Non-treyf foods Jews just didn't eat

[Gifted Gourmet]

What's a balaboste, please?

A traditional Jewish housewife who ran the entire home in an excellent fashion ...

didn't Rabbi Ribeye mention this somewhere early on?

Now I recall,from his Schmaltz thread, he wrote: balabos = bal-a-BUS = master of the house, major domo

Edited February 16, 2004 by Gifted Gourmet (log)

[Pan]

The line before "Los zeim gein" is important, and this is where I'm liable to screw up a little:

"Zei zint shvartser vi uns!"

"Los zeim gein!"

("They are darker than us!"

"Let them go!")

Blazing Saddles was a brilliant sendup of Westerns, and I could watch it any time.

[Mabelline]

I'm definitely going to rent and rewatch it now that I'll have a little knowledge. And what does the warbonnet mean?

[Gifted Gourmet]

The line before "Los zeim gein" is important, and this is where I'm liable to screw up a little:

"Zei zint shvartser vi uns!"

"Los zeim gein!"

("They are darker than us!"

"Let them go!")

Blazing Saddles was a brilliant sendup of Westerns, and I could watch it any time. 

See? I knew Pan ought to have done the response here!!

Thanks for filling in the gaps in my memory!

Told you it was far from p.c.

And what does the warbonnet mean? ..Kosher for Passover ... it is affixed to foods which observant Jews buy for Passover ... and some not-so-observant Jews as well!

Edited February 16, 2004 by Gifted Gourmet (log)

[Mabelline]

I wish they'd have put subtitles. There's a Western that was John Candy's last movie, Head East, I think, where the totally incorrect stuff with subtitles was some of the funniest material in the film.

[Gifted Gourmet]

I wish they'd have put subtitles. There's a Western that was John Candy's last movie, Head East, I think, where the totally incorrect stuff with subtitles was some of the funniest material in the film.

http://www.sbjf.org/sbjco/schmaltz/yiddish_phrases.htm

for starters ...

[Mabelline]

Ok! I am now gonna be able to blow some minds at the next Medicine Wheel I go to. Thanks sooo much!

[Rachel Perlow]

Yes, please, explain a lot of things we well meaning but ignorant folks do not understand about Jewish mores. But first, can someone enlighten me about Sephardic and Ashkenaze differences. I think enough folks would be grateful.

An excellent beginning to this topic can be found in The Book of Jewish Food : An Odyssey from Samarkand to New York by Claudia Roden....

Link to buy the book:

[Jinmyo]

That just reminded me of the funny scene in Woody Allen's movie Hannah and her sisters, when Woody is considering converting to catholicism and brings home a bag of groceries with a loaf of Wonder Bread and mayonnaise. Clearly, the stereotypes (Jews eat rye and mustard, gentiles eat white with mayo) exist or the joke wouldn't work.

Thanks for reminding me of this scene! It was that which I thought of at the beginning of this thread but couldn't recall the film's title ...

It made me think of Lenny Bruce's old bits about goyim and mayonaisse and white bread.

Or Milton Berle: "Anytime somebody orders a corned beef sandwich on white bread with mayonnaise, somewhere in the world a Jew dies."

[Suzanne F]

in my experience no self- respecting east european "balaboste" cooked without good amount of garlic and pepper!

Yes indeed! How could there be potted chicken or brisket without garlic?

[marlena spieler]

when i was growing up in sacramento california my mother was very taken with the whole american food thing, canned vegetables and hygenic stuff not like the old country foods. we never ate sliced bread and butter with a meal, though, somehow that just smacked of what the "others" ate.

even chicken soup: my mother didn't go the route that my grandmother did, with the chicken, vegetables, etc, she felt that if it could fit into a packet or a can, it was the better deal.

but into all of this tidy sterility came my fathers favourite treat, and later my own: raw garlic, raw onions, eaten on bread. it was what they ate in the old country and i could never resist though clearly it was a truely unamerican culinary digression.

strangely enough, into this gastronomical wasteland except for the garlic and the grandma food and the mexican and chinese restaurants, came tamales. there are always tamales in my parents house. thank god. just don't anybody tell them what goes into the masa!

[marlena spieler]

Or Milton Berle: "Anytime somebody orders a corned beef sandwich on white bread with mayonnaise, somewhere in the world a Jew dies."

Hysterical!!!!!!

[ghostrider]

In the UK in the 50s Olive oil was something you got from the chemist in small quantities for medicinal use, not as a Major food or cooking medium; my Mother never enjoyed garlic, so did not cook with it. These were not uniquely Jewish or even Ashkenazic. I'm sure garlic and olive oil did not feature in many American homes of the time...

Curiously, they featured in mine during that time - Protestant suburban St Louis. Couldn't have been a more WASPy household, & yet fresh garlic & olive oil frequently showed up on the table.

