Making Menena for Purim

Our Edot class has recently completed its unit of study about the Iraqi Jews, the very first Edah.  We began by studying the history of the Babylonian Jews, going back to King Nebuchadnezzar's conquest of the Kingdom of Judah and destruction of the first Temple in Jerusalem in the year 586 B.C.E., when he forced the elite of Judah's society - its craftsmen, political and religious leaders - into exile in his capital city of Babylon. We learned about how the Prophet Jeremiah advised the exiles to "...seek the welfare of the community in  which you live, for in their welfare you will find your welfare." (Jeremiah 29:7) We learned how over the ensuing centuries, the Babylonian Jewish community thrived, how they became famous for their institutions of Jewish learning known as "yeshivot," and even had a chance to study a page of the Babylonian Talmud relating to when the "Sh'ma" prayer should be said in the morning. The Edot students were introduced to the basic beliefs of Islam, and to the culture it nurtured in the Middle East and North Africa. We learned how by the mid-8th century C.E., 9 out of 10 Jews lived in Muslim-ruled lands, and it was thus not very surprising that Jews should have borrowed elements of Muslim art, cuisine, music, dance, and literature.  We learned how to make the Muslim amulet, the Chamsa, out of copper foil, and finally, last week, we prepared "Menena" in class - the Iraqi Jewish name for the Arabic pastry called "Ma'amoul".  These are "tartlets" filled with crushed nuts or date fillings (we used date filling, since our school is a nut-free zone!).  Our timing was perfect, since Menena pastries are popularly used by Iraqi Jews to fill their "Shalo'ach Manot" Purim baskets, and we were just a week away from celebrating the Purim holiday.

Preparing food, especially tasty desserts, is always fun, and our "Menena" activity was no exception. To prepare the pastry, you have to shape a walnut-sized piece of dough into a small cup, with very thin walls. This is easy for an experienced baker, but this didn't keep our "baker's apprentices" from having fun trying to come as close as they could to preparing the dough to put in the date filling.  A lot of interesting shapes resulted and the end results were very tasty!  We even had some mixing of the Jewish cultures, when a few Iraqi menena's came out looking very very similar to Ashkenazi hamantaschen!

Chag Purim Sameach!  (Happy Purim Holiday!)