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That bean recipe sounds like it would go well with franks. I would use facon instead of the bacon bits, though, and would add some mustard powder, molasses, maple syrup, cayenne, paprika and garlic powder. Sounds also like the basis of a unique cholent.
Hot coffee can be consumed in any establishment, especially in a disposable cup. Sugar and milk in DD shops both generally have hechsherim, and many hold that both these items in America don’t require a hechsher anyways.
Also, regarding donuts in DD shops: all mixes and ingredients used by all DD shops are kosher. Their toasters in the front of the store are used for treif and therefore, you cannot have toasted sandwiches in treif DD shops. But the donuts themselves are not problematic, according to an expert in kashrut, R’ Abadi.
Weisswurst is sausage made from veal that is white in appearance.
One of my favorite places to eat in Yerushalayim is Hess, which might be the world’s only (if not, best) kosher German restaurants.
Yekke culture was always interesting to me. Granted, the only kosher German butcher I know of in America is Wasserman and Lemberger in B’more. But, Hess has some of the best “wursts” (bockwurst, bratwurst, weisswurst), landjaeger, gruenkern, wiener schnitzel (real schnitzel is veal, not the Israeli misapplication of the term to refer to chicken cutlet), and other foods.
R’ Avigdor Miller said that anyone who learned 500 blatt gemara with Rashi and Tosafot could use the title rabbi.
I saw the show online (it aired Shabbos).
I found a few details to be off. This was unlike the movie A Stranger Among Us with Melanie Griffith, where they employed the gaon and talmid hakham Rabbi Philip Harris Singer, zt”l, longtime rabbi of Orthodox Avenue O Jewish Center, as an adviser, resulting in a film where there was stunning accuracy.
Regarding portrayals of Orthodox Jews in the media: Lately, they like featuring OTD types; presenting moderate, humane, urbane, educated, cultured, torah-observant Modern Orthodox Jews defeats their purpose of portraying us unilaterally as backwards, primitive, fundamentalist bumpkins. The people they feature are generally from such backgrounds where college is rejected and women are poorly treated, which is certainly not true of my community.
Modern genetic science certainly doesn’t recommend marrying a karov.
We need to diversify our gene pool, due to the high percentage of problems we see in the Ashkenazic community (not just Tay Sachs, but the percentage of developmental disabilities seems to be higher on a per capita basis in the frum community than in society as a whole, although I have no data to quantify this).
Reading someone else’s mail violates one of the takkanot of Rabbenu Gershom.
Fake meat tastes a lot better than fake cheese, hence my copious use of meat substitutes (which are really hezkat halavi, not dairy, as the OK labels them, in actuality).
Eating things that aren’t marketed as Halav Yisrael but are kosher is no yetzer hara or avera. Most rishonim would say that our milk in America has the din of halav yisrael anyways.
Hakham Ovadia Yosef permits gelatin and animal rennet. Is he not a gadol?
It is clear to me that gelatin would meet the standards of a davar hadash.
Rabbanut tends to hold by shitot that are correct mikar hadin, but that they never used in America, presumably due to anxieties over approximating the Conservative Movement. (Gelatin, Animal Rennet, Gevinat Yisrael, etc.)
The Purple One,
Yes I do like to cook gourmet. I generally use treif recipes and adapt them for kosher cooking.
I use a product in a lot of my dishes called Morningstar Farms meatless crumbles. They are a vegetarian ground meat substitute made from soy and are certified OK-Dairy.
Aside from chili, I make Swedish meatballs, “Beef” Stroganoff, Lasagna/Baked Ziti, American Chop Suey (a New England dish), Shepherd’s Pie, and many other dishes with the crumbles.
I see it all the time with a KSA hechsher- Soyrizo brand. Lightlife also has a hechsher, and both are strictly parve. I’ve purchased it at ShopRite in Brooklyn, Shaw’s and Hannaford’s in the Boston area, and at Whole Foods in the city.
It’s another scheme for the city to make more money, by ticketing people, etc. Welcome to Bloomberggrad, Soviet Socialist Republic of New York.
I make a really good chili for shabbos also- onions, green peppers, tomatoes, garlic, Morningstar crumbles, veggie chorizo, beans, jalapeno, chipotle, unsweetened cocoa powder, cilantro, brown sugar, Dos Equis, and a bunch of spices. Goes well with corn chips and with sour cream, pico de gallo, and cheddar cheese (I hold that cheese could be melted on shabbat as long as it is not done at yad soledet bo, which is how Hakham Ovadia Yosef holds regarding melting cheese on shabbat). While I enjoy Jameson with my chulent, tequila goes well with the chili/Mexican chulent.
