I was reading Abandoning Edens post about her first time eating crab and lobster and it got me thinking about cheeseburgers and their use as the ultimate sin according to my yeshiva high school Rabbis.
There were a few points stressed over and over again in my high school, if they didn’t have to do with masturbation or how evil girls were- until it was time to get married and they did this Kafkaesque switch from evil monsters to the ones that would make us happy and support us in kollel or the least cook our meals- it had to do with cheeseburgers.
That’s right, I must have heard any number of statements basically describing the cheeseburger as the ultimate sin, so sinful that it competed with the original sin of Adam and Eve. There were many chances for the Rabbis to use the cheeseburger as the symbol of gashmius, evil, satan, yetzer harah, peer pressure, treife, and countless other terms to make us revere and fear the lowly cheeseburger which was created by satan himself.
It was later on in life that I found out that a true treife cheeseburger was hard to come by. For one thing the meat and cheese both had to be kosher in order to create the perfectly treife cheeseburger, because unbeknownst to my puny 15 year old self, bassar v’chalov the prohibition against deriving any benefit whatsoever from the combining of milk and meat meant that both products had to be kosher.
I of course started pondering about such trivial things as who considers what kosher. What about a Hebrew National hot dog with kosher cheese? What about Hebrew National products after they got the triangle-K hechsher which means someone must think they are kosher- would I violate the grave sin of mixing milk and meat? What about the ultra orthodox- would they even consider empire meat and cholav stam milk kosher- then they could probably eat loads of things and not they are succumbing to the yetzer harah himself.
I was never infatuated with the idea of meat and cheese, in fact the mere thought of certain meat and cheese combinations gross me out, especially the cheeseburger. I am appalled at melting yellow cheese with plastic derivatives- maybe the book Fast Food Nation grossed me out, but I am pretty sure that true treifus does not appeal to me. On the other hand, the $5.95 all you can eat bread and salad from Olive Garden is the ultimate nisayon. I also do recall buying the lunch special at a local treife Chinese restaurant during 8th and 9th grades because it was $4.95 for the whole thing. But cheeseburgers should have been substituted for the Rabbis points were never forked over to me.
Then a buddy of mine tells me about his breaking of a his cheeseburger virginity experience. He said that after years of hearing Rabbis proselytize against the evil cheeseburger he was as excited of a yeshiva guy getting his first porn magazine. He was giddy with excitement until he dived in and said he could not describe the disappointment. Like years of hopes and dreams being washed down the drain, the excitement gone and a half eaten gastrointestinal nightmare lying on the silver wax paper in dismay. All the sudden all of what the Rabbis of our yeshiva were discounted because they had obviously never tried a real cheeseburger.
38 responses so far ↓
1 A23 // Jun 15, 2008 at 8:23 pm
You can go for the trifecta by not washing for the bun.
2 abandoning eden // Jun 15, 2008 at 8:32 pm
I agree that plastic cheese and fast food burgers are not good. But a good burger with a good peice of provolone or sharp cheddar cheese on top is just … awesome
( I was going to say “heavenly” and then realized the irony!)
3 hadassah // Jun 15, 2008 at 8:53 pm
isnt treife supposedly pareve?
hesh - for us, the ultimate sin was not eating a cheeseburger, it was having a second button open on our blouse, that would lead to eternal damnation.
i wouldnt go for the cheeseburger - just doesnt tempt me, BUT oh the joy in feeling a breeze down the front of my shirt…….
4 Child Ish Behavior // Jun 15, 2008 at 8:53 pm
They railed against cheese burgers because of exactly the reason you posted. It represents the epitome of all the avairos that are done because of tieva. You think it is good until you actually experience the thing for yourself, and then it is realized to have been not worth it.
5 Anon. // Jun 15, 2008 at 10:06 pm
Are you really so naive to think you’re not having an effect, Hesh?
Someone that’s ch’v considering tearing themselves away from Hashem - do you think this will encourage teshuva?
6 Mikeinmidwood // Jun 15, 2008 at 10:17 pm
They do have fake cheese burgers these days with some sort of soy cheese
7 Anonymous // Jun 15, 2008 at 10:35 pm
Cheeseburgers wouldn’t do it for me but I *do* wonder sometimes how awesome Chicken Parmesan must be…..
8 s(b.) // Jun 16, 2008 at 1:05 am
You know how freakin’ right wing I am, right? I have to say, I disagree with this: “bassar v’chalov the prohibition against deriving any benefit whatsoever from the combining of milk and meat meant that both products had to be kosher.”
If you were being completely facetious, then please disregard, but it’s not like Johnny shochet was out shepherding with the dudes who would consider bathing kid goats in their mothers’ milk. Ergo, any cheeseburger/meat & dairy combo would be treif. This being one of those black and white things like death and pregnancy (and lots of other things related to Judaism).
