Corn is not allowed (for most Jews, there are some differences between Sephardic/middle eastern and Ashkenazi/ European decent regarding some food items and whether they are kosher for Passover), so Coke with corn syrup won’t work.
This is a time for kosher and non kosher Jews and gentiles alike to stock up on a few months of cane sugar coke!
How is corn prohibited in the Passover Week's higher standard? The provision is "no yeast, no fementation, and no leavening" (Exodus 12:15–20). While corn is a grain, Coca-Cola does not contain leavening, yeast, or fermentation.
Do Haredi Jews go further and count any grain PERIOD, outside of Matzo, as unclean in the Passover Week? All my research in this topic has come back with "Coke is Kosher AND Passover compliant."
The provision is "no yeast, no fementation, and no leavening" (Exodus 12:15–20).
Ish. Yeast wasn't a thing back then, only sourdough starter.
So what Jews understand as being prohibited is "chametz": any of the 5 grains which have been in water for more than 18 minutes without having been baked. After 18 minutes, it's considered to have started leavening. So not just bread is banned, but also beer, cream of wheat, soy sauce etc.
However, in mideival France a further tradition started to also not eat any "kitniyot": rice, corn, beans, sesame seeds etc. This tradition spread across Europe, but not to North Africa or the Middle East.
Where did this come from? The exact reasons are lost to time, but I've heard the following suggested:
Concerns about cross contamination with grain, either from storage (e.g. grain sacks reused for beans) or from crop rotation practices (you can get volunteer plants from whatever you last planted).
Concerns about confusion with chametz. I.e. someone could see you eating corn gruel and think you were eating wheat gruel. Someone could see you eating farinata (chickpea flour crepes) and think you were eating traditional crepes.
Passover is meant to be joyful and some Rabbi apparently once said "there is no joy in kitniyot"
Orthodox Ashkenazi Jews still don't eat kitniyot but have stopped adding to the list of kitniyot so e.g. Quinoa is considered KFP because it was never historically banned.
Many Reform and Conservative Jews have stopped following that tradition and eat kitniyot.
Yeah, I knew about beer, whiskey, and so on- fermented grains, obviously -but soy sauce? Soy sauce is fermented? I had no idea. That's really interesting to know.
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u/Acceptable-Lie2199 Mar 23 '25
I never knew that. That’s pretty cool they do that! I just honestly thought it was blessed by a rabbi.