Should a Jewish woman/wife bake challah for Shabbos from scratch? Is this a mitzvah? Or is buying ready-made challah ok? I don’t want to miss out on a mitzvah, but it is a lot of work! Help?
There is a Mitzva of taking/separating Challah when you bake bread,or what we call Challah. There is a point in baking just so that you can do this Mitzva. However, only you know what you are holding by.
I have never baked a sufficient quantity of bread to be chayev in challah biblically, and neither has my wife. We generally support our local Jewish bakery, which is a different mitzvah.