just said “no” to me? Google it! But, sadly, the plethora of differ-
ing opinions, each one claiming to be unequivocally true, often
just leads to further confusion.
Listening to our Inner Voice
“Every day a bat kol goes forth from Mount Sinai . . . ” (Avot 6:2).
This bat kol, or voice, beckons us to our deepest reality.
We are all equipped with an incredible inner receptor to this
voice of the bat kol. Heeding this voice, we are guided by it; it is
a deeper listening to the reverberation of the vibrations of Sinai
during the time we received Divine wisdom in our lives. The bat
kol is a femininely termed name, literally translated as “daugh-
ter of the voice,” for it is a gentle echo, a receiving, continuation,
and realization of the wisdom of Sinai. The bat kol lives inside
each of us and, if we can tune in to its vibrations, we can access
its eternal wisdom.
Sounds too incredible?
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R I S I N G
Consider this: how often do we look to others for answers,
only to speak with a really good listener and discover that the
answers were within us all along and we simply didn’t take the
time to listen and acknowledge our own inherent wisdom? Most
“WITH BREAD YEAST & HUMANS, THERE ARE ABOUT 45 AMINO ACIDS
of the time, we actually know the answers to our deepest ques-
tions; they are part of who we are. In reaching deep down to our
bat kol we can access them and integrate them into our lives.
When we nurture our families, we are often at a loss for what
to do next. As soon as we feel like we are getting the hang of
nurturing a spouse, we become partners in raising a new life
and need to relearn the art. Just as we begin to feel proficient
in the newborn stage, suddenly she’s an infant, and then, all too
quickly, a toddler, a teenager, an adult. . . . Life moves quickly and
we want quick answers.
When we take the time to bake our challah, and place our-
selves fully in the process, we find ourselves accessing our very
own answers, our own deep intuitive knowledge, which tells us
we have the tools we need to get this right and do it with joy
and fullness of being. Just lean in and listen closely. Pour in each
ingredient and focus on the recipe for nurturing in your very
own way, rediscovering and rethinking each part of the recipe
each time you go back to your challah bowl. Each new week of
baking brings with it new realizations and new opportunities
for exploring the way we have been doing things, allowing us to
determine whether we need to find new direction.
We’ve spoken about the flour and water, the basics that we are
born with. Now let’s talk about the other stuff.
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T H E I N G R E D I E N T S : A R E C I P E F O R R I S I N G
“WITH BREAD YEAST & HUMANS, THERE ARE ABOUT 45 AMINO ACIDS
THAT ARE DIFFERENT AND ABOUT 59 THAT ARE IDENTICAL.
THINK HOW CLOSE TOGETHER MAN AND THIS OTHER ORGANISM,
BREAD YEAST, ARE. WHAT IS THE PROBABILITY THAT IN 59 POSITIONS
THE SAME CHOICE OUT OF 20 POSSIBILITIES WOULD HAVE BEEN MADE
BY ACCIDENT? IT IS IMPOSSIBLY SMALL . . . AND SO WE SEE THAT NOT
ONLY ARE ALL MEN BROTHERS, BUT MEN AND YEAST CELLS, TOO. . . .”
— LINUS PAULING, GREAT AMERICAN CHEMIST, 1933
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R I S I N G
Yeast
While rising will naturally occur when flour and water are left
to their own devices, this can be quite a lengthy process. The ad-
vent of adding a previously fermented yeast product has short-
ened the process and added to the tastiness of the bread, as well.
Yeast is a microscopic single-cell organism that is naturally
present in the air. When added to flour and water, it feeds on the
sugar in the flour’s carbohydrates. As the yeast multiplies and
grows, it produces alcohol, which add flavor to the dough, and
also carbon dioxide, which creates the structure of the bread.
Carol Field, in her book, The Italian Baker,1 writes that when
there is a lot of bread being prepared in one place, there is a high
concentration of naturally occurring yeast in the air that adds to
the bread.
1 Field, Carol. The Italian Baker. New York: Harper & Row, 1985. Print.
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T H E I N G R E D I E N T S : Y E A S T
The moral of the story is, the more challah you bake in your
kitchen, the better your challah will be!
With the availability of commercial yeast, and later, the in-
vention of granulated yeast (courtesy of Charles Fleischmann,
a German Jewish immigrant, during the Second World War), the
process of rising our dough has been considerably expedited.
A Closer Look
Yeast is an interesting organism that has been given much at-
tention in the Torah. Passover is an entire holiday, in fact, that is
dedicated to the avoidance of the fermentation process in gener-
al and, more specifically, to the consumption of yeast.
