Jewish holidays often provide excuses to eat delicious, symbolic foods, but few are as tasty as the custom of eating fried foods on Chanukah. The holiday commemorates the reconsecration of a damaged temple and the miracle of light; a vial of oil that was supposed to burn for just one night, stayed lit instead for eight nights. The eight candles of the menorah, one more lit each night, and the food cooked in oil serve as reminders of this miracle.

In my Ashkenazi house, the fried foods that we ate during the Festival of Lights were latkes, crispy delicious fried potato pancakes. We experimented with other flavors: carrot-zucchini, lemon-ricotta, and blends of parsnip and Jerusalem artichoke with potato. In recent years, however, I learned of other traditions. Sephardic Jews traditionally eat a variety of fritters soaked in sweet syrup. Italian Sephardim, for example, enjoy Frittele di Zucca, squash fritters flavored with raisins, pine nuts, orange zest and candied citron, and finished with powdered sugar.

But the tradition that has captured my fancy recently is the Israeli tradition of sufganiyot: puffy, sugar-coated, jelly-filled doughnuts. According to Claudia Roden in “The Book of Jewish Food,” this doughnut was actually derived from an Austro-Hungarian peasant carnival sweet, which was then adopted by the court of Marie Antoinette.

You can experiment with exotic varieties at some New York City restaurants. On December 28, Blue Hill (75 Washington Pl., between Sixth Avenue and Washington Square West, 212-539-1776) is offering a $68 prix fixe Chanukah dinner that finishes with sufganiyot for dessert. At Swedish-Japanese Riingo (205 E. 45th St., between Second and Third avenues, 212-867-4200) you can bite into hole-size doughnuts oozing with green tea jelly; and Suba (109 Ludlow St., between Rivington and Delancey streets, 212-982-5714) offers Spanish-style chocolate-filled fried bunuelos.

The traditional doughnuts for Chanukah tend to be small- to medium-size and filled with thick jam. And if you’re truly enterprising, you can celebrate the miracle of oil by frying your own.

Sufganiyot

1 package active dry yeast
4 tablespoons sugar
3/4 cup warm water
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
Pinch of salt
2 eggs, separated
2 tablespoons ( 1/4 stick) butter or margarine, softened
Raspberry apricot, or strawberry preserves
Confectioners’ sugar
Vegetable oil for deep-frying

1. Mix together yeast, two tablespoons of the sugar and water. Let mixture sit until it bubbles.

2. Sift the flour and mix it with the remaining sugar, salt, egg yolks, and the yeast mixture.

3. Knead the dough until it holds the shape of a ball. Add the butter or margarine. Knead some more, until the fat is completely absorbed. Cover with a towel and let rise overnight in the refrigerator. Roll out the dough to a thickness of approximately 1/8 inch.

4. Cut out the dough into 24 rounds with a juice glass or any object about two inches in diameter.

5. Take 1/2 teaspoon of preserves and place in center of 12 rounds.Top with the other 12. Press down and crimp at edges, sealing with egg whites. Let rise for about 30 minutes.

6. Heat two inches of oil to about 375-. Drop doughnuts into oil, a few at a time. Turn to brown on both sides.

7. Drain on paper towels. Sprinkle the doughnuts with confectioners’ sugar.