Gelt at Hanukkah

Of the many images of the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah a few stand out as especially symbolic. The menorah with its brightly burning candles, the irresistible smell of frying potato pancakes or latkes and who can forget those foil wrapped Hanukkah coins now referred to as “gelt“.

But how did the concept of gelt come about?

Well, that’s where it gets a bit cloudy. Common belief is that the practice of giving small amounts of money, called gelt in Yiddish, began at the time of the Maccabees when special coins were minted to symbolize their newfound freedom. Another theory is that in the 18th century in Eastern Europe a tradition started of recognizing teachers will small amounts of gelt around Hanukkah time as an appreciation of their teachings. Over the years, the tradition moved from teachers to students as a means of recognition for their studies and as an incentive to learn more about the history of the holiday.

In America, Hanukkah was not a widely celebrated holiday until the early 20th century. At that time Hanukkah began to flourish among American jews, becoming a major holiday coinciding with the secular celebration of Christmas.

American chocolate manufacturers, looking to capitalize on the growing popularity of the holiday began manufacturing gold and silver foil wrapped chocolate coins in the 1920’s. It wasn’t long before netted pouches of these shiny foiled discs became ubiquitous with Hanukkah itself.

Traditional imagery was often used on the coins including the menorah, Star of David, or the four Hebrew letters present on the small top known as a dreidel.

Unfortunately these early coins were nicer to look at than to eat. Manufactured with low-grade chocolate and paraffin wax to prevent melting, they didn’t taste much different than chomping on a menorah candle.

Nowadays, the caliber of Hanukkah gelt has evolved through the use of high-quality cocoa beans, more refined fats and better milk powders. The designs have also evolved into modern times. You can still get the traditional imagery of the menorah, dreidel and Star of David…but modern twists like “Oy to the World”, “Happy Challah Days” and “Jews Do It for Eight Days” add a whimsical touch to the Festival of Lights.

While the allure of fresh out of the griddle potato latkes is pretty alluring, with kids there’s no disputing the fact – Gelt talks.

Think of Halloween and your mind immediately goes to kids in Avengers costumes going door-to-door in pursuit of a scrumptious chocolate treat. Anything but the big orange peanut.

But the history of Halloween is a far cry from today’s modern celebration.

Halloween began as a religious holiday in the Middle Ages when it was called All Souls Day. On this deeply secular day, christians would go from village to village begging for “soul cake” in return for offering a prayer to the dead of the families they visited. Quite a difference from today’s experience of “give me a Kit Kat or I’ll egg your cat.”

The practice of children dressing up in costumes and going to door to door is a relatively modern one. It began in the late 1930’s and it wasn’t until the 1940’s that the present concept of Halloween became widespread in the U.S. Even then, candy wasn’t the definitive treat. As a matter of fact, the focus then was more on the “trick” than the “treat”. It was the one night of the year when kids’ (mostly young boys’) pranks were tolerated. The point was to be mischievous, not to collect treats.

In the 40’s and ’50’s doorbell-ringing ghosts and goblins were as likely to receive cookies, coins, nuts or small toys as they were to get candy.

During the late 1950’s candy manufacturers saw the rising popularity of Halloween and capitalized on the opportunity to expand their offerings. While Easter and Christmas had long been major holidays for the candy industry, Halloween’s growth gave them another rapidly rising demand for small, affordable candies. During this time, it became more and more expected that the handouts would be candy, culminating in the 1970’s when it became THE definitive Halloween treat.

Nowadays, Halloween doesn’t have any of the original religious connotations that were the impetus for the holiday in the first place. Instead, it’s morphed into a night of fun-size Snickers gobbled down by precocious tots dressed as Thor and Lady Gaga. I hear they’re dating actually.