Torah for Christians: Passover Foods
TORAH FOR CHRISTIANS
SEASON THREE EPISODE TWELVE
PASSOVER FOODS
As we will learn, the children recite 4 Questions during the Passover Seder. Adults also have 4 questions: When do we eat? When do we eat? When do we eat? and What do we eat?
We’ll get to the when next time. On this episode of Torah for Christians, we’ll talk about what we eat on Passover. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr. Let’s get started.
MUSIC
Welcome to Torah for Christians. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr.
A few episodes ago, we talked about kashrut, the Jewish dietary laws. We learned that the basic rules of kashrut were a prohibition against mixing milk and dairy, only to eat certain types of animals and then to prepare those animals in a ritually prescribed manner.
But on Pesach, those rules are tightened even further. On Pesach, God commanded us not to eat any kind of Chametz, leavened products, nor could we eat any of the five grains of the Land of Israel, wheat, rye, spelt and two kinds of barley, perhaps also oats. This leads to some very careful mindful eating during the seven or eight days of Pesach.
Let’s start with Chametz, leavening. Two major areas of interest are alcoholic products and breads. Since we are commanded to eat unleavened bread for the duration of Pesach, bread as we know it, a yeasted produce, is forbidden on Pesach. So are products like crackers, rolls and the like.
Before we could go to grocery store and buy yeast, bread dough used to rise of its own accord; the yeast spores in the air would cause the chemical reactions that turned flour and water into bread dough. This is the basis for sourdough. But the Israelites learned that if flour and water were mixed, kneaded, portioned, and baked within an 18-minute window, the dough would not rise. This is matzah; a dough that, as the Torah tells us, did not have enough time to rise; the Israelite women had to bake it immediately upon kneading.
This of course raises the question: if wheat, barley, rye, and the like are forbidden foods during Pesach, why do we make matzah from them? Simply put, the soon to be free Israelite slaves baked their matzah from these grains. There are some Jews, especially in certain Chasidic communities, that only eat matzah during the Seder rituals. But most Jews substitute matzah for bread, and matzah meal for bread flour, the entirety of the week. The matzah itself is produced under extremely strict rabbinic supervision, Rabbis supervise wheat fields all year long, checking for excess moisture, and pop-up matzah factories even spring up in Israel and other communities after Purim, just to bake the matzah.
We can bake matzah from any of the five grains of Israel. Most chain groceries carry wheat matzah due to national distribution systems. In larger Jewish communities, you will also find matzah made of whole wheat, rye or spelt; it’s harder to find barley matzah. But for those who are gluten-free, there is now oat matzah and matzah made from tapioca starch. The latter matzah, by the way, is my favorite for noshing, although we use the traditional wheat matzah for our Seder and to cook our favorite Passover dishes during the week.
The other important aspect of Chametz concerns wine. The rules for producing kosher wine are quite strict; frankly, only Jews can be involved in the entire process. And while it is perfectly fine to use yeast in the production of kosher wine, those wines cannot be used during Pesach. So, most kosher wines are fermented with sugar so that we can drink kosher wines all year long without worrying about separating out kosher yeast-made wine on Pesach.
On Pesach, we put away our non-Pesach food, sometimes even selling it or burning it; we clean our homes of all our Chametz, our vinegars and non-Pesach foods, so that we are ready for the holiday. Some Jews lock away the chametz; some remove it entirely from the home. And some Jews just clear a shelf or two for Passover products; customs vary widely.
To summarize, all Jews agree that we cannot eat Chametz during Pesach. We agree that Chametz means all wines fermented with yeast, all bread products and other products made with the five species of grains found in Israel, wheat, rye, spelt, the two types of barely and perhaps oats – except for baking matzah. We remove all non-Pesach foods from our kitchens and some of us even change out our dishes, using meat and dairy dishes and utensils reserved only for Passover use.
We also agree that all fruits and all vegetables except for legumes – beans and peas – as well as rice and corn, can be eaten on Pesach. This means that we eat a lot of potatoes, carrots, and the like. While we have created many different elaborate and delicious dishes for Passover, it’s still a great time to eat simply, perhaps just some grilled fish, broccoli, and a baked potato at dinner, for example.
In a minute though, we will talk about foods that only some Jews allow. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and this is Torah for Christians.
