Chanukah Math

In Israel, we do Chanukah a little differently than everywhere else. Our dreidels have a different letter, and Israeli’s don’t get down with the latkes, rather its sufganiot (jelly doughnuts). While latkes can be eaten with sour cream, apple sauce or ketchup, in Israel sufganiot are stuffed with everything from jam to cream, caramel, and chocolate fudge. For good measure, most sufganiot are covered with a liberal dousing of powered sugar.

My sister told me that since the army gives them to soldiers, and I am enlisting on Chanukah, I should try to make it worth my while. If it wasn’t for me wanting to go to the army for patriotic, Zionistic, or nationalistic reasons, perhaps service for food would be an interesting concept. I signed up looking forward to the real army experience; I think it’s going to make for some great stories. However, say someone did sign up to break even through eating army food.

Here is my calculation. The average plain jelly sufgania sells for about 2-3 shekels (which is about 25-30 cents). Assuming an average monthly salary in Israel of $1462 or 6300 shekels, you would have to eat about three thousand doughnuts. Factor in the salary from the army and multiply by the number of months you have to serve in Shlav Bet (second stage) and account for the other services the army pays for like food, accommodation and transportation. According to my calculations, you would have to eat about 10,800 sufganiot to break even with the army over the course of six months in comparison to the average salary.

In my particular situation however, the only problem is, I am starting my army service on the fourth night of Chanukah, leaving only four days to eat 10,800 jelly doughnuts. Accounting for sleep and bathroom breaks, that totals up to a whopping 175 doughnuts an hour for four straight days!

I guess I will go back to dreaming up loof recipes and take it easy this Chanukah.