Page:Wood - Foods of the Foreign-Born.djvu/101

Rh day. This need has led to the development of foods such as Sabbath Kugel or Sholend, Petshai, and many others.

Passover: During Passover week no leavened bread or its product, or anything which may have touched leavened bread, may be used. This restriction holds for eight days. In every Jewish home a complete and most thorough system of cleaning precedes this holiday. No corner escapes a scrubbing and scouring, lest a particle of leaven, or what is just as bad, a particle of food which may have touched leavened bread, should be found. A complete new set of dishes is used during the week. Cutlery, silver, or metal pots may be used during this holiday if properly koshered or sterilized. The usual method of doing this is to plunge red-hot coals into boiling water, and then to immerse the desired utensils. These or any other Passover utensils may be used after the holiday is over without re-koshering, but once used without Passover precautions they are unfit for Passover use unless re-koshered. In actual practice this means that in every orthodox Jewish household there are four sets of dishes—the usual set for meat and the set for milk food, in addition to duplicate Passover sets. The Passover dishes are stored away very carefully, lest some leaven come near them.

Because of the need for abstaining from leavened bread during Passover, many interesting dishes have developed, such as the Mazzah Klos (dumplings) soup, cakes and puddings made of the mazzah meal. Almond pudding and cake are very popular. Almost all of the food cooked during this holiday requires the liberal use of shortening or fat, with great danger of a too liberal use for health, as well as from the economic point of view. The fat generally used is either goose or chicken drippings, or clarified beef fat other than suet.

Fast Days: (a) Yom Kippur (The Day of Atonement). No food or drink may be had for twenty-four hours, (b) Fast of Esther. This precedes the Feast of Purim and is now observed only by the very pious. The feast is universally observed.

Semi-Fast Days: Eight days in Ab. For nine days no meat food may be eaten by the orthodox.