The following nine days are a designated mourning period for traditional Jews. During this period it is customary not to eat meat, which was considered a luxury, and to eat fish instead. Making meals for the “nine days” is a challenge. Putting together menus and staying within a regular budget is not easy. So running a soup kitchen which feeds close to 500 meals a night makes the “nine days” a very expensive proposition. Finding an alternative to chicken, which in our society has become the cheapest protein, is challenging.
Here comes family-owned fish distributor “Dagim,” the most trusted name in the Kosher fish market in the last 50 years, that carries a large variety of fish products, from canned sardines to fresh Tuna filets. To ease the burden on Masbia, Dagim will donate 2,500 portions of a variety of fish to the soup kitchen so they can feed the hungry. As the only Kosher soup Kitchen, Masbia takes it upon itself to offer a hot dinner for everyone in need, especially during the nine days of mourning when the needy find it harder to feed themselves.
“In the name of all the men, women and children who eat at our four sites every night, I am extremely grateful to Dagim for their generous donation,” said Alexander Rapaport, executive director of Masbia. “We always try to give our patrons the best, and Dagim is the best in quality, the best in Kashrus, and the best in taste. When Dagim does a good deed, they go full out.”
{Noam Amdurski-Matzav.com Newscenter}
“not to eat meat, which was considered a luxury”
For a very large sector of the Jewish population meat is *still* considered a luxury. The costs of kosher shechita and hashgacha are crippling to lower income groups, or to large fammilies.