We had just made a minyan this morning, which was a nes.
As a sociological exercise, I checked that website and found out why there are so many people not getting married.
For starters, one post said that a guy who wants to become a kiruv professional is dangerous, that the desire to do kiruv is a warning sign, that such a guy has extreme behavior, wants to leave klal yisrael, etc. (To boot, they say that Shalom Task Force says this- I thought they dealt with domestic violence. Since when is kiruv in the same category as wife-beating?) This is a sad, venomous post against kiruv rabbis. I know many, and they’re the most beautiful, heilige neshomas and kindest souls I’ve ever met. They turn nobody away, open their homes to all who seek nourishment, physical and spiritual, and bring HaShem’s Love and Torah to a world in need of it. One of my dreams in life would be to take a few years out and learn in Aish haTorah and get a Jewish Studies degree and to do kiruv on the university circuit.
Another excoriates guys that never learned in Israel. There are tons of good yeshivot in America. How is not learning in E”Y a pagum against a guy?
Another slams a guy who watches the SuperBowl; I went to a SuperBowl party at an Orthodox shul (the proceeds went to tzedakah) and we participated in the HalfTime program from YU.
It seems that conformity and a lack of balance are popular. Makes me glad I chose to become part of the MO community while adhering to a higher standard of halakhic practice and availing myself of yeshivish learning.
I feel I was victimized in the past by overly aggressive shidduch investigations (on grounds of personal status), despite the fact that I had many rabbonim vouch for the fact that they’d happily be mesadder kiddushin for me, including YU musmachim, a former RCA president, a Chassidishe Rov, and others.
We eat vegetarian chulent and kishka sometimes, but the only thing healthier about that is less cholesterol, but it has more carbs. It still uses booze, a healthy amount of oil (albeit good-for-you oil), but it’s heavy on processed fake meats.
I wish I had a steaming bowl of cholent on a day like today, with some kishka and at least 3 kinds of kugel and deli.
We had a healthier shabbos lunch 🙁
Beer lends a nice flavor to cholent. I also like a little bbq sauce, a ton of fried onions, garlic, paprika, and smoked salami, in addition to chulent fleisch, onion soup mix, etc.
The Conservative Movement’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards actually paskened on what to do about giving Jewish burial to an intermarried couple.
They say that a non-Jewish spouse can be buried alongside the Jewish spouse, as long as there is a wall 10 tefachim high or a path 4 amot wide separating the non-Jew from Jewish graves.
What institutions offer online semicha? I know about Pirchei Shoshanim and R’ Wilhelm, as well as R’ Mordechai Yitzchok Friedman. Any others?
Maybe make Sunday half a day off, so that Christians (who, unlike Muslims, contribute to the state, serve in the army, aren’t committed to its destruction) could attend to their needs.
I am not backing away from what I said. Years before I became Orthodox, I knew that rap music and most secular music of the past 40 years was little more than sex, smut, perversion, violence, and misogyny. For Jews to invite this into their lives and to start a marriage off on this foot is a bad idea. Likewise, aping Santa Claus is a shonda.
R’ Druckman’s allies in America are Rabbi Marc Angel and the International Rabbinic Fellowship, Rabbi Manny Vinas, Rabbi Aharon Ziegler, and in Israel, Rabbi Haim Amsalem, Rabbi Shlomo Riskin, and Rabbi Yisrael Rosen.
R’ Druckman is a talmid chacham par excellence and a rosh yeshiva (Ohr Etzion). I am glad to see that his kavod is no longer being impugned.
Nothing irresponsible or negative about preparing for one’s final arrangements. It takes a bug burden off your next of kin.
The Schmerling liqueur is great for making decadent desserts at fleshig meals.
I made a trifle once, using a parve Dunchan Hines chocolate mix, parve whipped topping (Eden or Rich’s, IIRC), parve chocolate shavings, and topped each serving with a shtickle of the Schmerling. To die for.
A shame is that kosher kahlua must be brought in from Mexico.
I am still on the hunt for acceptable Grand Marnier, Framboises, Sambuca, and Campari. Any suggestions?
The money wasted on pets could be used to feed hungry children, send kids to college to get an education, buy seforim, help baalei teshuva and gerim learn in yeshiva for a year, etc.
I went to a chatuna on December 25th.
