This week we start a new book of the Torah - in Hebrew it's Bamidbar, in the desert, which is an apt description. Though in English the name is Numbers, which sure feels right for the first part of this parsha....so many numbers about the census. Also, the taking of the census both begins and ends this book of the Torah, so it's a fitting name for the whole section. I thought about a recipe with a lot of numbers, but that didn't seem so fun to cook. So, how about the Hebrew

One of the most powerful, and often overlooked, leadership moves is simply connecting people to each other. As the leader, it's all too easy to become the hub through which everything flows: questions come to you, ideas come to you, updates come to you. It's an inefficient and exhausting way to run an organization. Leadership rooted in Yesod, foundation/connection, says that instead of holding all the threads, you start tying them together. In practice, it can be as simple as

I've said it before and I'll say it again...some weeks the #parshainspiredmenus ideas are really direct lines to ideas in the parsha and sometimes I go a more circuitous route. This week, admittedly, it's circuitous. In Behar, there's a lot of talk about the shmeitah year (every 7th year) and the Yovel (the 50th year). The Yovel, or Jubilee, is particularly special, coming on the 50th year in the cycle when, like the shemitah year, the land rests, but also land returns to it'

One of my favorite Jewish leadership stories is about Moshe. In Bamidbar there is this pasuk about Moshe's character: “Moshe was extremely humble, more so than any other person on the face of the earth.” Moshe, the greatest leader of the Jewish people...Moshe, who beat Pharoah...Moshe, through whom miracles were perfomed...Moshe, who talks directly with God. How could he be the most humble? Well, it is all about how you understand humility. You can consider humility in terms

This parsha is sometimes called Torat Kohanim - Law of the Priests - because of the extensive set of laws given that pertain just to the priests. The priests have a special responsibility among the Jewish people and, as part and parcel of that, comes particular restrictions and requirements. One of the things I noted is the qualifier in the first pasuk of the parsha, "Speak to the priests, the sons of Aaron." This unique group is passed down through the family line of Aaron.

The 4th week of the Omer is associated with Kabbalistic sphere of Netzach, which is often translated as fortitude or endurance. Interestingly, the first thing that came to mind regarding endurance was about the persistance, resilience, and stick-to-it-iveness of athletes. I guess those sports equipment ads really sunk in. Yet, endurance is a key part of good leadership of all kinds. A leader needs to show persistance, resilience and stick-to-it-tiveness to keep an organzation

"Inconceivable!" If you're around my age, this word probably brings to mind the movie, The Princess Bride . While not a direct quote of the commentators on a pasuk in this week's Torah portion, it's pretty close. Here's what happens: וּבָ֤א אַהֲרֹן֙ אֶל־אֹ֣הֶל מוֹעֵ֔ד וּפָשַׁט֙ אֶת־בִּגְדֵ֣י הַבָּ֔ד אֲשֶׁ֥ר לָבַ֖שׁ בְּבֹא֣וֹ אֶל־הַקֹּ֑דֶשׁ וְהִנִּיחָ֖ם שָֽׁם׃ And Aaron shall go into the Tent of Meeting, take off the linen vestments that he put on when he entered the Shrine,

I hope you had a chance to read the first installment in this Omer, Kabbalah and Leadership series, which explored leadership lessons from the sefirot of Chesed and Gevurah. As we move into week 3 of the Omer, we turn to the sefirah of Tiferet. Tiferet is associated with harmony and balance, in part due to its location on the mystical “Tree of Life” depiction. My dear friend, Dr. Rachel Barbanel-Fried, shared a framing for the concept of balance that really struck a chord wit

I'm getting this posted a little late this week. It wasn't even because it took me awhile to come up with ideas because I was done with the ideas by the end of Shabbat mincha last week! I just didn't get to write it out to share. Luckily, neither of these are particularly involved recipes, so they should still be easy to make. With our double parsha this week, my plan is to do one food per parsha. Of course, the major theme of Tazria is tzarat, this physical manifestation of