BREAK
Welcome back to Torah for Christians. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr. Before we return to our discussion of Pesach, I want to thank you for listening to this podcast. Please remember to review and rate this episode on Apple, Spotify, Facebook, or whatever service you are using. Also, please go back and listen to previous episodes if you have not done so already. A transcript is also available on our Buzzsprout feed. And now, this and many previous episodes are available on our brand-new YouTube channel. And if you would like to read my weekly Torah Study, please go to Bible Stories They (Never) Taught You in Religious School, available for free on www.Substack.com. I have also started another Substack page called Wednesday Torah, where I share random thoughts on the Jewish experience. Please subscribe to both.
There is a great debate in the Jewish world over the permissibility of foods called in Hebrew, kitniyot, commonly translated as legumes. Kitniyot include dried beans, peas, soybeans, chickpeas, and peanuts. Ashkenazic Jews, the Jews of Europe, generally but not universally have banned eating kitniyot during Pesach. The reason given is that the flours made from these legumes, such as chickpea or pea flour, look like wheat or barley flour. Before proper labeling laws were common, and even in the bulk products section at the grocery store today, flours can be mislabeled. To remove any doubt when making matzah or other Passover dishes, these rabbis banned the eating of kitniyot. It was a fence around the basic laws of Pesach.
Sephardic Jews, the Jews of Spain, and the Mediterranean Basin, allow kitniyot to be eaten during Pesach. They considered these foods to be staples; not to eat kitniyot would mean that the people would starve during Pesach. So, these foods were allowed. They also had no problem with confusing flours.
Sephardic Jews also eat rice during Pesach; Ashkenazic Jews do not. Again, rice is a staple of Mediterranean culture while it was relatively unknown in Northern Europe especially until recently. Sephardic Jews also eat corn while Ashkenazic Jews do not. Columbus brought corn back from the New World to Europe; the indigenous peoples called it maize but in English it was called corn. The reason is due to a linguistic confusion.
The Yiddish word for rye wheat is korn. The Yiddish speaking rabbis of Eastern Europe banned American corn lest the people confuse it with the Yiddish korn, rye. This is yet another fence around the Torah, as we discussed last week. Sephardic Jews don’t speak Yiddish, so this problem never arose in their communities.
In today’s world, more and more non-Orthodox Ashkenazic Jews, and most secular-oriented Israelis, are adopting the Sephardic food rules. Frankly, they are easier to observe and give the casual Jew greater motivation to observe the basic laws of Pesach. In our household for example, we keep the traditional Ashkenazic rules; it just doesn’t seem right, after a lifetime of not eating kitniyot on Pesach, to suddenly change. But for our kids, who do not have such strong attachments to the stricter rules, I have encouraged them to eat rice, beans, and corn so that they won’t eat bread – which everyone agrees is forbidden.
Many foods that we eat year-round are also eaten on Pesach, foods such as fruit and vegetable dishes. Noodle kugels though, noodle puddings, become matzah kugels, potato kugels, even apple or onion kugels. Panko breading becomes matzah meal. And a delicious piece of chocolate cake becomes a gluten-free chocolate cake, perhaps made with almond flour or even completely flourless. We really go through a lot of eggs on Pesach. Some of these substitutions are delicious, some not as much.
We will talk about specific Seder foods on the next episode when we discuss the Seder in detail. But there is a rich tradition of Pesach cooking from Jewish communities from around the world. Just pick up any Jewish cookbook or go online and you will see the great variety of dishes that we can eat during the holiday. Instead of thinking of Pesach as a time of denial, when we can’t eat our usual foods, when we think of Pesach as a time to eat simply, or to make foods that we don’t eat at any other time, Pesach becomes a delight. It’s a time of experimentation, with the freedom to try new foods and new experiences.
And freedom is what this holiday is all about.
I want to thank you for listening to Torah for Christians. Please remember to rate and review this, and previous episodes on Apple, Spotify, or other streaming services. You can also like and hear us on Facebook and now, you can subscribe to the podcast on Youtube and read a transcript on Buzzsprout.
Next week, we will continue our discussion of Pesach when we talk about the Passover Seder, the ultimate Jewish home ritual during the calendar year. We will talk about the Haggadah, the text used during this ritual, as well as discuss the ceremonial foods – and the other special foods and traditions that accompany this feast.
Finally, I have begun to publish a weekly Torah Study, called Bible Stories They Never Taught You in Religious School. It’s available for free on www.substack.com. You can also sign up on Substack for the newsletter to appear every Friday in your Inbox. You can also find my new column, Wednesday Torah there, where I offer weekly musings about life, the universe and everything.
Have a wonderful week and remember; Hinei Mah Tov … L’hitra’ot, till we meet again. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and this is Torah for Christians.
