a wholesale bakery called Bread Los Angeles. “That culture has been going all along, so we’re going to keep that going. We’re going to produce the corn rye and hopefully get it out there on a much larger scale,” he says.

Your guide to eco-friendly holiday gift-giving

Amid the climate crisis, KCRW offers advice on finding sustainable options for everyone on your shopping list.

Not all gifts have to be expensive or brand new. Consider buying from a secondhand shop, and/or upcycling an imperfect item. You can make something by hand; or give an experience (like a trip to the zoo), membership to an organization (like the gym or museum), or donation.

When it comes to wrapping gifts, standard paper has a landfill problem. Most of it’s not recyclable, and the worst offenders shine the brightest with their glitter-encrusted menorahs and reindeer. Thus, consider the Japanese tradition of wrapping packages in cloth — known as furoshiki.

As for the tree, a real one is more sustainable than a fake one. Real evergreens spent years sucking carbon out of the atmosphere before getting cut down. Fake ones did nothing of the sort, they’re made of plastic and created with fossil fuels, and were likely manufactured in another country, and shipped on a gas-powered boat to get to you.

‘He’s like a superhero’: LA celebrates Shohei Ohtani joining Dodgers

Japanese baseball superstar Shohei Ohtani signed a historic 10-year, $700 million contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers, making it one of the largest deals in sports history. However, he is deferring much of the contract.

“We’re talking about a player here who can pitch on the highest level. Two years ago, he struck out over 200 batters. He had 44 home runs last year, and he made The Angels $10-20 million in endorsements, advertisements. There’s now [an] international audience. The price of tickets will go up. I mean, this is huge, not just for the Dodgers, it’s huge for baseball,” explain Jason and Randy Sklar, co-hosts of the podcast View from the Cheap Seats.

They add, “For people who don’t know Shohei Otani, he speaks through an interpreter. He’s not a super Americanized player. So it’s truly an international player that is going to be coming to this team, which I think is wonderful. … It’s big for Japan. It’s big for Los Angeles. He’s gonna be the biggest star, and he is such a fun guy to root for. It doesn’t hurt that he’s 6’4,” 210 pounds, good-looking guy. He has everything you need. He’s like a superhero.”

Disability Studies: UCLA brings new major to campus

When the fall term began at UCLA, there was a new major on campus: Disability Studies. Victoria Marks, a professor of choreography at the school, is the head of the multidisciplinary program.

She explains, “We have faculty from all across the campus contributing research and teaching to the major. So we’re looking at history, law, rights and representation, access, identity, culture, and politics. We have faculty members from the humanities, the social sciences, health care, public policy, the arts, which is where I’m from, technology and education.”

Mark considers the program as an important part of DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion), and it’s a way to decrease stigma that can come with disability.

No, CARE Court won’t solve homelessness. But what will it do?

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s CARE Court, a new mental health program that’s part of the civil justice system, opens in LA County this month. People can petition to enroll individuals with schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders, who would then be assigned public defenders and a series of hearings. The goal is to come up with court-approved, time-limited treatment plans of up to two years. However, there are no civil or criminal penalties for not participating, or for walking away once an individual has a treatment plan.

As for resources to support CARE plans, LA County has received some separate but related funding from the state that local officials plan to prioritize for people in the CARE system. That’s according to Dr. Lisa Wong, director of the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health.

But the opening of CARE Court doesn’t come with any new influx of permanent supportive housing, mental health care professionals, services or treatment beds. Instead, county officials will have to reshuffle existing resources to ensure that people are able to follow through on CARE plans.