OneTable is the AirBNB of Shabbat. Aimed at adults 21 to 39, it provides a platform for Shabbat hosts and guests to connect with one another, while giving them resources and support they need to start or restart their Friday night Shabbat practice.

“One of our taglines at OneTable is called Find Your Friday,” Amy Bebchick, Chief Program Officer of OneTable, told the Journal. “There’s not [just] one way to bring Shabbat into your life.”

Some use this end-of-the-week gathering as an oasis with the people closest to them. Others invite their neighbors or open their home for an additional guest or two in order to build community connections. People Shabbat through OneTable in more than 700 communities all over the US and in Toronto.

“There’s a quote from Ahad Ha’am that says, ‘More than the Jews have kept Shabbat, Shabbat has kept the Jewish people,” Bebchick said. “There is something about the ritual … that really is grounding and centering.”

She added, “Now more than ever, we are all really hungry for a way to, to escape from what is going on outside and to really find that place that feels like a warm blanket on a winter day.”

About two years ago, they launched OneTable Together. This version is for adults 50 and up, who are reenvisioning and reengaging with Shabbat, whether they are empty-nesters, moving to  a new neighborhood or their kids are away at camp and they want a different kind of experience.

“We’re in the business of peer-to-peer Shabbat,” Bebchick said. “One of the things that we have learned with OneTable Together … is that more of our dinners on that platform are open [to others]. … they’re wanting to welcome new people in.”

Bebchick has regularly practiced Shabbat her entire life.

“I grew up in a family that had Shabbat dinner every single Friday … before we went to services,” she said. “When all my other friends in high school were going out on Friday night, I couldn’t go until after dinner.”

In college she hosted OneTable dinners, before OneTable even existed.

“My friends and I … were inviting people over; we were living in DC at the time.” she said. “When we were trying to figure out … relationships … and our next job and … moving and navigating money and all of those things, it was a grounding force for me and it continues to be.”

In fact, Bebchick, who previously served as the Assistant Vice President of Philanthropy at the Union for Reform Judaism and as the director of the Hillels at The George Washington University, Miami University (Ohio), and North County – and currently lives with her husband and two kids in Westchester County, New York – starts planning her Friday night menu as soon as she is done with Shabbat the Saturday before.

“I start thinking about what the weather is going to be, what do I want to be cooking, who else might be coming to the table,” she said. “[I like] the idea of really carving that space every Friday… no matter what is going on in the world, it is coming.”

For Bebchick, sometimes Shabbat is dinner around the table in the dining room, other times it’s a picnic or a hike. One of Bebchick’s favorite Shabbat to-go dishes is gazpacho soup. That recipe is below.

If you want to host Shabbat, Bebchick said to start with your comfort level. If you are used to hosting parties, you can apply that experience to your Shabbat, and then get support for the other elements through OneTable’s resources.

“Maybe you want to learn how to do some of the blessings,” Bebchick said. :[Then you need to decide]: Do you want to do them traditionally? Do you want to do them in English, in Hebrew? Do you wanna do something totally creative? We can help you do that too.”

Shabbat is all about marking the moment and making that moment sacred.

For guests who want to be helpful, OneTable added a collaboration function, so hosts can invite guests to help co-create the dinner.

“[Guests] report even higher levels of connectedness and even higher levels of joy, when they leave, when they’ve been a part of it,” Bebchick said. “So we created on the platform a way to say not only, ‘Please bring a delicious bottle of wine,’ but also ‘Do you want to come a few minutes early and help me set up, can you stay late to clean up, do you want to do a Shabbat blessing, do you want to do an icebreaker?’”

At OneTable, they talk about going online to go offline, Bebchick explained.

“We are a social dining platform: you have to go online to post your dinner,” she said. “But it’s really about IRL… how we come together in real life and build those relationships.”

Learn more at OneTable.org. Follow @OneTableShabbat on Instagram.

Read Debra’s cover story on OneTable.

For the full conversation, listen to the podcast:

Watch the interview:

Gazpacho On-the-Go

Adapted from Classic Gazpacho Recipe from “America’s Test Kitchen Complete Vegetarian Cookbook”

Ingredients

1.5 pounds of your favorite tomatoes, any variety, diced up (I generally core and remove seeds for anything that isn’t a small grape or cherry tomato variety)

2 red peppers diced

2 small cucumbers or 1 large – peeled or unpeeled, if using persian style no need to seed, if using garden cucumbers better to seed and then dice

2 shallots, minced

⅓ cup cider vinegar

2 garlic cloves, minced (or frozen)

5 cups tomato juice

1 teaspoon or more of hot sauce, optional

Handful of ice cubes

Plus: Mason jars

Instructions

Combine tomatoes, red peppers, cucumbers, shallots, cider vinegar, garlic, salt (original recipe calls for 2 teaspoons, I generally start with 1 teaspoon), and a couple grinds of black pepper in a large bowl for about 5 minutes, until vegetables start to break down a little

Stir in the tomato juice and hot sauce, if using

Add a handful of ice cubes, cover and fridge (it will be chilled in about an hour but you can certainly make it days in advance)

Pour into mason jars, so you can take it to a potluck or on a picnic.

Serve with corn chips for some added salt and crunch.

That’s really it!

Debra Eckerling is a writer for the Jewish Journal and the host of “Taste Buds with Deb.” Subscribe on YouTube or your favorite podcast platform. Email Debra: tastebuds@jewishjournal.com.