Hot on the heels of the record breaking thirty-five feet long challah, Brooklyn’s Strauss Bakery has been involved in producing another oversized Jewish bake.

Last weekend, the kosher bakery provided oven space for a huge kosher hamantasch. The giant Purim treat was created to launch a fundraising drive for Masbia — a kosher soup kitchen and food bank — which hopes to harness the spirit of giving that is part of Purim.

The triangular treat weighs in at fifty pounds (which converts to three and a half stones or twenty-two and a half kilos) and is nearly four feet long — roughly equivalent to the weight of an average six-year-old.

The New York Jewish Week reported that the oversized cookie, filled with apricot jam was unveiled at the Congregation Orach Chaim on the city’s Upper East Side on Sunday.
The charity hoped the headline-grabbing hamantasch would raise profile for their Hamantaschen for Hunger Initiative via which they hope to raise money for needy New Yorkers through selling gourmet hamantaschen in the run up to Purim.

Unveiled at New York's Congregation Orach Chaim Photo: Masiba Soup Kitchen

For every tray purchased online via the initiative’s website, Strauss bakery will be donating fifty percent of the proceeds to Masbia. The biscuits – which are parev — will be available in a range of flavours including apple cobbler, passion fruit, Oreo, s’mores and espresso.

Masbia was founded as a grass roots charity in 2005 by Mordechai Mandelbaum and Alexander Rapaport to provide free kosher meals in Brooklyn. Over the years they have opened a second kitchen in Brooklyn and a third, in Queens, and now provide more than two millions meals each year.

Rapaport told the New York Jewish week that since 7th October, many Jewish philanthropists have turned their focus towards Israel which has left local charities struggling.

“I’m pretty sure we’re not the only American charity that’s suffering — we are barely keeping our lights open. That’s how dry it is. We are hoping the situation will get better in Israel and hopefully with the fundraising season coming up with the Purim and Pesach, that it’ll give us some breathing room because we’re really feeling it.”

Readers based outside New York state now craving hamantaschen can find a few of the JC’s favourites here.