My father was a mess of socio/political/religious contradictions, but somehow he was able to put them aside when it came to good food!

He didn't "get" the whole EV oil thing, but hey, it was the 1950s.

Sorry for the diversion. I do that. Please continue on topic.

[Al_Dente]

The line before "Los zeim gein" is important, and this is where I'm liable to screw up a little:

"Zei zint shvartser vi uns!"

"Los zeim gein!"

("They are darker than us!"

"Let them go!")

Blazing Saddles was a brilliant sendup of Westerns, and I could watch it any time. 

See? I knew Pan ought to have done the response here!!

Thanks for filling in the gaps in my memory!

Told you it was far from p.c.

And what does the warbonnet mean? ..Kosher for Passover ... it is affixed to foods which observant Jews buy for Passover ... and some not-so-observant Jews as well!

That would be the Sosueme tribe, right?

I bought the Claudia Roden book for a friend a while back. It really is an excellent read-- everytime I'm over there I thumb through it. Would it be bad form to borrow it?

[Mabelline]

Actually,as far as olive oil and other Mediterrean foods, although my grandparents were not real familiar with their use, my father had returned from a stay on Sicily in the war with a passion for all things Italian, and my mother was raised on the Bay area, so he nudged her into learning anything and everything Italian. She was very attached to Portugese cuisine, also.So I'm a pedigreed food mongrel!!

And proud of it!

[hillvalley]

In the UK in the 50s Olive oil was something you got from the chemist in small quantities for medicinal use, not as a Major food or cooking medium; my Mother never enjoyed garlic, so did not cook with it. These were not uniquely Jewish or even Ashkenazic. I'm sure garlic and olive oil did not feature in many American homes of the time...

My father was a mess of socio/political/religious contradictions, but somehow he was able to put them aside when it came to good food!

He didn't "get" the whole EV oil thing, but hey, it was the 1950s.

Sorry for the diversion. I do that. Please continue on topic.

I had to accept a long time ago that my grandmother would never understand why I spend my Hannukah gelt (money) on over priced vegetable oil made from olives or why I have 4 types in my cabinets but no Liptons Onion Soup mix

[robyn]

Jews just didn't eat it, just like they didn't eat white bread. In fact, "white bread and mayonnaise" would be a typical stereotype of a White Anglo-Saxon Protestant from the Midwest.

That just reminded me of the funny scene in Woody Allen's movie Hannah and her sisters, when Woody is considering converting to catholicism and brings home a bag of groceries with a loaf of Wonder Bread and mayonnaise. Clearly, the stereotypes (Jews eat rye and mustard, gentiles eat white with mayo) exist or the joke wouldn't work.

And then there is Annie Hall - where Diane Keaton orders a pastrami on white bread with mayo.

And the stereotypes really do exist. There's a lunch place near me that serves pastrami cold on white bread with mayo unless you order your sandwich some other way . Robyn

[Gifted Gourmet]

the Sosueme tribe? Terrific!!

and, yes, by all means, do borrow the Roden book!! Not "bad form" so much as it is more, whatta great read I picked for you! Roden is marvelous in many different ways ... and the recipes are almost as interesting as the text! She won the James Beard Award for it if memory serves me correctly ...

Edited February 16, 2004 by Gifted Gourmet (log)

[robyn]

http://www.egullet.com/?pg=ARTICLE-ribeye011604

Rabbi Ribeye's discourse on this is an interesting start.

that *is* an interesting start. thanks.

so would i be right in saying that the interpretation of what is "not treyf yet not eaten" is a little arbitrary?

thanks for other historical info in this post too.

and i am profoundly sorry they didn't eat Rabbi Ribeye's rib roast rare...

Most of what is or isn't kosher isn't arbitrary. You'll find the original rules in the Old Testament - especially in Deuteronomy. You can see how specific they are in the first passage below. As for the lack of rare roast - it comes from the proscription against consuming blood - which is found in Leviticus. That's the second passage below. Robyn