The chatan’s buddies did some kind of a shtick involving Santa Claus hats.
I was very put off by that, but didn’t want to make a macha’ah since it was an otherwise joyous occasion. OTOH, the fact that this was a chatuna where the most scum secular heavy metal/rap tunes were being played was very troubling to me. I also chuckled to myself when men dressed in the kedusha of the spiffy spodek processed to Elton John tunes.
Koch was the type of Democrat I could have a conversation with. He was not anti-American like today’s Democrats. He was for America and for our military and our fight for freedom against totalitarian aggression abroad, in the mold of JFK, Truman, LBJ, etc.
His endorsement of Bush and McCain attests to his love of country and ahavat yisrael, and I enjoyed his political commentary and desire to stamp out corruption in local politics.
His memory should be for a blessing.
That being said, I don’t think the “daat torah” would permit watching his funeral. R’ Soloveitchik didn’t allow people to watch Kennedy’s funeral mass on television, since he saw this as an extension of the prohibition on entering a church. Likewise, I don’t think one could find a heter for viewing a Reform service on television.
Especially considering that Temple Emanu El is a holdout of Classical Reform.
Be kitzur, American Reform in the 1880s totally stopped any ritual observance (see the Pittsburgh Platform of 1885), since they denied the binding nature of mitzvot.
This was unlike the earliest German maskilim, like Chorin, who employed tradition and were more or less halakhic/neolog. Certainly, they used certain aesthetics which were not problematic in the sanctuary (like Geneva robes, choirs, vernacular, learned sermons, etc. which the Hirschians and early American Orthodox used), but their theology urged little more than an Ethical Monotheism devoid of anything uniquely Jewish.
Thus, the desire to emulate Christian churches in aesthetic.
The Reform environment I was raised in was more like “Reformadox.” Nowadays, many Reform Jews individually (my household incluced) observe kashrut, shabbat, tefillin, etc, and more closely resembles Reconstructionism, which is itself a liberal offshoot of Conservative Judaism and places an emphasis on observing what they view as folkways. Reform Jews participate in non-denominational yeshivot like Hadar and Pardes, where Orthodox-trained and Halakhic old-style JTS faculty train them in making a leining on Gemara/Rashi/Tosafot/rishonim, etc. Hebrew Union College employs Prof. Michael Chernick, who has semicha from RIETS and is active in the left-wing Modern Orthodox sector, and he teaches seminar courses in “Talmud with Rishonim.” One of his syllabi online shows that Reform rabbinical students in his class learned perek slishi of Sanhedrin with Ritva, Tosfos Rid, Ramban, Meiri, and Rashba.
Emanu-El is a holdout of the olden days resisting this otherwise positive development, and therefore is problematic.
One popular salad in yeshivishe circles seems to be broccoli with a sweet mayo dressing and craisins and cashews. I happen to like it a lot, but sometimes, I can tell the broccoli is frozen, since it has a sulfury/flatulent taste. Is there any way around that?
He is also rosh yeshiva of Ohr Etzion, affiliated with Bnei Akiva, and was awarded Prat Yisrael.
R’ Marc Angel is a talmid chacham, yet people challenge his conversions.
R’ Manny Vinas is also a big talmid chacham, having learned under R’ Zweig in Miami and at R’ Ziegler’s kollel, yet his conversions are challenged.
R’ Moshe Soloveichik in Chicago is also given flak over his conversions, as are many other Orthodox rabbis.
R’ Druckman is the rosh yeshiva of Mosdot Bnei Akiva. He is an unparalleled talmid hakham.
I stand in solidarity with the brave men who learn in yeshivot hesder, combining service to the Jewish people with delving into the deepest depths of torah. Shaalavim, KBY, Gush, Mevaseret, etc. are wonderful mosdot and each is a true makom torah.
Re: The mailman on shabbos- wouldn’t it be better to take the mail than to embarrass the mailman, since embarrassment is an issur d’oraita, and making a chillul hashem is a serious concern?
What frustrates me is when it rains on shabbos and nobody holds by the Hatam Sofer on umbrellas, but that doesn’t matter, since I don’t use the eruv, anyways. Same is like finding money on the ground on shabbos and yom tov.
Prilosec is usually OTC, IIRC. Maybe a drug store should have it?
An extremely frustrating moment for me was when YUTorah had a bunch of shiurim from Spring 2010 that went missing, mostly in Bava Basra, but also many in Kesuvos (from R’ Aryeh Lebowitz).
