When it comes to latkes, a lot of quibbles come up before the first potato is even peeled. Thick and hefty, or crispy-lacy? Do you hand-grate the potato or process it to mush? Squeeze out the liquid or let it be? Par-boil the potatoes, or avoid the potato altogether and head for the untrammeled wilds of zucchini with parmesan or yams with ginger? Can bacon be involved?

But all of these questions are nothing compared to the Big One. Which is, of course, OMG these latkes are SO GOOD why don't you make them EVERY NIGHT???

This, of course, is a question for sages and Jewish mothers everywhere to contemplate. The answer may become clear in the aftermath of a good latke fry-up, when bits of shredded potato are shriveling to blackness all over the counter, and a fine mist of splattered oil surrounds the stove.

Right now, though, Chanukah has just begun, and latke enthusiasm is at its height. Why potato pancakes for Chanukah, you ask? First, there's the holiday's celebration of scrappiness trumping might, the humble potato standing in for the outnumbered, outpowered but triumphant Maccabees. Able to reclaim their desecrated temple, so the story goes, the Jews found only one day's worth of oil for light, with the nearest source of consecrated oil a week's journey away. Then the little miracle: the one day's worth of oil burns for 8 days, hence the 8 days of Chanukah, and the dictum to fry, fry, fry.

Anything fried will work, and Jews around the world fry up all kinds of different things. In Israel, the go-to Chanukah treat is soufganiot, jelly-filled doughnuts dusted with powdered sugar. In Eastern Europe, however, winter meant root vegetables, most likely fried in chicken or goose fat, served with applesauce for sweetness.

Here in the Bay Area, we can do a little of each: potatoes for cultural tradition, fried in olive oil for religious significance, or just because it's local and we use olive oil for everything, anyway. If you have chicken fat or goose fat or duck fat lying around looking for trouble, use it by all means, perhaps half-and-half with a mild vegetable oil like canola so that the simple potato taste isn't clobbered by poultry-ness.

Now, on to technique. Since I am not your mother, or (more importantly) your new Jewish husband's mother, if you already love your latkes, nothing I tell you need influence your latke-making in the least. If, however, you've been relying, sadly, on those nasty frozen ones that taste like wadded-up flannel pajamas all these years, or your children have suddenly reached latke-eating age and you feel compelled to hand down a little tradition, even if otherwise you order in pad thai, burritos or aloo gohbi every night of the week, here is everything you need to know.

First, if you're going to fry, fry for a crowd. Making latkes is a festive event, and the more people around, the less you'll notice what a giant mess all that spattering oil has made of your kitchen.

Once you start in with the latkes, you won't have the focus or energy for anything else. Since most people's appetite for potato pancakes is limitless, especially if they're only made once a year, you should put together some satisfying one-pot thing the night before, like hot beet borscht or a crock-pot brisket, with challah or rye bread on the side. This also gives you something to throw at your guests as they start circling the stove and eyeing your spatula like starving hyenas, drawn by the irresistible diner whiff of sizzling potatoes, onion, and grease.

Second, grate by hand. Like writing thank you notes or taking off your mascara before bed, this process looms much larger in the imagination than in actual minutes spent. Use the coarse holes on a big box grater, and you'll get perfect texture and minimal clean-up. No need to peel the potatoes, especially if you're using organic spuds.

Alternate onion and potato as you grate, since the onion juices will help keep the potato shreds from oxidizing into gray yuck as you go. Another thing: don't grate more than you can fry up in a few batches. If you're frying for a crowd, don't be tempted to grate up ahead of time. Liquid will seep, potatoes will blacken, and you'll end up with a bowl of unpleasant, gray-black soupy sludge that even frying cannot redeem. Instead, grate, mix, fry, repeat. (See "Why don't we have these every night?", above.)

Once your potatoes and onions are grated, scoop the shreds into a large colander set over a big bowl. Now, get your hands into that potato mound and act like you're wringing a pair of very wet socks. Squeeze and wring, squeeze and wring, releasing as much liquid as possible. Sex educator and cultural critic Susie Bright, a woman who knows how to find the right tool for the job, swears by a potato ricer for this; others load their taters into clean tea towels and wring away. Me, I'm a two-hands, no-equipment kind of lady, but follow your inclinations. When all the potatoes look well-wrung, step back and let the liquid collected in the bowl stand for a couple of minutes.

Meanwhile, separate your eggs, dropping the egg whites into a big bowl and putting the yolks aside. Hand the egg white to a helpful guest, and ask them to whisk them into stiff peaks. Here, technology helps; like natural childbirth, whisking egg whites with nothing but muscle tone and a whisk is admirable but achingly slow. If you don't have a hand-held electric mixer, just tell people to pass the whisk along when they tire out. Line a cookie sheet with paper towels and place it near (but not within catching-on-fire range of) the stove.

Lift up your colander of potatoes and onion. Underneath, you'll see a pool of brownish liquid with a squeaky layer of pinkish-tan potato starch at the bottom. Pour off the liquid, then dump the grated potato on top of the starch. Add the egg yolks, the matzoh meal or flour, and plenty of salt and pepper. Mix it all together, being sure to scrape up the extra starch from the bottom of the bowl. Track down that bowl of egg whites. Quickly, scoop the whites onto the potato mixture, and using a down-and-around motion, fold the whites into the grated potato.

Heat up a couple of wide, heavy frying pans (cast iron works best). Add about 1/2 inch of oil to each one, and get that oil really good and hot. (Buy a fresh bottle of oil for this endeavor. You'll need a lot more than you think.) When a shred of potato sputters and bubbles, slide as many large spoonfuls of potato as you can fit into the pan without crowding. Fry, turning once, until pancakes are a rich mahogany brown. Drain on paper towels, blotting off as much grease as possible so they'll stay crisp. If necessary, keep the first batch warm in a 250°F oven while you fry up another round.

