The blog, Life in Israel, posted regarding a ban on fish because the worms in them cause them to be unkosher.
This reminded me of a question I once asked a well respected Rav and to which there was no satisfying response.
I told the Rabbi about a dish called Ceviche. This is a dish where you take some raw fish, put it in a bowl and pour over a bit of vinegar or fruit juice or any acetic acid. You let the fish soak for X amount of time while the acetic acid cooks the fish. Serve right out of the refrigerator when X time has elapsed.
So I asked if one could prepare this dish on Sabbath. He replied absolutely not because the acid is clearly cooking the fish and that is forbidden on Sabbath.
So I asked him, what about using vinegar based salad dressing? If you notice, when you eat salad with vinegar, bits of salad wilt and turn black. This is the acetic acid cooking the salad. Should vinegar and other citrus products not all be forbidden to be put on any raw dish on Sabbath?
There was no response. I think he was scared of the idea of assuring vinegar dressing on salad, a staple of the sabbath meal.
Any takers? Who can answer this for me?
15 comments:
as far as I know you can add the spices or vinegar or dressing fairly close to the meal and the amount of time necessary for preparing the dish right before the meal. The problem would be to add the vinegar a number of hours prior to the meal which would then soak for that long, thus "cooking" the salad.
I am not familiar with this dish, but ti seems soaking it for a specified amount of time would be a similar problem. Many things are allowed, even if they technically should not be, when they are done as part of the normal food preparation, right before the meal. When they are done far in advance they remain problematic. It sounds like that might be the problem with this dish.
I do see a separate reason to be l;enient and not call it cooking, as this is not the regular form and mode of cooking, which is a leniency often used in food preparation (normal mode of use/preparation/etc), but I am not sure if that really works when done in advance. There is also a problem of "pickling" foods which has a certain status of cooking when the food is soaked for lengthy amounts of time. Again, not being familiar with the dish it is hard to say, but ti seems that this is the problem, while the vinegar in the salad would be ok as long as it is prepared close to the meal time.
I used ceviche as an example simply because it is a protein dish where the goal is to actually cook the food through the use of acid over a period of an hour or two.
As it applies to green/vegetable salad: the cooking is an unintended byproduct of the flavor.
However, cooking is the action of speeding up molecules. Why does it make a difference if one heats up the molecules through fire or any other source of heat.
And, greens and such heat up from vinegar much faster than a protein. This is why a protein needs to soak in acid for an hour or two and greens begin to wilt and the cellulose begins to break down immediately.
Further, even if it is just a matter of timing, that would imply that a "dressed" salad can only be served immediately and must be thrown away after a short time period. Otherwise, if you dress a salad for lunch how can you save the leftovers for suedat shlishit?
Regardless, if you can't cook with acid, why can you use acid as a dressing for flavor and ignore that it is cooking the salad?
Cooking, using a chemical reaction; with items such as salt or vinegar usually does not raise the temperature of the item to be cooked to be above 132 degrees Farenhiet, which is the accepted standard of cooking or heating on Shabbat.
Whether changing the composition of the cooked item using a chemical reaction, is something that might also be brought into question.
The standard response is usually
"Ask you local Orthodox Rabbi".
Of course there are many other qualified people to ask as well, but I am not one of them.
farenheit,
Hi Norman.
Thanks, I did not know that 132f was the kashrut standard for cooking.
I was planning on using the change of composition as a follow up question.
But I am also curious about the standard. If I took a piece of meat and slow cooked it at 120f that would be ok?
Way,
As an engineer, I'm sympathetic to your attempt to define "cooking" similar to the way it is defined by science. However, that is not the halachik definition. As Rafi G. pointed out, pickling may be considered a form of "cooking" according to halacha, even though it may not meet the scientific definition thereof.
One has to be careful when using convenient, yet not exact, translations of a concept and then assuming that all of the limitations of the translation apply to the concept. Here, you're using the scientific definition of "cooking" and trying to make the concept of "bishul" conform to it. Doesn't work. If you keep in mind that "cooking" is merely a convenient, yet inexact, substitute for "bishul", you'll have an easier time with it.
The same problem comes up with the term "melacha" on shabbos, which is usually translated as "labor" or something similar. While there is a lot a overlap between melachot which are prohibited on shabbos and things which can be defined as a labor, it is the exact definition of "melacha", and not of "labor", which determines which actions may be performed on shabbos.
