Hafrashas Challah - Spaghetti

QUESTION: I make my own spaghetti. I make a 5 lb. batch of dough, extrude it through a pasta press into thin spaghetti strips and then boil them. Am I obligated to take challah from this dough?

ANSWER: According to Shulchan Aruch (YD 329:3), dough that is made to be boiled (and not baked) and is in fact boiled is exempt from challah. As such, one is not obligated to take challah from spaghetti or any pasta product. Rabbeinu Tam, however, maintains that dough that is made to be boiled is obligated in Challah. The Shach (Yoreh De’ah 329:4) recommends that one should separate Challah without a beracha because this is a matter of dispute. Seemingly, this stringency would apply to spaghetti as well.

However, Pischei Teshuva (YD 329:1) notes that poskim dispute whether pasta is exempt from challah even according to Rabbeinu Tam. The lenient view maintains that pasta is exempt because it lacks tzuras hapas (appearance of bread). Rav Chaim Kanievsky (Derech Emunah – Bikurim 6:12) writes that the Chazon Ish favored the lenient opinion that spaghetti is exempt from hafrashas challah even according to Rabbeinu Tam, and this is the common practice.

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The Gerald & Karin Feldhamer OU Kosher Halacha Yomis is dedicated to the memory of Rav Yisroel Belsky, zt"l, who served as halachic consultant for OU Kosher for more than 28 years; many of the responses in Halacha Yomis are based on the rulings of Rabbi Belsky. Subscribe to the Halacha Yomis daily email here.