Dear JITC- Mayim Bialik just mentioned cholent on Jeopardy. What is it and why do Jews eat it? Thank you, A Dear A- Thanks for your question. Cholent is a form of stew traditionally eaten at the Shabbos afternoon meal. The reason for it is comparable to the reason for lighting Shabbos candles. Exodus 35:3 […]

A question about the Shabbos staple delicacy cholent stumped Jeopardy! contestants this week, and observant host Mayim Bialik helped explain the answer. As the $400 “Sabbath” category clue presented was a photo of the traditional slow-cooked stew, alongside the following: “Exodus 35:3 bans doing this on the Sabbath, hence the Jewish dish ‘cholent,’ which can […]

The most common question I get at our weekly community Shabbos meals is, “You must have spent all week cooking for this!” I always explain that in fact, I only cook on Friday mornings because I don’t like to spend my entire week cooking. To make this possible, I’ve adopted various tricks and methods over […]

A surprise extended stay in Washington DC due to President Biden attending to the crisis in Afghanistan led to Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s team scrambling to make accommodations for his Shabbos observance in the U.S. Capital. He, along with the large contingent of security, staff and journalists with whom he was traveling, made impromptu plans […]

A new kind of phone call has been coming in to General Electric’s technical support: those of people who have inadvertently and unknowingly activated their oven’s Sabbath Mode. This handy feature, designed to help observant Jews keep religious laws, might be confusing to users of other faiths when they encounter it, but it is a […]

Dear Jew in the City- Jacob Steinmetz and Elie Kligman both just made history as the first Orthodox Jewish players to be drafted to the MLB. Steinmetz plays baseball on Shabbos but Kligman doesn’t. How can both be considered “Shabbos observant” with this difference? Thank you, JL Dear JL- The answer to this question is […]