Halachically, some things that we call "cooking" are not cooking. For example, we were told by a prominent NY rav that a non-Jewish housekeeper could cook food for us in the microwave, even if the food was raw and was not just being reheated. The microwave process is not "cooking" as it relates to bishul akum.
Clearly one can't microwave on Shabbos, but perhaps that is only because of electricity, not bishul.
Can a non-Jew prepare ceviche for a Jew?
Hi Yoni,
Although its been a long time since I learned the rules of Shabbat, I recall an explanation that cooking was, to paraphrase: the act of taking a raw food product and fundamentally changing/finishing it, ie: texture,color,taste, through the use of heat.
So for a salt or salt brine, where the salt draws out the moisture, I see that as different than the heat of sped up molecules.
And like the use of fire, acid causes heat and a fundamental change from raw to finished. Raw greens left to soak in vinegar look nothing like raw greens. It is that fundamental change in the food product, through heat, that has me stuck.
Tes,
So lets say a microwave could be powered by some force other than electricity, (maybe magnets), could a jew cook raw food in a microwave on shabbat?
It could also be a "p'sik reisha d'lo ichpa leih." The fact that it "cooks" the salad is not something I care about.
Personally, I think Yoni is on track here. So, let's finish his answer. If I were in the beit midrash, this is what I would offer to explain your rav's difficulty.
The halacha tells us that if I have a thoroughly salted fish, such as preserved cod, that is inedible without washing off the salt; then to remove the salt on Shabbat is forbidden as a tolada/related act of bishul/'cooking'. Yoni has already explained that we need use the halachic definition of cooking; not some other notion. Similar to the case of the preserved fish or meat, if your dish is rendered edible by the acid soak, that is probably bishul. If it is considered edible without, but the acid soak 'finishes' it, then it may be prohibited as a different m'lacha/forbidden 'labor'. There might even be cultural differences or considerations that come into play.
In the case of your salad dressing, nobody will claim that the dressing makes the salad edible. Similarly, we often eat salad vegetables without dressing. So the dressing isn't doing anything in that case.
I don't think Lawman's answer is necessary; and in any case I would think it is 'niha lei'. But again, I don't think we need that. The problem is specific to the act and purpose with the fish.
Of course, I could have it all wrong; but I offer that for consideration.
Pretty cool question!
Way - it is not the change that is prohibited, but the process by which you cause the change.
For example, you are not allowed to take a frying pan, stick it on a fire (even if the fire was lit before shabbos) and fry an egg on shabbos. that would be cooking.
to take the same pan and stick it in the hot sun on a really hot day and fry the egg in the heat of the sun would be ok.
the process defined as prohibited is cooking. Not everything that changes the molecules in the food product falls under the category of cooking.
I should point out that my last comment was not accurate. I wrote it that way for a reason, but somebody wrote to me because of its inaccuracy so I should clarify. Putting a frying pan in the sun to cook an egg is rabbinically prohibited, though as far as the discussion is concerned, I felt that was good enough, as m'd'orayta it is allowed.
The reason it is rabbinically prohibited is because they consider that the frying pan is heated up in the sun and the egg is cooked on the heat of the pan rather than the heat of the sun.
On the other hand, if you poured the egg onto a hot rock sitting in the sun, it would be allowed even rabbinically because that would be considered cooking in the sun.
At the end of the day, my point is the same. It is the process of cooking that is prohibited, not the molecular change. If the change occurs in a process that is allowed, it is not considered cooking and is ok.
Excellent responses.
Thank you everyone for clarifying this issue for me.
Mord: The idea of "finishing" the product is interesting. In which case, all salads should be dressed before shabbat? no dips or sauces?
Rafi: I was actually thinking specifically of the example of the heat from the sun and the idea of using pans and rocks. Very cool that you used that example.
Way,
No. The defined m'lacha of 'finishing a product' has no application with salad. I suggested it only as an alternative to bishul/cooking in the matter of the fish, since one might argue that the fish is nonetheless edible raw. Goes back to my quick reference to cultural issues.
There is no problem with salad dressing and salads. The salad dressing is nothing more than another ingredient or garnish, as if you added some more greens or spices. It really plays no role in the discussion of bishul/cooking.
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