As you fry, your friends and family will exhort you to come, sit down, eat. Ignore them. This is the martyrdom known to every latke maker: you must stand and work while others sit and enjoy. (See "Why don't we have these every night?", above.) Serve with sour cream and applesauce. You might think you could go all California and use salsa or fig chutney instead, but you would be wrong. Or not; maybe latkes are sensational with fig chutney. (Gravy, I've been told, is wonderful on matzoh balls.) But try trusting your inner grandmother first.

Latkes
This recipe makes thin, crispy latkes, more hash brown than hockey puck, because you can always make room for one more latke when they're light.

Ingredients:
2 1/2 lbs potatoes, well scrubbed
1 large yellow onion, peeled
2 eggs, separated
3 tablespoons flour or matzoh meal
1 tsp salt, or to taste
freshly ground pepper
Vegetable oil, for frying, or whatever fat you want (Yes, I'm sure bacon fat would be delicious, but really, must you?)
Sour cream and applesauce, for serving

Preparation:
1. Grate potatoes and onion alternately. Scoop grated mixture into a large colander suspended over a large bowl.

2. Squeeze and wring excess liquid out of potato mixture. Let potato mixture drain for a few minutes. Lift up colander, and pour off excess liquid below, reserving the layer of potato starch at the bottom. Dump grated potatoes on top of potato starch, and mix in egg yolks, flour, salt, and pepper, making sure to scrape the layer of potato starch into the mixture.

3. Beat egg whites to stiff peaks. Fold egg whites into potato mixture.

4. Heat 1/2 inch of vegetable oil in a heavy frying pan. Drop in a shred of potato; when it sizzles and bubbles, slide in as many large spoonfuls of potato mixture as you can without crowding. Fry over medium-high heat, turning once, until pancakes are well-browned. Add more oil as necessary for subsequent batches, but make sure to get it good and hot before adding the potatoes.

5. Drain on paper towels and serve immediately with sour cream and applesauce.

Makes about 20 latkes.

Tamara Keith, reporter for The California Report and KQED Public Radio, recently learned how to cook these potato pancakes the right way...from her mother-in-law. Here's her story.

This may be the ultimate parable of Jewish cooking tradition. Growing up Methodist in a small, central valley town, my first introduction to latkes was through my college boyfriend, Ira, when I went to visit him at his parent's house in L.A. during Hanukkah. The whole house had this distinctive scent of grease and potatoes --and it was sort of fishy. The potato pancakes Ira's mom and sister made were terrific. They were crispy and warm and dunked in apple sauce for that perfect balance of grease and fruit.

So, Ira and I kept dating (for like a decade) and recently got married. Over the years, I've tried making him some traditional Jewish foods -- dishes he remembers from his childhood. But I've basically screwed everything up. I put dill in the matzo ball soup (big mistake), and my matzo balls were fluffy in stark contrast to what his mom makes. And my brisket, while quite tasty, is nothing like his mom's. So several years ago I asked for her latke recipe. She photocopied it from a small paperback cookbook, and I followed the recipe exactly, more than once. But my latkes also were a dud. They were like over crispy little hash browns. I gave up and started using Manischewitz latkes in a box -- which is essentially admitting defeat.

A few weeks ago, my friends at The California Report convinced me that I should do a story about celebrating Hanukkah as a newly converted Jew. For me, Hanukkah is all about latkes, even if I make them using a mix. But with my in-laws coming to town, I decided this little radio story would be a perfect excuse to actually learn how to make the family recipe.

So there we were in my kitchen, my expert latke-making mother-in-law (Andrea) and sister-in-law (Shannon) and me. I pulled out the recipe and put it on the kitchen counter. I might as well have left it hidden away in my recipe binder, because they hardly used it! Instead, they kept referring to what we were making as "Poppy's latkes." Poppy was the patriarch of the family (my mother-in-law's grandfather) who continued making latkes well into his senior years. The secrets of Poppy's latkes are lots of oil in the frying pan and the perfect mixture of shredded potatoes and mushy potatoes.

Clearly, following the printed recipe all those years was setting me up for failure. The real recipe is in the nuances passed from generation to generation. Here's the recipe as close I can recall it. It contains elements from Sara Kasdan's cookbook "Love and Knishes," but has been modified over the years by Ira's mother and sister working under heavy influence from Poppy's latke-making tradition.

Ingredients
2 cups grated raw potatoes (measure after draining)
2 eggs beaten
1 teaspoon salt
1 heaping tablespoon of flour or matzo meal
1 pinch of baking powder
1 small onion grated (optional)

Preparation
Put potatoes and onions in a food processor (exact quantity is up for interpretation). Ideally your food processor will have both a grate and a chop blade running at the same time. Otherwise grate, then chop until the latkes reach the appropriate mixture of mush and shred. Add a little lemon juice to the mixture so the potatoes won't change colors. Push the mixture into a strainer removing the excess moisture. Add flour and eggs until it looks right. Don't put in too much salt because people are on low sodium diets these days.

Cook the latkes in vegetable oil about a half inch deep in the pan. Really, there's no such thing as too much oil. It is best if the latkes float in the oil just a little but aren't fully submerged. Cook until they are quite crispy. You're aiming for brown, not golden brown.

Sara Kasdan adds in her book: "Note: This recipe should serve 4-6 people, but when some people see potato latkes they act like they haven't eaten for a week. They will want to make from latkes alone a meal. When you have people who enjoy so much, you won't mind grating potatoes all day long."

Post by Tamara Keith, from The California Report.

You can listen to Tamara in the kitchen with her mother-in-law at The California Report's website.