About 300 - 400 years ago, the Kabbalists added a new dimension to the period of the Omer - the 49 day period between the 2nd night of Passover and Shavuot. They matched each day to one of the 49 aspects of personality, derived from the interaction of the lower 7 sefirot. (Check out this article from My Jewish Learning for a good explanation more deeply into the sefirot.) As I was counting the Omer on yom tov, an idea came to me: each week holds a leadership lens. So I’m sh

The laws of kashrut originate in the Torah, though what we practice in our current lives is a lot more involved and detailed than the relatively sparse verses in the Torah. What takes 1 pasuk in the Torah - " You shall not boil a kid in its mother's milk" - becomes pages and pages and pages of rabbinic interpretation. Nonetheless, the practices we follow today have direct links to passages in the Torah a nd in our Torah reading this week we have one of the more comprehensive

I know we're getting close to Passover and about 90% of the "Menu" part of my brain is on seder and the days that follow, Shabbat is still coming and there's a parsha to inspire, so here we go! In this week's parsha, there's a lot of talk about the sacrifices (I know I could say that for a lot of weeks!) This week, in particular, there's a lot of information about the sacrifices (the what and the how) for the Tabernacle andAaron and his sons. After consecrating the Tabernacl

And so we begin another book of the Torah, the one which some (including a son of mine who will remain anonymous) think of as the most boring book....so many sacrifices, repetition, not a lot of action, but as we often say, when you look deeply you can always find something interesting. This week I have two examples of that phenomenon. The first comes courtesy of our cantor's shiur this past Saturday afternoon. We focused on the "mincha" offering, which is the offering of gra

This week I got some great inspiration for the #parshainspirdmenus plans from family members - my husband and our youngest son. Our son read though Vayakhel and noticed that the Israelites were uber-generous in their giving of materials to help build the mishkan. He thought it might be reflective of the Israelites seeing it as an opportunity to make up for the sin of the Golden Calf. If jewelry was given to make the Golden Calf, how much more so should they give lots of mater

A smoothie is one of my "go to" breakfast nowadays. I usually use banana, and maybe add in some berries, yogurt, maybe some almond powder...today I actually made it with mango and pineapple so it was very yellow, which reminded me of the element of the parsha that our youngest son called out to when we were discussing what to do this week. He remembered learning this parsha last year in his Tanach class and he laughed thinking about the "Egel Hazahav smoothie." So, what's a E

In the early years of having my own apartment and kitchen I used to get Cooks Illustrated. We loved hearing the mystery style articles of how the chefs came up with the best version of a beef stew, or chocolate chip cookies, or roasted green beans. We loved the kitchen hacks shared by readers. And we loved the sketchings and descriptions of foods done without color photos. I recently saw a Cooks Illustrated magazine in the "impulse" section of the supermarket and, well, acte

Several years ago I created a class on the waves of aliyah to Israel. I've had the chance to teach it several times and one part I always enjoy is discussing the amazing nature of the "ingathering" of Jews from all over the world to Israel. Some had an easier road getting there than others (thought A LOT of olim had hard roads.) As Israel got stronger, the country was able to help bring people to Israel. I LOVE that these operations were given names that referenced Torah, inc

It's not often that I see this notation in Sefaria and this footnote says " * armed Meaning of Heb. ḥamushim uncertain." There are certainly other words that have been translated differently, depending on the commentator or translation, but it means that this word is particularly in question. Is it armed as in with weapons? That would make sense later when they fight with Amalek. It could mean arms laden with the gifts from the Egyptians. This would also make sense later when

With the last 3 of the plagues in this week's parsha you could, once again, do food that plays off of the plagues, but I am always looking for something new so I came up with two new ideas of foods inspired by something that stood out in the parsha. The first comes from the back and forth with Moshe and Pharoah. I actually first noticed this last week. When Moshe comes to Pharoah, the "ask" is to let the people go so that they may worship God in the wilderness. Pharoah refuse

About 8 years ago I added some fun to our seder to entertain our boys and our guests by having an edible representation of each one of the 10 plagues...red jello in a wavy dish for the Nile turning to blood, gummy frogs, non-pareils for boils, and so on. You could definitely do something like that for this week's Parsha Inspired Menus, since we get the story of the first 5 plagues in this week's parsha. However, I wanted to focus on two interesting details that took me a diff