This is coming from someone whose logic dictates that Wendy’s baked potato w/cheese = l’pesach (I never said it was kosher), so your rabbinic mileage may vary.
9 x // Jun 16, 2008 at 6:44 am
For those of us who grew up in the 50’s and 60’s this reminds me of the looooong awaited tasting of the Oreo cookie. It is mildly described as a disappointment (not very different from the Hydrox :&)
10 hadassah // Jun 16, 2008 at 7:33 am
oreos are still not kosher up here in canada
11 heshman // Jun 16, 2008 at 8:25 am
SB- I am just saying halacha- the product is still treife, but deriving benefit can mean you cannot heat your house with it, or donate it somewhere- or if you are a pyromaniac you cannot burn it.
12 Meira // Jun 16, 2008 at 9:04 am
I’ve gotta recommend the Morningstar Farms veggie burgers w/a slice of cheese. Yum! Better than an actualy cheeseburger if you ask me. (Of course this would not be for you chalav yisroel types…)
13 heimish in bp // Jun 16, 2008 at 9:12 am
YOU CHANGED THE NAME??????????
NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WHY DID YOU DO SOMTHING LIKE THAT??????????????
AND GOT RID OF THE WORD “FRUM”?
Hesh??
14 Hesh // Jun 16, 2008 at 9:15 am
I did not change the name- my web designer changed the name- and if I were to explain to you why we changed the name (because its all for search engine rankings) I would put you to sleep. I didn’t even notice it until you said something.
I am trying to rank on the first page for Jewish comedy- right now I am not even in the first 200 results of google- hence the name change. The blogs name is still frum satire.
15 KissMeI'mShomer // Jun 16, 2008 at 9:23 am
I always did wonder if boys’ yeshivos told them that girls were as evil as girls’ yeshivas tell us boys are… (Err… does that sentence make sense, exactly…?)
But in our school we were essentially told that boys were basically just out to have sex with us, willingly or otherwise… what do they say about us girls? That we tempt you to rape us?
16 heimish in bp // Jun 16, 2008 at 9:24 am
shew!!!!
you scared me.
17 KissMeI'mShomer // Jun 16, 2008 at 9:43 am
Gah, my post didn’t show up.
I apologize if it shows up later and I turn out to have a double post…
Anyway, I had tried to comment how I had always wondered if boys’ schools talked about how evil girls are since girls’ school talk about how how boys are evil and sex-obsessed.
Wonder what they say about us.
18 heimish in bp // Jun 16, 2008 at 10:05 am
Hesh, to be honest, I never new this halacha that you are not over bassar v’chalav if its not kosher. Thanks for teaching me something new. Do you by any chance have a source for that. would like to look it up and find out why.
Chesseburger never really appealed to me, however a fat philly cheese steak sandwich with carmilized onions and peppers, with hot cheese dripping from the sides, MMMMMMMMMMMMM, that makes me drool like crazy.
Also i do some cooking and alot of recipes call for cheese all the time, and milk and heavy cream for tenderizing the meat/chicken and its very annoying when you cant make a good recipe. I never use substitutes.
19 Shevers // Jun 16, 2008 at 10:11 am
Dude, cheeseburgers are delicious and taco bell. What I would give for a happy meal cheeseburger.
But I guess that’s only if you grew up eating it instead of placing it on a pedestal your whole childhood…
20 s(b.) // Jun 16, 2008 at 1:22 pm
in response to hesh, 8:25,
oh, okay; the only deriving benefit prohibition I’d ever heard of before was someone telling someone they couldn’t work at a not-kosher restaurant, ’cause they’d be making money from not-kosher food. Which I guess would mean very observant folks wouldn’t work at secular supermarkets or general merchandise retailers that sell food, either.
21 heshman // Jun 16, 2008 at 1:30 pm
I have heard that the issues of working in a non kosher restaurant have to do with serving Jews and moris eyin.
22 heimish in bp // Jun 16, 2008 at 1:45 pm
Hesh = Talmid Chacham
23 Nemo // Jun 16, 2008 at 1:57 pm
Always piping in with a little Halachik perspective …
Not every opinion holds that the meat and cheese has to be Kosher. The words used are “Basar Tehorah” and “Chalav Tehora.” Whether or not Tehorah (pure) means Kosher or just of a Kosher species is unclear. (see Yoreh Deya 97:2)
Eating Ham and Cheese (the Reform variant of the “ultimate Yetzer Hora”) would not technically be a Basar B’Chalav transgression because swine is definitely not a Kosher species.
Eating non-Kosher beef with milk from a Kosher species of animal, can - according to the strict opinion above - be a violation. Furthermore, if the milk was from those Kosher species but the cheese was curdled with non-Kosher rennet, it would still categorically be “Tehora.”
So basically it’s really not that easy to get away with the Basar B’Chalav restriction. Unless … unless you don’t mind breaking a few D’Rabbanans, in which case you just have to be careful how you make your cheese burger: don’t melt the cheese over heat or try nuking it.
