Taking pride in being Jewish women

The fourth annual Challah Bake Long Island Style will take place at The Sands in Atlantic Beach on Nov. 1. The event, which drew more than 1,300 attendants of all ages last year, helps Jewish women become more acquainted with their heritage by baking the braided bread as a mitzvah, or Judaic commandment.

Women from all different sects will be seated at tables as Elizabeth Kurtz, a cookbook author and founder of GourmetKosherCooking.com, will lead them through the recipe step-by-step. The actual baking will have to be done at home.

“Anyone can make [challah] with the right effort, time and love,” Kurtz said.

Tony- and Emmy-nominated actress, Tovah Feldshuh, and author and lecturer, Slovie Jungreis Wolff, will also speak about their experiences about being Jewish women. Feldshuh will be seen in a recorded video and Wolff will attend the event. Kurtz said she’s humbled to be featured in the same event as those two women.

This is the first time she’s presented at the Long Island event, but has done similar presentations in Detroit and New York City, and said she really enjoys seeing everyone come together. “It’s so much fun seeing the young girls and the older women at the same table,” Kurtz said.

Celia Weintrob, one of the many volunteers helping to organize the event, said that is what the bake is about: coming together as Jewish women. “The event allows us to reconnect with our Jewish past and present with women from across the spectrum of Judaism,” she said.

Events such as this have taken place across the U.S., spurred on by the Shabbat Project, a global grassroots movement begun in 2013 by Chief Rabbi Dr. Warren Goldstein, from South Africa.

The event’s global origins help participants feel that they’re a part of the larger global Jewish community. “It’s about coming together,” Kurtz said, “no judgment between their differences in observances, just pride in being Jewish women.”

Adina Fischlewitz, has been one of the event’s main organizers and said that this event is about empowerment, as much as it is unity. “This is something we’ve done for millennium, it’s not an event for foodies,” she said, “it’s an opportunity to take something from the physical world and elevate it with a blessing, and then take it to feed your family.”

In a video to be shown at the event, narrated by Rabbi David Fohrman of AlephBeta.org, a website with more than 150 videos relating to Jewish history and heritage, he describes why the ritual has its place in Judaism. By turning the flour made from dead wheat into living yeast and molding it into bread the baker mimics God breathing life into clay and creating Adam.

Doors for the event open at 6:45 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 1 and the program will start at 7:30 p.m. The Sands is located at 1395 Beech Street in Atlantic Beach. Admission is $36 and tickets can be purchased at ChallahBakeLI.com.