[Avodah] Do you ever recite Birkas Hamazon on crackers?

[Akiva Miller via Avodah]

R' Yitzchok Levine posted:

>From today's OU Halacha Yomis
>
> Q: Do you ever recite Birkas Hamazon on crackers?

The simple answer is: Yes, many people do, especially when Erev Pesach is
on Shabbos, and they choose to use Matzah Ashira for their Lechem Mishneh.

> A: The Gemara (Brachos 42) states that if one eats an entire meal
> of an item that is considered "pas haba'ah b'kisnin" (see earlier
> Halacha Yomis for explanation of that term), the bracha on that
> food (e.g. crackers) would be Hamotzi and one would recite Birkas
> Hamazon. The Magen Avraham (O.C. 168:24) clarifies that one would
> say Hamotzi in the following two instances: 1) If one ate only
> crackers, and consumed an amount that would suffice as a main meal
> (such as dinner) for an average person. 2) Alternatively, if one
> ate other foods (for example, herring along with the crackers),
> and together these foods are a full meal, one would recite Birkas
> Hamazon. Rav Moshe Feinstein (Igros Moshe O.C. 3:32) states that
> in the latter case, one must consume the amount of crackers
> equivalent to the normal amount of bread eaten at a meal.
> According to Rav Belsky, this would be equivalent to two slices
> of bread.

I recommend seeing that Igros Moshe inside. It's only a half-page long (the
last two paragraphs are on related topics).

Rav Moshe explains the nowadays, "in this country," people eat much less
bread than before, and the shiur is much less than three beitzim.
Therefore, he gives this example: If someone is at a wedding and doesn't
want to wash and have to wait for the zimun, he should avoid eating any
cake, "for if he eats even a little cake, sometimes it will be the shiur of
'how much bread one eats at a seudah'. ... And therefore, in this country,
where because we have so much, people eat only a little bread, one should
not eat cake unless it is less than the bread one eats at a meal of meat
and other things. And when it is difficult for him to measure this, then he
should not eat cake."

It seems that unlike Rav Belsky, Rav Moshe seems to have specifically
avoided giving a specific shiur. And with all due respect to Rav Belsky, I
have often seen people at the Shabbos table eat no more bread than a bite
or two of their lechem mishneh slice. Rav Moshe referred to this country as
bountiful, with so much to eat beside bread that it is no longer the staple
of our diet. It seems to me that in the decades since he wrote that, our
society has gone even further, and bread is seen as a food to be eaten in
limited amounts for health reasons. This could easily impact one's
determination of how much is typically eaten at a meal.

On the other hand, it also seems to me that Rav Moshe's opinion on this is
not generally accepted by most people. I often see people at a kiddush
eating all sorts of food indiscriminately, and it is not unusual for them
to be sated by this to the point where they choose to delay lunch for a
while. And if it was a particularly sumptuous kiddush, they might skip
lunch altogether. Sometimes I hear them ask a question of whether it is
okay to skip the Seudah Shniyah in such a case, but I never hear them ask
if they should have washed and benched at the kiddush.

My personal practice at a kiddush is to first survey the tables for some
noodle kugel or pasta salad that I can use for Kiddush B'makom Seudah, in
which case I'll allow myself free rein of the other foods (including even
some Pas Habaah B'Kisnin, though I ration it to less than a kezayis per
keday achilas pras). If the only mezonos at the kiddush is Pas Habaah
B'Kisnin, then I limit myself to only a few kezaysim of it, plus some snack
foods (chips, nuts, popcorn, candy), but absolutely no meal foods like
cholent, tuna, or potato kugel, because that could make my eating into the
sort that Rav Moshe would label as Kevius Seudah. For example, see the very
last paragraph of Igros Moshe OC 4:41, where he specifically writes that
"one should eat only the baked items, or only meat and fish and other
items."

Akiva Miller
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avodah-aishdas.org/attachments/20160915/4c807641/attachment-0008.html>