—-
On a personal note, even in my most heretical of thoughts, I’ve been repulsed by the thought of anything that came from a pig; it just seems so filthy and grub. And as far as shellfish and other creepy crawlers from the sea … EWW, that’s like eating full-grown insects.
24 Nemo // Jun 16, 2008 at 2:01 pm
Hesh-
Basar B’Chalav has three separate prohibitions:
1. eating
2. deriving benefit
3. cooking it
Flipping burgers at MKD’s would mean cooking and therefore it’s a big no-no.
25 s(b.) // Jun 16, 2008 at 2:11 pm
thanks, nemo.
26 heshman // Jun 16, 2008 at 2:25 pm
Thank you for that Nemo- I was waiting for a halachic discourse on the subject.
I agree with you- pigs and swimming cockroaches don’t do it for me. The smell of frying bacon makes me want to puke.
27 Anita // Jun 16, 2008 at 5:22 pm
There are worse things than a cheeseburger, such as the Ham and Cheese sandwhich, which happens to be the sandwhich al Rabbi’s are convinced are being cut by the Mexicans with the knife that is used at ur local non-kosher fruit store to cut watermelons.
Anyway… I don’t understand the hype behind the cheeseburger. Before I became frum I hated them. And I agree with Hadassah, the ultimate sin for us girls is the second button on the blouse. Hehe
28 Toronto Yid // Jun 17, 2008 at 6:53 pm
So I guess ultimate aveira is:
Kosher ingredients cheeseburger eaten on Yom Kippur without washing for the bun!
29 heshman // Jun 17, 2008 at 7:10 pm
While having an extramarital affair in front of an idol.
30 Toronto Yid // Jun 17, 2008 at 9:13 pm
And not benching afterwards . .
31 s(b.) // Jun 17, 2008 at 9:48 pm
then speaking ill of the person with whom you had the affair
32 Stacy // Jun 17, 2008 at 10:46 pm
sorry to break the thread but i’d take a Pop-tart over a cheeseburger any day.
33 JDMDad // Jun 18, 2008 at 7:51 pm
Since I grew up not keeping kosher, I have to comment on a few of the comments… I don’t know what the other person’s disappointment was with the cheeseburger, maybe it was the pedestal concept Shevers mentioned. Breaking the cheeseburger habit was the hardest one for me. The soy cheese? Not even close. I just don’t do it any more, period. I’ve adjusted to plain hamburgers.
Anonymous // Jun 15, 2008 at 10:35 pm mentioned Chicken Parmesan. I didn’t have that as often as cheeseburgers, but yeah, I really miss that.
Stacy, there’s something that’s like pop-tarts, I can’t remember the name off hand, but it’s in the organic section of my local supermarket. They carry a hescher from Canada (COR). They have strawberry, chocolate, cinnamon, etc. (Frosted and unfrosted)
And since I worked at Wendy’s during my high school years, I’m sure I served plenty of non-kosher food to other non-observant Jews.
Now that I’ve been kosher for a few years, my wife (kosher all her life) asks me if I miss any foods. Well, yes, I do, but not to the degree that I’m drooling every time I pass a non-kosher restaurant and smell some of my old favorites. That’s what I was afraid would happen when I first started. I guess my body accepted it and moved on.
34 heshman // Jun 19, 2008 at 9:21 am
My buddy tells me he misses “real” chicken wings with blue cheese sauce and that Jews have no idea how to make chicken wings.
JDM its the pedestal that the Rabbis created for the cheeseburger, in my mind they could have done it with anything- well actually evil girls were pretty good once I left high school and got into college.
35 Shevers // Jun 19, 2008 at 10:26 am
Everytime I walk past Taco Bell or my old favorite Japanese restaurant, it’s painful!
36 On Her Own // Jun 20, 2008 at 11:17 am
Funny - I recently wrote a post lamenting my simultaneous temptation and inability to cross the “cheeseburger line:”
http://findingherpath.blogspot.com/2008/05/for-last-few-days.html
It really is such a symbol of treif, even if it’s not as treif as treif can be.
37 Marcos // Jan 1, 2009 at 12:10 pm
I only had one cheeseburger in my life. I was 5 and with my babysitter. It was from McDies and I remember the disappointment eating it and knowing it didn’t taste good or feel right.
One of my few memories from the age of 5.
38 LonelyMan // Jan 1, 2009 at 7:08 pm
Everyone speaking ill of cheeseburgers hasn’t been to California and tried In-N’-Out. McDonalds cheeseburgers are garbage. Since I became observant (and even on the downhill fall,) that is the one thing I truly miss when keeping Kosher. If I wanted to hit the cheeseburger message home, I’d put my Yeshiva near an In-N’-Out. The smell of burning rubbery meat from McDonalds just doesn’t excite enough.
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