Another frustrating moment that happened more recently was the fact that the daf yomi shiurim of R’ Shalom Rosner went missing on Project Sinai, although he tells me that they’re going to put them back up soon, IY”H.
Rabbi Seth Farber is a true ally of gerim who helps with these issues.
He should have the support of anyone who believes in ahavat hager.
If you can see yourself married to this person and spending eternity with them, if you know it, you know it, and should move forward.
Some people know this after a few dates; maybe it takes others a few months.
You cannot prove intention. Rabbis or anyone for that matter cannot read minds. Mind-reading is not part of Torah.
Rambam paskens that if beis din fails to tell the ger about mitzvot and their schar v’ onesh, the conversion is still valid (Issurei Biah 13:17) and the Magid Mishneh says that such a law for informing the convert about the mitzvot is simply not me’akev.
The issue is whether non-observance nullifies a conversion, and I have never seen a reasonable halakhic case made that a conversion can be annulled. A person who has brit milah and tevilah and verbally expresses their understanding of what is required of them is Jewish, period. This is how poskim have historically understood the matter, and the mishegoss I’ve seen in recent years is damaging and without any halakhic basis.
This is something to either laugh or cry about- a ger was converted by a former RCA president and leader in the Modern Orthodox community. The RCA itself doesn’t endorse it, and the ger went to a Chassidishe beis din in Boro Park (Biala, Satmar, and others) who accepted him without a problem and welcomed him into the Lvover shteible without issue.
I don’t fold my tallit on shabbat at all. I fold it after I’ve heard havdalah in shul.
If a person says they’re Jewish, they’re believed, for the purpose of aliya l’torah, etc.
Rambam says we only investigate for the sake of chupah v’kiddushin.
Your ideas sound draconian, There are also many cases where people are observant but they’re rejected because the converting rabbis are politically incorrect- for instance, R’ Karelitz’s converts in Israel are not accepted and cannot attain citizenship.
Do you have any reason why zera yisrael shouldn’t be helped and brought close?
The minyan at Maimonides School in Brookline, where R’ Soloveitchik was rosh yeshiva, had a bat mitzvah and the family sponsored a huge kiddush with Johnnie Walker, Glenlivet, etc. and lots of cholent and kugel and even these teriyaki beef skewers.
I like davening at Ramat Orah on the UWS partly because 3 of my rebbeim/friends daven there, and mostly due to their famous kiddush with a huge assortment of scotch, and at least 4 different kinds of cholent and kugel.
These people aren’t stam goyim; they’re members of Israeli society through no fault of their own,
I made a denominational shift from Reform and then Reconstructionist to Traditional and Orthodox. I was very observant by non-Orthodox standards- I davened every morning with tallit and tefillin and also davened Mincha-Maariv (albeit using Reform and Reconstructionist siddurim). I studied Gemara and other texts, learned the parsha every week twice with Onkelos and Rashi, kept kosher (didn’t eat “milchigs out” ever, since I lived in NYC), kept shabbos (I walked to services 3 miles from home), and wore a kippah and sometimes tzitzit. I learned trope and nusach, and was involved in transdenominational efforts in learning and other areas. I began observing at this level around the age of 12.
I grew up to realize that the only community where my lifestyle made sense was the traditional, halakhic community, and that being a halakhic Jew meant that I had to meet personal status standards al pi halakha, and I had to go through many hurdles to be where I am at today (a teudat giyur from one of the most respected rabbinical leaders in Modern Orthodoxy and a former RCA president).
In order to make “connections,” investing time and money in the proper courses and yeshiva education is a necessity for me.
Why anyone born with the linguistic skills from age 3, with the yichus, social network, right connections, who can learn rishonim presumably by the age of 18-19, who was raised with the geshmack of what I worked so hard to achieve and learn, would choose to reject this astounds me.
That being said, there are several areas where we need to return to the teachings of Hazal and the Rambam, Rav Hirsch, and other rational and correct gedolim.
We need to encourage those who inquire and ask questions and scrutinize knowledge. They are sincere mevakshei Hashem.
We need to adopt a grand religious vision that combines ethics, yashrus, humanism, and universalism with the demands of a strixt halakhic life and torah learning. Our torah learning needs to be enriched by a robust agenda of studying the natural and social sciences and humanities, which sharpen the mind and allow us to see life holistically.
Spirituality needs to be nurtured, in addition to philosophizing. Historical revisionism, conformity, brainwashing, and closed-mindedness need to be erased from the picture.
I think whatever I drank knocked out whatever bug was in my system.