3 Thou shalt not eat any abominable thing. 4 These are the beasts which ye may eat: the ox, the sheep, and the goat, 5 the hart, and the gazelle, and the roebuck, and the wild goat, and the pygarg, and the antelope, and the mountain-sheep. 6 And every beast that parteth the hoof, and hath the hoof wholly cloven in two, and cheweth the cud, among the beasts, that ye may eat. 7 Nevertheless these ye shall not eat of them that only chew the cud, or of them that only have the hoof cloven: the camel, and the hare, and the rock-badger, because they chew the cud but part not the hoof, they are unclean unto you; 8 and the swine, because he parteth the hoof but cheweth not the cud, he is unclean unto you; of their flesh ye shall not eat, and their carcasses ye shall not touch. {S} 9 These ye may eat of all that are in the waters: whatsoever hath fins and scales may ye eat; 10 and whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye shall not eat; it is unclean unto you. {S} 11 Of all clean birds ye may eat. 12 But these are they of which ye shall not eat: the great vulture, and the bearded vulture, and the ospray; 13 and the glede, and the falcon, and the kite after its kinds; 14 and every raven after its kinds; 15 and the ostrich, and the night-hawk, and the sea-mew, and the hawk after its kinds; 16 the little owl, and the great owl, and the horned owl; 17 and the pelican, and the carrion-vulture, and the cormorant; 18 and the stork, and the heron after its kinds, and the hoopoe, and the bat. 19 And all winged swarming things are unclean unto you; they shall not be eaten. 20 Of all clean winged things ye may eat. 21 Ye shall not eat of any thing that dieth of itself; thou mayest give it unto the stranger that is within thy gates, that he may eat it; or thou mayest sell it unto a foreigner; for thou art a holy people unto the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in its mother's milk. {P}

10 And whatsoever man there be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among them, that eateth any manner of blood, I will set My face against that soul that eateth blood, and will cut him off from among his people. 11 For the life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that maketh atonement by reason of the life. 12 Therefore I said unto the children of Israel: No soul of you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger that sojourneth among you eat blood. 13 And whatsoever man there be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among them, that taketh in hunting any beast or fowl that may be eaten, he shall pour out the blood thereof, and cover it with dust. 14 For as to the life of all flesh, the blood thereof is all one with the life thereof; therefore I said unto the children of Israel: Ye shall eat the blood of no manner of flesh; for the life of all flesh is the blood thereof; whosoever eateth it shall be cut off.

[Pan]

Most of what is or isn't kosher isn't arbitrary. You'll find the original rules in the Old Testament - especially in Deuteronomy. You can see how specific they are in the first passage below. As for the lack of rare roast - it comes from the proscription against consuming blood - which is found in Leviticus.

That's a really good point, Robyn. Thanks for mentioning that.

[robyn]

Most of what is or isn't kosher isn't arbitrary.  You'll find the original rules in the Old Testament - especially in Deuteronomy.  You can see how specific they are in the first passage below.  As for the lack of rare roast - it comes from the proscription against consuming blood - which is found in Leviticus.

That's a really good point, Robyn. Thanks for mentioning that.

I'm far from an expert on the dietary laws - but ever since my father-in-law went to live in a skilled nursing facility that is "glatt kosher" - I've been learning.

I was trying to make some sense of the stuff about birds - and all I could think of was that birds that eat berries and seeds and other vegetable matter are ok - birds that eat animals that may or may not be ok aren't ok (you are what you eat ). Robyn

[Pan]

It's not that simple in terms of birds. Chickens are omnivores. But carrion-feeders are definitely out.

[Mabelline]

Your mention of the dietary laws reminds me of a service my girlfriend and I were at. In her Bible the term 'rock lapin' was used, and I couldn't make "hide nor hare" of that, since a lapin is a rabbit. It took a week to find out it was a badger species. No problem there: badgers and vultures are not on my shopping list. Do you reckon that people realize that ostriches are unclean? That's very popular up here.

[cakewalk]

The only spices in our home when I was growing up were salt and sweet paprika. That was it, really. Forget about garlic and olive oil, sheesh. My mother used mayonnaise when she made our tuna fish sandwiches for lunches to bring to school, there was simply no other purpose for the stuff. On Passover the Wesson oil became Planter's Peanut Oil, and that's as exotic as it got.

Stuff that is or isn't kosher is not arbitrary, that's true. What is completely arbitrary is the stuff that IS kosher that many Jews won't touch anyway because it's somehow, well, "spoiled" is the good rabbi's word. In my family it was "hazzarai." Not literally (it literally means "not kosher"), but just because it's not something "we" would eat. Mayo with roast beef is perfectly kosher, but it's hazzarei anyway. Who needs it? Who eats that way? Not us, certainly.

There are also a lot of animals that are kosher but were never raised for kosher slaughter. Deer, bison, etc. I think kosher bison is becoming more readily available (it is kosher, isn't it?). Duck and goose never came close to the popularity of chicken, even though they're just as kosher if killed properly. This is all stuff that my parents would have referred to as "hazzarai," kosher or not.

Edited February 17, 2004 by cakewalk (log)

[Pan]

Chazerei literally means "piggishness" (Chazer=pig, and there are all sorts of transliterations from the Hebrew alphabet of Yiddish.)

There's nothing inherently treyf about buffalo, as it has a cloven (separated) hoof and chews cud. So nothing prevents kosher slaughter of buffaloes.