Interestingly, the discovery of yeast as a food fermentation
product dates back to ancient Egypt, where our own story be-
gan. The Egyptians, most likely having left flour and water
outside in the heat, realized that the fermentation leads to a
better-risen and more flavorful bread, as well as a really great
beverage known as beer . . . so now just imagine that the whole
story of our exodus occurred with a thoroughly inebriated Egyp-
tian Pharaoh, but that’s for another time.
In the Torah, this rising process represents a rising ego, just as
the matzah, flat bread traditionally eaten on Passover, symboliz-
es an absence of ego, a humility as it were. This is why the Exo-
dus from Egypt, the place of constriction, serves as a metaphor
for our own personal release from our ego, which is the root of
all perceived limitation. We take a week off from all association
with yeast and, therefore, ego, and allow ourselves to re-cali-
brate our internal rising system.
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R I S I N G
Balancing Ego
Ego is essential to our survival. Without it, we wouldn’t get
up in the morning, feed ourselves, go to work or bother to look
both ways before crossing the street. The Torah prescribes an
eight-day abstention from yeast, a deflating of the ego, that may,
with time, become opaque and overly bloated due to perceived
threats to its survival when, in fact, there are none. For example,
there are times when we walk into a room and think that the
people in it are talking about us, affecting our ability to focus
and function. That is an expression of an inflamed ego, an exag-
gerated or skewed sense of our place in this world that leads to
an unhealthy relationship with others and the world around us.
Unlike humility, a low self-esteem is actually a sign of an in-
flated ego. The person perceives all of humanity as a threat or, at
the very least, to be revolving around his existence.
With a healthy sense of self, we are comfortable with who we
are and are happy with our place
in society. From that vantage
point, we are comfortable and have a healthy, realistic sense of
ourselves. We are able to view the rest of the world as a coun-
terbalance to ourselves. We see every person and situation as
someone or something to learn from as we strive to grow and
perfect ourselves towards our own tikkun, personal soul eleva-
tion and articulation.
The Import of Faith
In raising joyous and confident children, our first job is to give
them a healthy sense of self. We do this by acknowledging them
as part of the Divine, a perfect gift from above.
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T H E I N G R E D I E N T S : Y E A S T
Faith is the very first thing a child learns upon entering this
world and it is the mother who provides it. It is, much like bread,
essential to our survival. In responding to our child’s immediate
needs, we are able to instill within him a healthy sense of trust
and faith in humanity, an inherent knowledge that he is deserv-
ing of care and love, and an instinct to trust in goodness.
All the information our children will receive during their lives
will be filtered through this lens of trust and faith. It is precisely
this faith that will allow them to receive knowledge and inte-
grate it in a healthy way.
Our first and foremost responsibility as nurturers is the trans-
mission of a sense of self-worth and esteem in the people we
love and an inherent sense of faith in their inner goodness and
wholeness. A person who has received in such a way is capable
of giving in much the same way, creating a cycle of love that pro-
duces whole and happy human beings. As such, I wholeheart-
edly believe that the healing of this world will be brought about
through the perfect love of each mother to her child, each nur-
turer to those he or she embraces.
When we think of the brokenness of the world, the fighting
within families, the wars, the struggle for power and wealth, it
is obvious that the pain is caused by children who have grown
into adults never having felt that they are essentially good and
whole in the crucial beginnings of their lives. Perhaps this may
sound presumptuous or perhaps an oversimplification of a fact.
However, it is something that, over my years of nurturing, I have
come to understand as a deep, deep truth.
When we are taught to believe that we are whole and com-
plete at our essence, we see the whole world as participating
in our growth and sustenance and the world looks back at us in
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R I S I N G
the same way. If we haven’t received this knowledge of our in-
herent positive qualities, there is a shattering. Essentially, this is
a breaking of our natural trust in the inherent goodness of our-
selves and therefore in others, and a distrust of others is born.
All our brokenness and pain in life, aside from circumstances
beyond our control, such as, G-d forbid, death or illness, can be
traced back to this lack of faith in our own wholeness.
When we decide to believe that we are each a G-d given gift
and, as such, wonderful even in our imperfections (which, of
course, does not negate the need to constantly grow and bet-
ter ourselves), we shine a light into this world, one that brings
healing and peace to those around us. I have seen it happen
countless times. A person who feels secure about himself enters
the room and the room lights up. Those in his sphere feel better
about themselves just by being in his presence and the effects
can be far-reaching.
This innate security that radiates outwards is known in He-
brew as chein, an inner light that comes along with a person’s
outside being aligned with his or her inside. It is a wholeness of
self, a deep belief that he or she is lovable and worthy of love,
which, in turn, makes him or her lovable and pleasant to others.
