December 25, 2014--Christmas, Jews, Chinese Food

Now our little secret is exposed--Atlantic magazine just published a piece titled, "Why American Jews Eat Chinese Food on Christmas."

I could have told you that. From personal experience I have known about this for more than 60 years. Every Christmas everyone in my family and Brooklyn neighborhood went out for Chinese food (or, if you'll forgive me--chinks) stuffed themselves with chicken chow mein, shrimp with lobster sauce, and pork fried rice.

When I asked why we did this so ritualistically on Christmas day I was told that with Catholics (how Jews referred to all christians) eating at home with their families, it would be easy to get a table--the same point made in the Atlantic article.

Further, I learned, since the only other restaurants in the neighborhood were Italian and Italians were Catholics and thus at home their restaurants were closed. And so Chinese food was our only option.

"Only option"? Most of us ate at home 360 days a year.

And I added, "There's never a problem getting a table. Catholics don't like Chinese food. Only Jews. Since there are so few Catholics in our neighborhood what difference does it make anyway?" I was a bit of a smartass.

I never got a satisfactory answer, just a little slap on the back of my head and the admonition to finish my egg drop soup.

And the Atlantic piece also doesn't supply a satisfactory answer. They claim that eating Chinese was the easiest way for Jews to eat out and fool themselves into believing they were still being kosher--like with authentic kosher food, the Chinese do not mix dairy products with meat.

But that's where the self-deception ends--shrimp with lobster sauce is kosher? Shrimp? Lobster? And pork fried rice? Really?

The author needs to revisit Deuteronomy where the foods that are forbidden are explicitly listed.

At the very top of that traif list are shellfish such as shrimp and lobster (though I suspect there was never any lobster in the lobster sauce--just a lot of shellfish stock flavored cornstarch) and of course the most forbidden of traif, finger-licking pork in all its forms.

Thus, one has to dig a bit deeper to figure out why I and my people will be found later today gorging on spareribs and shrimp wantons.

From me, then, here are a few actual reasons--

Perhaps foremost, Jews (as is true for most others) don't like to be exposed as hypocrites. In a small neighborhood, being observed eating traif in public qualifies as being thus exposed. So, we could indulge ourselves in as much forbidden food as we liked on Christmas day, knowing we would be doing so in private, among our "own kind," without being concerned that there would be any Catholics around to observe and expose us for what we were--well, food hypocrites.

Then, there is the reality that traif is scrumptious (does anyone not like shrimp or bacon?) and to have any excuse to get one's hands on it can quickly turn into an annual ritual. Like always going out for Chinese on Christmas day.

Plus, for those of us who were over-coddled by proverbial Jewish Mothers, participating in anything forbidden (even eating egg rolls) added additional spice to the experience. Being bad within safe limits was something pretty much everyone I knew who was leading an over-monitored life found to be alluring. Even something seemingly as benign as loving clams with black bean sauce.

So, you'll know where to look for me later today. At Noodletown in Chinatown or Phoenix Gardens up by the UN where they make the best salt-baked shrimp in New York. Or, back in the old neighborhood, at the Happy Garden on Pitkin Avenue for their classic pork egg foo young.