Food Fights

Years ago, a certain friend of Rav Tzvi Kovalsky, zt”l, approached him privately.

“As you know, I’m not married that long, but I’m already having terrible problems with my wife. We have different tastes. What I want her to prepare she doesn’t enjoy and doesn’t want to cook, and all of the ‘delicacies’ she prepares aren’t to my liking at all. We keep getting into arguments, and I don’t know what to do.”

Rav Kovalsky answered, “Let me tell you a little story. Once upon a time, when I was a young bochur, I came home one day from yeshiva and my mother served me vegetable soup. It was so horrible, I thought that I would have to vomit. Somehow I got it down, and when my mother asked me how I liked it, what could I say? How could I upset her after she had gone through the trouble to cook it for me? So I praised it to the skies, and when I saw how pleased she was, the awful taste didn’t bother me a bit. I even managed to accept seconds! To my dismay, I found that since my mother thought I had enjoyed it so much, the same soup was waiting for me every single day. I ate it despite all, and prayed that I would be released from the torment when I got married. Lo and behold—my devoted mother had shared my ‘favorite’ recipe with my kallah, and sure enough, the soup followed me into marriage. And so it is until today—I can barely swallow the soup, but she always is so happy when I eat it, I keep up the pretense.”

He concluded, “And you are telling me that you have problems because your tastes don’t match exactly???”

Years later, after Rav Kovalsky passed away, that same avreich told the Rav’s widow, “Rav Kovalsky’s words saved my marriage!”