Children who are young enough to be un-self-conscious radi-
ate this natural chein; it is what draws us to them and makes
them so beloved. They are not worried that something is wrong
with them. They know we will love them and they believe them-
selves to be worthy of that love. And so it is true, we do love them
and believe wholeheartedly in their inherent right to adoration.
We don’t need to have received this perfectly in our infancy to
be able to achieve this state of chein, nor do we need to be in a
perfect state of chein to pass it on to those we love.
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T H E I N G R E D I E N T S : Y E A S T
Second Chances
A frantic call at 3pm on Friday: It is Giselle. She has been com-
ing to my challah class about once a year for the past few years.
Challah baking does not come naturally to her but she is hero-
ically determined to master it. In a panicky voice half-hiccup-
ping with despair as I pick up the phone, she blurts out, “My
challah dough! It’s not rising! It’s been an hour and still no sign
of rising. I used all the ingredients you told me, I did everything
right. What happened?”
We calmly went through all the steps. I had her check the
package of yeast she had used. Had it expired, or was it fresh
and still “alive”? We determined that indeed the yeast was okay
but perhaps the water she had used had been too cold and the
environment the dough had been placed in, too dry and cool.
I had her place a pan of boiling water on the bottom of her
oven and set her stubborn, unrisen dough into this steamy, sau-
na-like environment. She shut the oven door. Within moments,
Sometimes, we don’t get it right the first time. We gave it all we
had, or perhaps we didn’t. Maybe we were distracted, not com-
pletely present at the moment. Overwhelmed by the peripherals
and unaware that this precious time to create the dough was so
short, it passed by quickly and we missed the moment. What-
ever the case may be, at some point we see the dough we have
created and feel that we have failed. The dough is not rising.
Remember the basic ingredients of challah: flour and water.
That’s it. All of us already possess these basics ingredients, a
body and a soul. Bathed in a conducive environment of mois-
ture, warmth, and sweetness, it will eventually rise. When the
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R I S I N G
dough does not seem to be developing as it should, just remem-
ber these three simple elements: water, an environment that is
eternally alive with spirituality and connectedness; warmth, an
embracing, accepting place; and sweetness, pure kindness and
patience. Mix together, give it plenty of time and watch your
dough rise.
We don’t always remember or know to have given these things
when our babies were young, when our marriage was new,
when the friendship began. We ourselves may not have received
the connectedness, the warmth, and the sweetness. But the les-
son in our challah bowl is that it is never too late. It is a constant
striving to
reach this place of deep faith in ourselves that gives
rise to the perfect nurturing of others.
When we put the yeast into our dough, we take the time to
focus on our own sense of self-worth and faith in our essential
wholeness. We then extend that faith into the ones we love and
nurture. We understand that each moment, each day, is a new
opportunity for us to instill a deep-seated sense of the inborn
wholeness of each person whom we love. With this “bread of
faith” we will heal and transform, allowing ourselves and our
loved ones and, in the process, our challah dough, to rise.
Note to my reader: To the novice challah baker, yeast seems to be
the scariest part of the process. I'm here to tell you, don't fear the
yeast! Proofing the yeast will determine whether or not the yeast
is working and, as long as conditions are right (very warm water
and some sugar, see page 174 for more detailed instructions) the
yeast will do its job and your challah will rise.
Did everything right and the dough still isn't rising? See RISING!
(the cookbook,) for troubleshooting a non-rising dough.
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S U G A R V S . S A LT
Sugar vs. Salt
: the great debate
While sugar and salt may seem like simple flavor additives and
extraneous to the essential building blocks of a challah dough,
they are, in fact, quite necessary in the creation of a perfect chal-
lah.
Sugar and salt, while both crucial elements in the challah
dough, serve opposite and even opposing functions. Sugar en-
courages the growth of yeast and the subsequent rising of the
dough. Salt does the absolute inverse of this. It serves to quell
the rising, inhibiting the growth of the dough and creating a
tighter structure of gluten strands.
So herein lies the great debate: to sweeten or to brine? Would
we create giant swelling mounds of yeasty goodness, or tightly
controlled spheres of gluten correctness?
Of course, this debate doesn’t end with dough. It always goes
back to the nurture balance. So read on . . . and decide for your-
self!
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R I S I N G
“WHATEVER WE ARE DOING, NO MATTER HOW
HOLY, WE SHOULD NEVER BE SO ENGROSSED
AS TO MISS THE SOUND OF A CHILD’S CRY.”“
—Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi
(the Alter Rebbe)