About Jewish Food

I love going to shiurim as you can tell. It’s a way of getting a dose of Ruchnius put into my day. Monday night started a series of shiurim that will last throughout the summer. I’ve come to see many programs that have been started to keep the men busy and out of trouble in the city, while their wives and family are up in the country. I think such programs are great. But yet, when I have a family I can’t imagine leaving to the country and leaving my husband back at home, I think I would rather just stay in the city.

Anyways, the shiur I went to on Monday night was by R’ Zev Cohen on the topic of Jewish Food. While I was listening to the shiur, it reminded me of different posts I had read, it gave answers to questions other bloggers have asked. So I figured I would write one post to answer all the questions and at the same time give an interesting summary of what the shiur was about.

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Nissan is one of the first months of the Jewish calander. Pesach comes first, and the Karbon brought on Pesach was barley, which is animal food. Then 7 weeks later is Shvous and the Karbon brought then was wheat which is human food. Since by Pesach we are like animals, and then by Shvous we become like humans, after going through the 7 week process. Now this 7 week process is compared to a lady’s cycle, where at the end there is milk which symbolizes purity. That is why on Shvous we eat Milichigs. Now how did cheese cake come about? It came about because, Pesach we have matza which has no yetzer hora, while Shvous we have Lechem which symbolizes the yetzer hora. But yet Shvous we have milk which symbolizes purity. So when you have lechem with the milk it is showing that you have the yetzer hora and yet your pure. The only way this is possible is with the Torah. So once we got the Torah on Shvous then we are able to have lechem- the yetzer hora and yet have milk- be pure. So that’s where it got started to have cheese cake, it’s lechem with milk. 

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Chanukah became a time when people buy those Jelly doughnuts, you may ask why it’s fitting for Chanukah. The reason according to R’ Shlomo Zalman Orbach is as follows. Al Hamichya is the only place that mentions the Mezbeach, in benching it doesn’t mention it, so therefore we need a mezonos. Now Al Hamichya is also the only place it mentions Peiros, and we need a tam peiros, so that’s why there is Jelly in the Jelly doughnuts. (This is based on a posuk where it says Mezbeach and Peiros, but I forgot what the posuk is).

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Chulent is a Jewish food that is supposed to be specifically for Shabbos. R’ Cohen said he can’t handle beans in his chulent, so he has rice. He always felt guilty as though he wasn’t having chulent the right way, but then he came across a Russian custom where they have rice in their chulent - Dafina, and then he felt better about it.