Challah Bake & Brunch: Food Share NOLA

 January service hours: 2

Cumulative service hours: 2





During the month of January, I had the opportunity to learn to bake challah for the first time during my community service. I went to the Anshe Sfard Synagogue with classmates Rabia, Amelie, and Sammy to bake challah. The atmosphere was very wholesome and had a family oriented feeling to it which I liked a lot. The event was hosted by the synagogue, Tulane graduates, and medical students so there were many people from those programs in attendance. Challah Bake & Brunch was designed to bake challah together with some of it being for personal consumption and the rest being donated to those in need through Food Share NOLA.

The event started off with a family style brunch and then proceeded with a welcome talk from the Rabbi, Yochanan Rivkin. The introduction speech by the Rabbi and his wife discussed the symbolism of challah baking and the correlation it has to the jewish religion and giving back to the community. The message really resonated with my personal beliefs and desire to help others and tied very well into the idea behind hosting the event. 

After the introduction talks, we got started on being taught how to make challah which was new to me. Challah involves smoothing out the dough and rolling it into a uniform roll that's long enough to twist and fold in the proper way. For our personal rolls, we were able to paint on egg to keep the rolls moist and add our own toppings. My challah (pictured above under my tag) was a sweet topping challah with honey and cinnamon sugar added. It was delicious!

After our personal challah, we then proceeded to make many rolls that were baked and donated to Food Share NOLA. Many of the more experienced challah bakers were braiding their challah rolls so that was fun to attempt to learn and watch. One of the braided challah experts was a current Tulane Medical School student so it was nice talking to him and hearing things he would have done differently or prepared for differently regarding medical school and that whole process. 

Overall the experience was new, very unique, and a good opportunity to get involved with the community and help others. I am looking forward to sharing my next community service opportunities with you all in the coming months. 

Hope the new year has started off well for you all,

Edward Benjamin

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