This Halacha is an excerpt from our Sefer
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Chametz is defined as foods which contain any one of the five grains [wheat, barley; rye, spelt, oat] which have leavened. When these grains, or their flour derivatives, come into contact with water or water derivatives, they become leaven after remaining with the water unworked on for 18/24 minutes. When the grains or flour have leavened it is defined as Chametz. If one adds 100% fruit juice, without any water, into the flour, then the dough cannot become Chametz, even if the dough rises and remains un-worked for over 18 minutes. However, according to all, if the fruit juice is mixed with even a minute amount of water, then the dough can become instant Chametz, in even less than 18 minutes.
List of Chametz foods:
- Bread
- Beer
- Bulgur
- Cereal extract
- Couscous
- Cookies
- Crackers
- Cracker meal
- Flour of wheat, barley, oats, spelt or rye
- Farina
- Fu
- Gluten
- Kamet
- Malt or malt extract
- Pasta
- Pita
- Seitan
- Semolina
- Tabbouleh
- Triticale
- Triticum
- Wheatgrass
- Whisky
List of products and trace ingredients that may contain or be produced from Chametz, as given by the AAFA Allergy Foundation:
Artificial flavoring, natural flavoring; Caramel color, Dextrin; Food starch, gelatinized starch modified starch, modified food starch vegetable starch; Glucose syrup; Hydrolyzed vegetable protein (HVP) Malt dextrin Monosodium glutamate, MSG; Soy sauce, shoyu, tamari, teriyaki sauce; Surimi; Vegetable gum.
Q&A
Is Play dough\Play-doh Chametz?
The company product called Play-doh is actual Chametz. It is made of flour, water, and food coloring.[1] It must be destroyed before Pesach or sold to a gentile.[2] If one did not do so, then he is to destroy it on Pesach as soon as he remembers, if he did not sell his Chametz to a gentile.[3] Nevertheless, a blessing is not recited upon destroying it.[4] If one sold his Chametz, then the play dough is to be placed in the area sold to the gentile.
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[1] Ingredients provided by the play-doh company “Hasbro”: The compound is primarily a mixture of water, salt, and flour. Home-made recipes will include salt, flour or corn starch, a vegetable, canola, or olive oil and cream of tartar.
[2] Play-doh is consumable and does not contain any poisons or dangerous material for a human. It thus must be destroyed just like a piece of actual dough. It does not follow the allowance of owning Chametz that is not food, which is brought in 422:22, as there it is referring to Taaruvos Chametz while here it is Chametz Beiyn. Nevertheless, perhaps it should be viewed as Chametz Nuksha being that it is not meant to be eaten and is hence exactly similar to the dough made by the Sofrim, mentioned in 442:20, which is Chametz Nuksha. Thus, although it must be destroyed or sold to the gentile before Pesach, if one did not do so and found play-doh on Pesach, it is be destroyed without a blessing as is the law by Chametz Nuksha in 442:20.
[3] Admur 442:20
[4] Admur ibid
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