Drawing on ethnography conducted in Israel since the late 1990s, this book considers how power is produced, reproduced, negotiated, and subverted in the contemporary Israeli culinary sphere. The book explores issues such as the definition of Israeli cuisine (a defining element of which is large portions of “satisfying” dishes made from mediocre ingredients), the ownership of hummus, Israel's Independence Day barbecues, the popularity of Italian food in Israel, the privatization of communal Kibbutz dining rooms, and food at a military prison for Palestinian detainees to show how cooking and eating create ambivalence concerning questions of strength and weakness and how power and victimization are mixed into a sense of self-justification that maintains internal cohesion among Israeli Jews. The book concludes by presenting two culinary trends in contemporary Israel that emerge at the intersection of food and power.