Home Matzoh Baking In Borough Park

"My father used to make matzo in our home," Brauner said, recalling his childhood in rural Hungary. "So let me do what my father used to do."

 

Orthodox Borough Park family continues tradition of matzo-making with backyard bakery
Mike Mclaughlin • DAILY NEWS WRITER

A Borough Park man has an unorthodox style of preparing for Passover - a backyard bakery.

Zecheriah Brauner, 89, fires up a huge outdoor oven once a year to make matzo for the Jewish holiday, which starts this Monday.

"My father used to make matzo in our home," Brauner said, recalling his childhood in rural Hungary. "So let me do what my father used to do."

A retired baker, Brauner began the tradition of cooking the thin, crispy wafers in his backyard 20 years ago, and it now feeds more than 150 relatives and neighbors.

While the flattened bread is cooked the day before Passover begins, setting up a full-fledged kosher kitchen outside Brauner's 54th St. home takes a week.

"It looks like any other driveway the rest of the year," said Sandy Brauner, 21, one of Zecheriah's 102 grandchildren. "It takes a lot of work."

Kosher rules forbid sunlight from shining on the dough, so Sandy rigs a high canopy and wooden walls that block out rays.

Then they build the stations for mixing flour and water, flattening the dough, and rolling it into discs.

A wood- and coal-burning oven sits in a shed and bakes the matzos in under a minute.

Over the afternoon, it churns out hundreds of them for family and friends who flock to the house and serve them at Seder - the feast on the first two nights of Passover.

From start to finish, each batch takes exactly 18 minutes and is done under the supervision of a rabbi from the ultra-Orthodox community.

"Every half step is written out on how to make it," said Alexander Rapaport, 33, another grandson of Brauner.

The retired baker can't easily move around the makeshift bakery anymore, but he still starts the ceremonial mixing of flour and water - the only ingredients in matzo.

Luckily, help is nearby. The family calls 54th St. "Brauner's block," because relatives live in eight other houses on the street.

Groups of 30 men and boys aged 13 and up work in shifts on a matzo assembly line.

"It gives you a different emotional feeling to eat matzo that you made yourself," said Yosef Rapaport, 56, Brauner's son-in-law.

"Everyone has a chore. The grandchildren run around trying to help," he said.

Most people in the ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighborhood stock up on matzos at bakeries or synagogues.

Rabbi William Handler, who lives in the neighborhood, tipped his hat to the family for keeping the tradition alive.

"It's the way it used to be done in Europe," said Handler. "It's an expense and requires expertise. Somebody has to really want to do it to set that up."

Unfortunately, Zecheriah Brauner is apparently the grandfather father of pedophile Jerry Yechiel Brauner.

[Hat Tip: Burich.]

Comments

[DBSesq]

Unfortunately, Zecheriah Brauner is apparently the grandfather of pedophile Jerry Yechiel Brauner.
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It's crap like that above that makes people so angry about this site. The old man didn't molest anyone. He's committed no crime. All he does is bake "matzos mitzvah" the way his father did in Hungary. Why do you need to rub his nose in his grandson's misdeeds?

[Loshon Hora]

That is a grandson not a son?

[Critical minyan]

A feel good story about jewish tradition. Ironically, that's what the molester used to tell his victims b4 he touched them.

[Deremes]

Thanks,that is so sweet of you informing us who's grandfather he is.

The man is 89 years.
He went through a Holocaust,all his life helped out poor families never hurt a fly and you cant resist throwing in that he is closely related to JB.
Oh, you throw in the word "Unfortunately".thanks

[Critical minyan]

Headline should have been, "charedi molestors zaide runs illegal, matzoh bakery without permit".

[jewishwhistleblower]

Take it easy Danny Boy.

You may have Brauner confused with confessed/convicted pedophile Rabbi Lewis (Lipa) Brenner. Don't worry. Rabbi Jerry Yechiel Brauner is not part of your colleague and alleged pedophile, Rabbi Ephraim Boruch Bryks' extended family.

And since when are you "people" let alone a person? You sit at dinei Torah with alleged pedophile Bryks, sometimes on the same side of the table.

And you get angry at this?

[Gevezener Chusid]

JWB: Jerry Yechiel Brauner is a registered sex offender and is indeed Zechariah's son (not grandson), but as the other poster said, what difference does it make? The sins of the sons are not visited upon the fathers. Not to mention the fact that anyone who has ever met Jerry can see at a glance that he is a few fries short of a happy meal.

[baruch]

Thank you FM for this touching human interest article. How sweet that some souls still cling to the ways of their fathers and are self reliant, eschewing the pay-for-someone else-to-do-it-for-me attitude with all it's attendant ills, e.g. questions of kashrus, price gouging and so forth. And now, with your newly acquired fame on FM and the local papers, get ready for unexpected and unwelcome Pesach visitors, i.e., the departments of police, fire, health, taxation and child welfare. Thank you FM for this human interest piece. I have just one question for FM: Is that a Pavlovian anticipatory drool sliding down your chin? One just shivers at the thought of the havoc this might wreak.

[A Yid]

Unfortunately, Zecheriah Brauner is apparently the grandfather father of pedophile Jerry Yechiel Brauner.

Scott Shmaryah Rosenberg is apparently a grandson of one Leo Gleckman also known as the Al Capone of S. Paul.:
http://benatlas.com/2011/01/shmarya-rosenbergs-grandfather-killed-himself-rather-than-face-federal-sentence/
Seriously though Shmaryah can Zecheriah Braune be held responsible for his sons or grandsons sins (and btw he has 101 grandsons as pointed in the article)anymore than you are responsible for your grandfather's sins? And if not why mention it?
It sounds almost Stalinist. Under Stalin there were laws discriminating against the relatives of the so called "enemies of the people" . Is that where you got this bright idea from to mention persons relatives when there is really on connection to the topic?

[seymour]

my grandfather used to go to shul on the weekday with a horse and buggy I will do that to to keep up with the old ways

[A. Nuran]

He's not responsible for what his adult descendants do, Shmarya. This is completely irrelevant to the story.

The guy is doing something good. It's a positive, useful community-building event that helps Jews perform a mitzvah together.

[Dave]

It was a beautiful story that was told. Traditions like those, need to be maintained. Why should it bother you to hear that his son is a registered pedophile? Doesn't every family in the cult community have one in theirs? It's not his fault of course, these mutants are created because of cousins marrying cousins, etc., that cause all kinds of physical and mental defects. The Heredi's have THE highest incidence of pedophilia in their extended family than any other group on this Planet. Can't take the truth?

[marrtin nerl]

dave, where are you getting your facts? the highest incidence of pedaophilia? is your source THIS website?

[yechiel brauner]

why didnt jerry brauner go into JAIL ??

[Moish the spacedout BT]

If Brauner's becomes in any way competitive with the local matzo bakeries be sure someone will "complain" and mosser him to the Dept of Health.