Ask a Jew: What are some of the Jewish food traditions related to celebration? Part 1

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This is part one of a 2-part series.

By Neal Schindler

What are some of the Jewish food traditions related to celebration? 

As I so often do when a serious, journalistic answer is required, I will defer to Buzzfeed. The pop culture website best known for its click-bait headlines (e.g., “This Dog Looks Exactly Like John Travolta”) has put together a nice sampler platter, if you will, of Jewish culinary gold in Deena Shanker’s October 2014 article “25 Classic Jewish Foods Everyone Should Learn To Cook.” Shanker captures the amazing diversity of the Jewish diaspora, as well as Jewish cooking’s stubborn refusal to let anti-fat, —salt, and — sugar propaganda stand between you and the edible deliciousness you so richly deserve.

Since you ask about celebration foods, I should note that every weekend brings a kind of celebration in Jewish culture. Shabbat, which starts Fridays at sundown and ends Saturdays at sundown, is a weekly mini-holiday that traditionally demands no work and all play (or, at least, all walks and naps and conversations). Cholent, a thick stew that has given many a crockpot its raison d’être, is common Shabbat fare. Challah, that famous braided egg bread, is baked in advance of Shabbat and torn apart by the hungry assembled masses after the blessing over bread (hamotzi) is said. (Want a solid recipe? Smitten Kitchen’s got you covered.) Kugel, whether sweet and noodly or savory and potato-y, is another favorite celebration dish, whether at your basic Shabbat potluck or during Rosh Hashanah, one of Judaism’s High Holidays.

One of the best-known Jewish celebration foods is the latke, a potato pancake eaten in vast, inadvisable quantities during the eight days of Chanukah. What you might not know is that anything fried in oil is thematically appropriate, since the Chanukah story involves one day’s worth of oil that miraculously lit the Temple for eight days. Ergo, making a run to Donut Parade just means being a good Jew (or friend to the Jews). It’s important not to make God cranky, right?

Hamantaschen are another crowd-pleaser from the Jewish holiday kitchen. These triangular cookies are made to look like the tricorner hat of the Purim story’s villain, Haman. (Why are we glorifying a murderous villain with cookies? Is it a self-persecution complex wrought by millennia of oppression? Eh, who cares, they’re delicious.) Hamantaschen are traditionally made with poppyseed or prune fillings. More contemporary fillings include apricot, chocolate, raspberry, or pretty much anything you can put inside a cookie (Nutella?).

Passover, the Thanksgiving of Judaism, brings a tidal wave of traditional and/or symbolic foods. Maror (read: horseradish) reminds us of the bitterness of slavery in Egypt, while charoset (a delightful mix of apples, honey, nuts, and wine) recalls the mortar we used to build things as slaves. (Again with the weird mix of deliciousness and terribleness.) Matzo, everyone’s least favorite Jewish food, is best known for blandness and enabling constipation. Still, it fries up great with eggs as matzo brei (unleavened French toast, basically) and has led more than one Jew into temptation when covered in dark chocolate.

Jewish food, in all of its eclecticism, constitutes a great world cuisine. It fills your mouth with flavor, sticks to your ribs, and communicates the very Jewish idea that food equals love. Festive occasions seem like a natural time to celebrate that age-old, life-sustaining notion.