If you serve only challah, dips, and cholent for lunch

Bnei Berak 10

Sun, May 07 2023, 12:51 pm

LovesHashem wrote:

Making rice or roasted potatoes and boiling Brocolli or some baby carrots really isn't that hard.

Why is not liking cholent considered to be such a picky eater?

Well in my circles everyone serves and eats Cholent.
The issue for me is how to heat it up in a permissible way on Shabbes morning.

Bnei Berak 10

Sun, May 07 2023, 12:53 pm

rachelli66 wrote:

For DH and myself we wash, and sometimes go straight to Chulent, and slaw. (we have a Kiddush in shul, cake, herring drinks.) I would never serve this to guests for Shabbos lunch. I would serve challah ,chummos, eggplant salad, eggs and onions, vegetable salad. Then Chulent and slaw, pickles. plus cake dessert. When our married children come I also add other types of Deli.

Slaw as in coleslaw salad?

amother

Amber

Sun, May 07 2023, 12:54 pm

LovesHashem wrote:

Curious, what type of community do you live in? I've only encountered this twice in my life at an actual shabbos table.

Chassidish. It's actually our minhag to not add on any new foods only serve traditional shabbos food. For us that's Fish (always, we don't skip fish), eggs with onions ( optional liver for a special treat) & cholent. Cholent can contain meat or chicken, any kind of kugel etc but there is no meats & sides outside of the cholent pot ever. Maybe an apple pie.

Everything licks their cholent plate clean, from my 1 year old to teens & dh & myself.

zaq

Sun, May 07 2023, 12:59 pm

Bnei Berak 10 wrote:

Well in my circles everyone serves and eats Cholent.
The issue for me is how to heat it up in a permissible way on Shabbes morning.

Isn't the whole point of cholent that it sits on the blech all night and doesn't have to be heated up on Shabbos morning?

amother

Amber

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:01 pm

amother Bluebonnet wrote:

People don’t serve salad or any kind of veggies? That is so weird. I’ve never experienced anything like that BH. Why would I want to eat mostly challah and dips?

Yes. We don't eat mostly chalah but rather mostly proteins - fish & cholent. I'm ok with it because A. Tradition & B. We eat salad Friday lunch, 3rd meal on shabbos, melava malka, Sunday brunch... you get the idea. We can handle 2 shabbos meals without fresh salad.

amother

Orange

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:13 pm

You don't have to be a picky eater to avoid a combination of foods that were cooked 20+ hours into a brown mush and tastes like overnight.

You can add potato kugel, steaks, green beans, ice cream, and it's still a brown mush from yesterday.

My cholent has 9 large potatoes, half a pack of meat, a big kishke, and more. My boys and husband refill their plates and I still have too much left over. My baby eats it during the week, no one else will touch it. Mush is perfect baby food, not adult.

Just like if someone is entitled to say no thank you to gefilte fish which is sweet and peppery and kind of spongy and the weirdest food ever if you think about it, it's perfectly fine to pass up on cholent without being labeled picky.

Most shabbosim I skip cholent and go for another plate of fresh salad. Lighter, healthier, and doesn't make me fleishig!

Cheiny

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:20 pm

amother Peony wrote:

In my circles it's the norm to serve just cholent as the main. And I haven't met anyone who doesn't eat cholent.

I'm happy this is the way it is, because otherwise I would never be able to have guests.

I had guests Shabbos morn and this is what I served:
challah
dips
egg
liver
salad
cold cuts
cholent

And this is considered a perfectly respectable menu in my parts. Even if I would omitted the liver it would have fine as well.

Right, cholent for a main but you have a lot of other choices as well. OP was describing having only challah, dips and cholent. That’s a whole different story, and really not enough for guests.

amother

Jetblack

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:23 pm

Ok so what do you think about my meal?
It resembles an upside down pyramid.

First I serve a lot of salads, not just „salatim“ but leafy green salad(s) too, plus salmon.
It is the biggest course of the meal.
When we are done here, I serve just cholent.
Then I serve dessert.

