Seeking Joke on Ritual Slaughter of Potatoes for Latkes
e...@best.com
and the preparation of latkes. I recall a piece about removing the eyes from the potatoes
on the basis of the biblical quote "the eyes have it."
Any chance? Please post.
</edg>
--
Ed Greenberg e...@greenberg.org Ham Radio: KM6CG
http://www.greenberg.org/
Annie
link. An interesting read!!
http://al.cs.engr.uky.edu/~raphael/yiddish/homent.html
Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879
> Does anybody have this piece?
Herewith I quote:
- - - - - - begin quote - - - - - -
Ritual slaughter of the latke
Raphael Finkel
Presented at the Latke-Homentash Symposium
Hillel House, Madison, Wisconsin
Purim, 1984
It is well known that our tradition surrounds the most important actions in
life with ritual. The importance of life-cycle rituals and holiday-cycle
rituals underscores their stature. On the other hand, there is no
particular ritual for, say, hunting boars. The Jewish tradition has nothing
much to say about it, except that hunting bores.
Eating has long held a fascination for the Rabbinic mind, not to mention
the Rabbinic stomach. We are all familiar with some of the rituals involved
with food: Washing the hands before going to the supermarket, checking for
the o u, reciting "Who brings the can opener out of the drawer", and the
injunction to leave a little food in the can for the cat. In the Talmud,
there is a dispute whether searching diligently for the o u itself fulfills
the mitsvo of "bedikas hekhsher" or whether one needs to also know the
rules for affixing the o u, over which one recites "lehagboa hekhsher". For
example, did you know that according to Rashi, the o u must be in the upper
third of the label, and must be vertical, whereas according to Rabbenu Tam,
it must be sideways?
This attention to detail is the hallmark of importance that we attribute to
food. I want to raise your conciousness (and maybe your gorge) and explain
to you the Torah-true Halakhic way in which latkes must be prepared,
according to Rambam's "Sefer", so called because each chapter begins with
the word "Sefer". In particular, Chapter 23 is called, "Sefer example you
want latkes." Another chapter, dealing with food poisoning, is "Sefer ways
to can latkes". You may not be surprised to hear that there is no mention
whatsoever of Homentashen in this standard reference. They just don't rate.
In fact, the only reference I could find to Homentashen in the whole
Rabbinic literature, which I read through yesterday (in the Cliff notes
edition), was in a chapter on spinach homentashen in the justifiably
obscure responsa of Poppy, the seltzer man.
Say for example you want latkes. The potato must be healthy. Any potato
unable to swim upstream with the current is considered sick, and you have
to wait until it recovers before you can use it.
You have to properly slaughter the potatoes. You need a knife sharp enough,
in the words of the Rambam, so that it can cut 30 bunches of krokhmal in 10
strokes. I expect that's pretty sharp.
You slaughter the potato with a quick double cut, holding the knife so the
blade is facing up, attacking the potato from underneath.
If there are any eyes on the potato, they must be facing up, so the potato
doesn't see the knife coming. The stroke must sever at least the main
artery of the potato, although according to Rambam, this is difficult with
our modern potatoes, which have no arteries, and it suffices to cut at
least .357 inches beneath the skin.
Any potato juice that come out within the first spurt is treyf; you must
let it pour on the ground and stomp on it, quoting meanwhile from
Deuteronomy, "thus be done to the manna whom the king delighteth to honor."
You then check the dead potato for health. If there is a hole between the
veena and the keyba, the potato is treyf and may not be eaten, although it
may be used for a paperweight. If you carve a dreydl out of it, the dreydl
is kosher, but the knife may only be used as a screwdriver from then on. If
there are any adhesions on the skin, the potato is glat treyf and must be
discarded.
You must remove the eyes (in Yiddish, this is known as "eyebering"); as
long as they are not removed, the outer part of the potato is treyf
(literally, "the eyes have it".)
Modern latke factories don't bother with the extremely time-consuming
removal of the eyes, so they sell the outer part of the potato to non-Jews.
You must be very careful if you are making a large batch of latkes not to
slaughter two potatoes from the same plant on the same day. The Bible
explicitly says, "You shall not slaughter it and its plant-mate on the same
day". The Talmud tells of a thief who stole two potatoes and slaughtered
them on the same day. As you know, the penalty for stealing is that you
must pay back double. But if you steal a potato and slaughter it, you must
pay back 5-fold. The Talmud records a discussion about whether, when the
thief slaughtered the second potato, he was obligated to pay the 5-fold
penalty or not, since he was by that same act guilty of the "two on the same
day" rule, and was thereby sentenced to the harsher punishment of juggling
5 eggs and cleaning up the mess. Let it be a lesson to you: Buy each potato
from a different store, you should never have a problem.
If you peel the potatoes, you are obligated to donate one twelfth of the
potato peels to a Cohen, assuming you have peeled at least 20 potatoes and
you have gotten at least 1/4 cup of peels from each. The best way to do
this is to put the peels in an envelope and mail it to the first Cohen or
Katz you find in the phone book. It is also acceptable to stop people on
the street, ask them if they are Jewish, and if so, talk them into
performing this important mitsvo "putting out the peelings" themselves.
I could go on, and I will.
