EATING OUR FEELINGS
Donato’s sixteen-year-old daughter, Mary, took over oper- ations of the bakery. Eventual- ly, a judge interviewed Vincen- zo and found him “entirely inno- cent of any subversive act or in- tentions.” More suspicious was Vincenzo and Donato’s accuser, Augusto Bersani, a former min- ister of their Protestant church. Bersani’s name came up fre- quently enough in the judge’s interviews that he examined all cases in which detainees had been fingered by the former minister. Cast out of the church for allegedly embezzling funds and falsifying birth records, Bersani appeared to have been using his role as an RCMP infor- mant to seek revenge on those he felt had wronged him. Visiting the families of interned men, initially posing as a helpful friend, Bersani told Mrs. Monaco, “Remember when I was put out of the church? I suffered. Now your husbands are suffering.” Just before Christmas of 1940, Donato and Vincenzo were released, though Antonio was held until 1943. The false im- prisonment of a family’s entire generation of men is not some- thing that happens without leav- ing deep wounds. Donato’s son Leonardo work- ed in the bakery until it closed in 1995. Romanow grew up in the adjoining house; her grandfather made teething rings for her out of bread dough. “They were shaped like a bagel and were baked until quite hard,” she remembers. It was a multigenerational home; the grandparents lived one floor above her. Every Sun- day, they’d all have lunch togeth- er, the table set with spaghetti
and tomato sauce. Sometimes there would be braciola, thin- ly sliced beef wrapped around cheese and herbs and sim- mered in tomato sauce. Always, there was the same bread. It was known then as zulu bread (see recipe on the next page for why we wouldn’t call it this today): a slightly sweet, oval loaf with a lightly golden crust and a soft and airy crumb. Occasionally dipped in sauce, it was primar- ily eaten on its own, sliced and spread with margarine. At Concordia, Romanow stud- ied under Jewish feminist activ- ist Norma Joseph. “I thought I should know more about the religion I was always told Christi- anity/Catholicism was descend- ed from.” Joseph told Romanow that she could study Jewish food- ways and something clicked. From there she spent a summer at Brandeis University, after which she knew she wanted to convert.
“Alongside the research we were doing, we also went to Shabbat dinners, synagogues, and visited other Jewish in- stitutions in the Boston area. After being immersed in Jewish culture and practice, I felt a connection to Judaism and began to explore conversion.” In the years since, she’s had time to reflect on why she em- braced the food and faith of Ju- daism, rather than the traditions she was born into. It goes back to her great-grandparents’ unjust imprisonment and the mark it left on her family. “From what I understand— and it’s hard because my family never talks about this—on my mother’s side, there was a shift to downplay their Italian identity and be more Canadian English. I don’t exactly know what they were intending. So even though being Italian is a big part of my identity, at the same time, there
46 WINTER 2025/2026
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