Does it feel like too little?

tichellady

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:26 pm

amother Blueberry wrote:

I think this is the typical standard shabbos more options is more comfortable but not necessary
night:
Challah
Fish/Dips/salads
Chicken soup
2 Mains Chicken/meat
2-4 Sides
2 Dessert

Day:
Challah
Fish /Dips/salads
2 Mains Chicken/meat
2-4 Sides
2 Dessert

this is a lot of food. where I live it's one main, one dessert, and people rarely serve fish and meat. but always a salad and a veggie and fruit

tichellady

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:27 pm

amother Jetblack wrote:

it's fine just tell people at the salad/fish course that the next course is cholent and then dessert

Cheiny

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:27 pm

amother Plum wrote:

I live in Israel and have never seen just cholent for the main course.

That said, I think dips are a total waste. They exist for people to have challah and dips so they'll fill up and not eat too much meat. .

That’s your assumption but totally not true in most cases… most everyone I know likes some dips with challah as a small appetizer. Nothing to do with filling up and not eating meat. You’re reading things into it.

Cheiny

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:28 pm

amother Diamond wrote:

Why do people take away the challah and dips? That’s the type of thing that I think should stay on the table for the whole meal, unless you really have no room for the other foods.

Totally agree, and yet lots of people do remove them after the fish/first course.

LovesHashem

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:28 pm

amother Jetblack wrote:

Sounds fine to me. I'd be full.

Happykind

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:30 pm

My mom is on a strict diet. She either eats a salad before she comes or brings her own. This way she isnt starving.

If I’m being invited out I’m thrilled. I don’t expect anything. Also, u get to know ur host. Eat there once and u know.

Simple Eat before. Don’t come starving.

Cheiny

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:32 pm

amother Caramel wrote:

When it’s just my nuclear family, I serve chulent and salad and dessert. If I have company I’ll make fish and salads (at least two, types vary) and chulent and kishka and some other meat (usually schnitzel but could be deli) and dessert. I ask if ppl will eat fish (answers vary) and will or won’t serve it. If I go somewhere I always ask what to bring and it works out well since I have picky eaters BH. I don’t buy dips usually and everything is homemade. Where I live the shul has a big kiddush every week so no one is hungry for lunch.
In all honesty, rather obnoxious to invite yourself to someone and then tell them they don’t have enough food. No one forced you to go there. And I hope if someone invites you, you don’t tell them to have enough food. Maybe you eat more than a typical person? How would you feel if someone tells you you eat too much?

Whoa, you just took offense at OP for no reason! Who said she invited herself, who said she told them they didn’t have enough food? And big assumption to say maybe she eats more than a typical person! Most typical people won’t be full from dips, challah and a small bowl of cholent and it really isn’t enough for any host to just serve that.
Why did her post anger you so much?

amother

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:39 pm

Cheiny wrote:

I was wondering the same. When did I say I invited my family? I did not.

I'm thinking there are some people on this thread who are offended because this is what they do when they have guests and it's hard to see someone try to nicely communicate on this forum that challah, mayo based dip, and a scoop of cholent is not a meal.

I can't be the only one here who was taught not to fill up on challah? Am I?

Raisin

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:45 pm

I only serve one course for shabbos lunch. Otherwise I find its a waste of food. So either meat, dips and salads or fish, dips and salads. Definitely a green salad of some type. If I do cholent it gets served in bowls after the fish or if meat, during the meat course.

My boys appreciate cholent more than the girls, not sure if that is because they don't think its worth being fleishig for.

We do try and let people know what is happening - there is only one course, so fill up.

Cheiny

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:50 pm

LovesHashem wrote:

Its one pot but it's the same taste. It's like making chicken in the rice. I would have chicken and rice seperate plus a veggie dish.

IMHO cholent looks and smells like throw up. It's a one pot meal that's cooked for so long it's looks like a huge mush and it's all disintegrated and gross. Even if I liked one part like chicken or potatoes usually by shabbos day it's all one mush to the point you can't even pick something out like that (unless it's a huge chunk of meat)

I think you may have just killed everyone’s appetite.

amother

Black

Sun, May 07 2023, 1:53 pm

amother OP wrote:

As it goes through you are making it sound worse and worse. First dips now one mayo based dip. Cholent is very satisfying if you eat a bowlful, a scoop is ridiculous.

And why do you need to be "taught"? When in Rome do as Romans do. If you see your hosts eating 3 or 4 slices of challa, assume that that is where you need to fill up. Just because you were "taught" not to fill up on challa it doesn't mean that when you're out as a guest you shouldn't fill up on challa. It may mean it isn't the healthiest, I'd agree there. But it's not wrong that you need to be taught not to do it.