Remember to salt the potato and leave it to drain for at least 24 hours. We
do this in memory of Lot's wife Latke, who was turned to salt. Use a lotta
salt, in memory of Lot's daughter, Lotta.
You may wonder why Sephardic Jews don't eat latkes. It stems from two
differences of innterpretation. The Torah speaks about a "Poroh Aduma", a
red potato without blemish. The Sephardim consider red potatoes too holy to
eat, so they avoid latkes. On the other hand, the Ashkenazim think only
Swiss cheese is too holy to eat. They liken "Poroh Aduma" with "Pereh
Odom", the common person, and consider a red potato glatt kosher. Kosher
airline meals made with potatoes therefore always specify "red potatoes".
The other difference of opinion is the meaning of "you shall not yoke them
together". The Sephardim read this as a prohibition of mixing eggs and
potatoes. The
Ashkenazim say, and I quote "Love and Knishes", the authoritative cookbook,
"So nu, use two eggs already. You want more, so you should use more."
Let me warn you about applesauce. Its proper preparation is just as complex
as latkes themselves. It is best to consult a competent authority.
One last warning. You may remember that the Megilla tells us that the
Persians cast latkes, which they called Pur, from which we get the name
Purim. You must fry the latkes to make them kosher. Let them burn a bit, in
memory of the burnt offerings. But don't do like the Persians. Don't cast
them. If you cast them, they'll turn out Pur for you, too.
Postscript: At the symposium at which I presented this talk, Barry
Buchbinder suggested that homentashn have an aphrodisiac effect. My
response: "Poppycock!"
Marvin Margoshes
<759pfu$l1c$1...@flood.weeg.uiowa.edu>...
>>From article <754k9r$bdq$1...@shell7.ba.best.com>, by e...@best.com:
>> Does anybody have this piece?
>
>Herewith I quote:
>
> - - - - - - begin quote - - - - - -
>
> Ritual slaughter of the latke
> Raphael Finkel
> Presented at the Latke-Homentash Symposium
> Hillel House, Madison, Wisconsin
> Purim, 1984
Most informative, but it doesn't tell us anything about what the potato has
to say during the process. Mark Twain wrote about the agonized sound a
lettuce makes when you tear its heart out.
Jonathan Dresner
Marvin Margoshes <phys...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879 wrote in message
><759pfu$l1c$1...@flood.weeg.uiowa.edu>...
>>> Does anybody have this piece?
>>
>>Herewith I quote:
>>
>> - - - - - - begin quote - - - - - -
>>
>> Ritual slaughter of the latke
>> Raphael Finkel
>> Presented at the Latke-Homentash Symposium
>> Hillel House, Madison, Wisconsin
>> Purim, 1984
>
>
>to say during the process. Mark Twain wrote about the agonized sound a
>lettuce makes when you tear its heart out.
Tom Paxton wrote "Don't Slay That Potato," which includes the imortal
lines:
Potatoes are ugly, potatoes are plain,
they're wrinkled and bumpy to boot.
But give me a break here, do you mean to say
you'll eat us because we're not cute?
Jonathan
Fred Rosenblatt
<phys...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879 wrote in message
> <759pfu$l1c$1...@flood.weeg.uiowa.edu>...
> >>From article <754k9r$bdq$1...@shell7.ba.best.com>, by e...@best.com:
> >> Does anybody have this piece?
> >
> >Herewith I quote:
> >
> > - - - - - - begin quote - - - - - -
> >
> > Ritual slaughter of the latke
> > Raphael Finkel
> > Presented at the Latke-Homentash Symposium
> > Hillel House, Madison, Wisconsin
> > Purim, 1984
>
>
> Most informative, but it doesn't tell us anything about what the potato has
> to say during the process. Mark Twain wrote about the agonized sound a
> lettuce makes when you tear its heart out.
I actually heard a zucchini scream after it was placed whole into a microwave.
I could barely eat it afterwards.
PSmith9626
you dont have to be jewish to love
leviticus
penny
Joseph Clarke
e...@best.com wrote:
> Does anybody have this piece? It concerned the ritual slaughter of the potatoes
> and the preparation of latkes. I recall a piece about removing the eyes from the potatoes
> on the basis of the biblical quote "the eyes have it."
>
> Any chance? Please post.
I'm not sure about that one, but there is the one about the guy who circumsized elephants at
the Zoo for a living.
The pay wasn't so good, but the tips were big.
J Pagona
>> lettuce makes when you tear its heart out.
>
>I actually heard a zucchini scream after it was placed whole into a
>microwave.
>I could barely eat it afterwards.
>
>
defenseless vegetables that are rooted to one spot and can't run away when you
go to kill them.
Jay
mos...@mm.huji.ac.il
> "Marvin Margoshes" <phys...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>> Douglas W. Jones,201H MLH,3193350740,3193382879 wrote in message
snip
>> Most informative, but it doesn't tell us anything about what the
>> potato has to say during the process. Mark Twain wrote about the
>> agonized sound a lettuce makes when you tear its heart out.
>
> I actually heard a zucchini scream after it was placed whole into
> a microwave. I could barely eat it afterwards.
>
Glad to see the "barely". It would have been a shame to waste it and
have to zucchini zapped for nought.
Moshe Schorr
It is a tremendous Mitzvah to be happy always! - Reb Nachman of Breslov