Jewish Holidays

• Jewish holidays include Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year), Purim (Festival of Lots), Pesach (Passover) and Chanukah (the Festival of Lights).
  
  The website Something Jewish describes Jewish festivals and their spiritual meaning for the Jewish people. In every event, Jews enjoy specified foods as part of their remembrances. Jews celebrate Purim four weeks before Passover, recalling Queen Esther who saved the Jews from death. Passover is a pivotal Jewish festival, which recalls God's deliverance as Moses led the Hebrews out of slavery in Egypt. Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish New Year; the holiday, celebrated over two days, is considered one of the most sacred. During the eight days of Chanukah, Jews recall the times when they were not allowed to openly practice their faith.
  
  

Foods

• Something Jewish describes the foods Jews eat as part of their celebrations. For example, on Purim, Jews eat hamentashen. Filled with jam or poppy seeds, these triangular pastries are shaped like three-cornered hat of Haman, who schemed to have the Jews executed but was condemened to death himself.
  
  Purim is followed by the eight days of Passover. On the first two evenings of Passover, Jewish families celebrate the Exodus from slavery in Egypt with a prayer service and ritual meal. The occasion includes four cups of wine and various types of ritual foods such as maror, the bitter herb that recalls the bitterness of slavery. Throughout the eight days, Jews abstain from eating bread, cereal and alcohol made with grains. Instead, Jews eat matzah, a type of unleavened bread, because when they fled Pharoah, the bread had no time to rise.
  
  As Jews celebrate forgiveness and hope on Rosh Hashanah, they enjoy traditional honey-dipped apples, which signify an approaching sweet year, and a special round Challah (ritual bread), representing the year cycle.
  
  Jews gather around the table for Chanukah to enjoy foods cooked in oil, recalling the miracle when a small amount of oil was sufficient to light the temple lamps for eight nights. (See Reference 1)