Hashachar Ha'ole (; "The Rising Dawn") is a brand of sweetened

chocolate Chocolate is a food made from roasted and ground cocoa beans that can be a liquid, solid, or paste, either by itself or to flavoring, flavor other foods. Cocoa beans are the processed seeds of the cacao tree (''Theobroma cacao''); unprocesse ...

spread Spread may refer to: Places * Spread, West Virginia Arts, entertainment, and media * ''Spread'' (film), a 2009 film. * ''$pread'', a quarterly magazine by and for sex workers * "Spread", a song by OutKast from their 2003 album ''Speakerboxxx/T ...

popular in

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

and the

Jewish diaspora The Jewish diaspora ( ), alternatively the dispersion ( ) or the exile ( ; ), consists of Jews who reside outside of the Land of Israel. Historically, it refers to the expansive scattering of the Israelites out of their homeland in the Southe ...

, and was invented in 1948.

Etymology

The name ''Hashachar Ha'ole'' translates to "The Rising Dawn" or alternatively "The Bright Morning" in

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

, in reference to it mainly being used in the morning and spread on something such as on toast,

pita Pita ( or ; ) or pitta (British English), also known as Arabic bread (, ), as Lebanese bread and as kmaj (from the Persian ''kumaj''), is a family of yeast- leavened round flatbreads baked from wheat flour, common in the Mediterranean, Levant ...

, or bread such as

challah Challah or hallah ( ; , ; 'c'''hallot'', 'c'''halloth'' or 'c'''hallos'', ), also known as berches in Central Europe, is a special bread in Jewish cuisine, usually braided and typically eaten on ceremonial occasions such as Shabbat ...

, or

malawach Malawach or Melawwaḥ (Hebrew: מלוואח), is a Yemenite Jews, Jewish Yemenite flatbread that is traditional in Yemeni cuisine as well as Israeli cuisine. The name of the dish comes from the Arabic "ملوح", literally “board-like bread� ...

for

breakfast Breakfast is the first meal of the day usually eaten in the morning. The word in English refers to breaking the fasting period of the previous night. Various "typical" or "traditional" breakfast menus exist, with food choices varying by regi ...

History

In 1948, 5 brothers, who were all members of the Weidberg family, started a small factory manufacturing chocolate and other confectionery products including their eponymous chocolate spread, in 1948 outside the city of

Haifa Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...

. In 1950 Levkowich family joined the company. Seeing a need for a new product in the Israeli market, Hashachar Ha’ole stopped producing their other products to exclusively focus the production of its chocolate spread in 1955, which was 9 years before the similar Italian product

Nutella Nutella ( , , ; stylized in all lowercase) is a brand of brown, sweetened hazelnut cocoa spread. Nutella is manufactured by the Italian company Ferrero and was introduced in 1964, although its first iteration dates to 1963. History Pietro ...

was launched in 1964; possibly making Hashachar the world's first chocolate spread.

Overview

Hashachar Ha'ole has become one of Israel’s best-known foods. It is even called the most successful

chocolate spread Chocolate spread is a sweet chocolate-flavored paste which is eaten mostly spread on breads and toasts or similar grain items such as waffles, pancakes, muffins, and pitas. Although it tastes, smells, and looks like chocolate, it does not solid ...

in Israel and has become a symbol of

Israeli cuisine Israeli cuisine primarily comprises dishes brought from the Jewish diaspora, and has more recently been defined by the development of a notable fusion cuisine characterized by the mixing of Jewish cuisine and Arab cuisine.Gold, Rozann''A Region's ...

. There are two different versions of it: halavi (dairy) and

parve In ''kashrut'', the dietary laws of Judaism, pareve or parve (from for "neutral"; in Hebrew , ''parveh'', or , ''stami'') is a classification of food that contains neither dairy nor meat ingredients. Food in this category includes all items th ...

(non-dairy). This is because

Jewish law ''Halakha'' ( ; , ), also transliterated as ''halacha'', ''halakhah'', and ''halocho'' ( ), is the collective body of Jewish religious laws that are derived from the Written and Oral Torah. ''Halakha'' is based on biblical commandments ('' mit ...

prohibits mixing milk with meat-based foods, thus the parve version allows kosher-observers to include the spread in dessert after a meat-based meal. For many years, Hashachar Ha'Ole was the only chocolate cream available on the Israeli market. Nowadays you can also find brands like Elite and Nutella. Until the 2010s Hashachar had never been advertised in the mass media. Its original logo has been retained and remained the same since its launch in 1948.

Varieties

Hashachar Ha'ole is available in a number of flavor including milk chocolate, pareve chocolate, dark chocolate, white chocolate, nougat,

halva Halva (also halvah, halwa, halua, and other spellings; ) is a type of confectionery that is widely spread throughout the Middle East and North Africa, Eastern Europe and the Balkans, Central Asia, and South Asia. The name is used for a broad va ...

, chocolate halva, and milk chocolate mixed with tehina among others. It is sold in tubs, individual cups, and tubes. It is also available as a

chocolate bar A chocolate bar is a confection containing chocolate, which may also contain layerings or mixtures that include nut (fruit), nuts, fruit, caramel, nougat, and wafers. A flat, easily breakable, chocolate bar is also called a tablet. In some variet ...

Popularity

Marketing

References

External links

Official Website (in Hebrew)
{{Jewish cuisine Chocolate Condiments Israeli confectionery