Posted by:
Tevai
(
)
Date: August 18, 2021 03:06PM
elderolddog Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> What if I was trying to pass as Jewish, but didn't
> like cream cheese? Wouldn't this ploy fool
> people?
Granted: marshmallow creme MIGHT fool some people (especially new immigrants from places like southern Yemen, or small and unfamiliar Jewish enclaves in Asia, Africa, etc.)
OTOH, this substitution of marshmallow creme for cream cheese COULD potentially be of value if you were trying to create a brouhaha between observant (follows the dietary laws) Jews and non-observant (do NOT follow the dietary laws) Jews.
For example: you could use marshmallow creme on a bagel to trick a Jewishly observant someone else into thinking you were mixing milk dishes and meat dishes at a designated "meat" meal. [Kosher dietary laws say you cannot mix "milk" dishes with "meat" dishes at the "same" meal, which is defined by a certain number of hours in between either "milk" or "meat," depending on the circumstances.]
This apparently rare situation, I discovered when I was in Israel with my [mostly] American tour group, can come up more frequently than you might think.
I am vegetarian and have been for about thirty years, and when I was in Israel, there were three people in our tour group who were plenty, and loudly vocally, irritated by my mealtime questions along the lines of: "Is there meat in this [unknown to me] Israeli dish?"
These few people kept getting more and more visibly and vocally upset as our tour unfolded, day by day, and I finally asked the "ringleader" of the "group" why ME being a vegetarian was SO offensive to THEM.
The answer was (to me) astounding: "It's because you have it SO EASY!! Every day, WE have to figure out the hours between "milk" and "meat," and YOU never have to! You being a vegetarian is just trying to take the [Jewish] easy way out, so YOU don't have to make the effort required to be kosherly observant! While you take the easy way out, WE have to always do the [hard] work of keeping "milk" meals/snacks totally apart [separated by specific time units] from "meat," keeping our "meat" and "milk" dishes and cutlery totally separate at all times (including during dishwashing), etc.
I was literally speechless.
I never would have had a thought like that in a zillion years.
In my life since, I have never forgotten that, to at least some strictly and faithfully observant Jews, being a vegetarian CAN be thought of as "taking the easy way out."
Marshmallow creme has its place in life, but in my highly personal opinion, that place is definitely NOT on a bagel.
Your mileage, quite obviously, may vary.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/18/2021 03:10PM by Tevai.