At 13, Claire Saffitz Was Almost Too High Strung To Enjoy Her Bat Mitzvah
Lately Claire Saffitz and her husband, Harris Mayer-Selinger, have spent a lot of time reflecting on their respective bar and bat mitzvahs. While Saffitz grew up in the not so Jewish city of St. Louis, Mayer-Selinger hails from bar mitzvah mecca: Long Island. “It’s become a joke between us. My husband says with pride that his bar mitzvah was in the top three best ones of his town. When he told me he had ‘motivators’ at his party I was like, ‘What’s that?’ He was like, ‘You know, those hype people.’ It was so crazy to me,” she tells The Spiel. Meanwhile, Saffitz had a themeless party, sans dance crew. Or as she puts it, “By [my husband’s] bat mitzvah standards mine was very low key and minimally produced.”
At 13, Saffitz was a “classic introvert.” The now famous pastry chef and former Bon Appétit video personality hadn’t yet found baking and was still seeking outlets for her bountiful creative energy. “I was really into art projects. There was a local art alliance in St. Louis near our house and every season my mom would enroll me in classes. I would take painting, pottery, or wire jewelry making,” says the Dessert Person author. But it wasn’t until she started devouring her mother’s Martha Stewart Living magazines that she discovered the crafting components of baking. “I would always do these little activities that I would see in the magazine. My poor mom, she let me attempt to make chocolate Easter eggs by blowing out real eggs and then tempering chocolate on a marble slab. It was such a mess!”
And the now 34-year-old still brings the same artistic eye to the kitchen: whether it’s by making homemade Twinkies and Choco Tacos in her former Gourmet Makes video series, or guiding viewers through Tarte Tatin in her newly launched Claire Saffitz x Dessert Person YouTube channel. Below, Saffitz reflects on her childhood favorite frozen custard, listening to her torah portion on a cassette walkman, and her lifelong love of magazines.
On being a high strung 13-year-old:
I’m way more relaxed now than I was as a 13-year-old. I was a super high strung adolescent and very focused on achievement. I was type A, as I still am, and just high anxiety. But I coped with my anxiety back then the same way I do now: which is plan, prepare, and practice. My torah reading was from Noah and it was a surprisingly rigorous bat mitzvah experience despite the fact that we were members of a reformed synagogue. I had a tutor who would record herself chanting and I would listen to it on my cassette walkman to practice.
I remember feeling very prepared for my bat mitzvah. And I do remember enjoying it, which I’m glad about because it would’ve been the kind of event that I would’ve been so worked up about that I wouldn’t have enjoyed it.
On serving wild Alaskan salmon:
The night before my mom did a Friday night dinner at our house. We had Ted Drewes, which is a famous St. Louis frozen custard place for dessert. Then for the party my parents didn’t go all out on the venue or anything like that but they were like, “Food is important and we’re going to get the good caterer in town.”
My dad is a fisherman and he had gone fishing with his brothers in Alaska and brought back a bunch of salmon, so the caterer cooked the salmon that he’d had frozen for the adults to eat. I remember having the best leftovers from the catering.
On her skirt suit:
For the party I wore this like black long sleeve shirt with a rhinestone butterfly on it, capri plants, and big platform shoes. I thought it was the coolest thing ever. But for the actual service I wore a really timeless gray skirt suit. I have two older sisters and at that age there was this constant argument and discussion about clothing, like who gets to wear what and this and that. It was also usually a topic of great debate with my mom about what I could or couldn’t have for clothes. But I appreciate that she steered toward me something not only very age appropriate, but tasteful for my service.
On what that bat mitzvah girl would think of her career:
I think my 13-year-old self would be shocked to find myself in a profession and in an area of my industry that is very public facing. I’ve never been a performer and I think it’s easy to sort of see the videos and think, “Oh, you’re performing.” But it’s really not. It’s me being in an element where I’m really comfortable and having that captured on camera.
As a teenager growing up in St. Louis I was very, very into consuming media. I read a lot and got a lot of magazines in the mail. I wanted to feel connected to this New York media world. In that sense I think Claire as a teenager would be over the moon and totally amazed that I ended up working at a magazine, and working in and around these major titles that I consumed so avidly as a teen. It’s a very cool thing to think about because I think it would be shocking and exciting — in all positive ways.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Great work
Another great one-someday we have to hear about your bat mitzvah