Is it possible to eat vegetable during Lent? Diet, oil and dry eating during Orthodox Lent

Today you can find a lot about the rules for observing a lean diet. useful information online. Christians who only call themselves such and more experienced people try to learn more about the essence of fasting and how to observe it correctly. Many people are confused by the external form of fasting, when they have to limit themselves in many ways.

Dry eating during Orthodox Lent

The practice of dry eating during Lent is not acceptable for many. Food with oil during fasting, even if only with vegetable oil, is somehow more familiar. But strict regulations may not be for everyone. The church often makes concessions for those who have, so to speak, extenuating circumstances for avoiding general rules. According to the Church Charter, only vegetable oils are allowed to be consumed during Lent. It is important to remember that in the first and last weeks, believers completely refuse oil.

On other days, vegetable oil is included in the daily diet - you can cook food in vegetable oil and season salads with it. Oil completes the dish and affects the taste of the dish. However, we should not forget that we fast not in order to try new people, but in order to achieve the main Christian goals - to cleanse ourselves morally and physically, to weaken the actions of our own passions against us. Issues of gastronomic content somehow by themselves with this approach to fasting are relegated to the background. But in general, no one forces anyone to starve.

Is it possible to eat butter during fasting?

Food with butter during Orthodox Lent becomes when you can cook vegetables, mushrooms, and make baked goods. For use in fast days you can choose: vegetable oil, peanut, mustard, hazelnut, sesame. With fragrant oil you can cheer up your guests. When the Church Charter restricts the use of vegetable oil, Christians switch to dry eating. In monastic practice, dry eating is observed three days a week - Monday (in honor of the angelic powers), Wednesday (in memory of the betrayal of the Savior) and Friday (when the God-Man was given up for crucifixion). For ordinary parishioners, strictness Christian fasting with practice, dry eating is limited to two days - Wednesday and Friday. Although there are many concessions here too.

For example, dry eating during fasting is important to observe in full, and when there is no fasting, you can limit yourself to regular lean food. Overall, if it doesn't let you down physical health, and if the priest blesses you, you can slightly adjust your fast, but only in accordance with Church Charter. &1

Text of the Orthodox prayer to the holy noble prince Andrei of Smolensky

O exceedingly wonderful and wondrous in miracles, glorified by God in heaven, worker of Christ’s grapes, inhabitant of the highest Zion, the pre-built city of Jerusalem! The saints are the joy of the Angel and the wondrous goodness of man, having longed for wonderful and wondrous heavenly villages, and now you are a co-perceiver with all the saints. Even though by nature you, holy Prince Andrew, were a man, you labored diligently in your struggles and received an endless future age. You were a strange stranger on earth, and for this reason you received life in heaven. Having left the earthly and perishable fatherland, you accepted the incorruptible and eternal. The Lord God has crowned you with the gift of miracles, to heal ailments on earth and to graciously greet those who come to you with faith; May the Lord God show you to us, merciful, like a merciful father to his sick children. For this reason, we pray, standing before your multi-healing tomb, to ask and pray to you in bewilderment, so that you may cover us sinners with your wonderful cover, not trodden with gold and silver, but given by God in grace. We stand tenderly before your grave with fear, defiled in every sin; For this reason, we shed tears and tenderly appeal to you: have mercy on us, O holy and wondrous blessed Grand Duke Andrei, give us a helping hand and God's mercy. We offer you as an intercessor to God, we wish for help from God; We know that you are not a false servant of God, deliver us from every slander of the enemy. Be a merciful protector for us and a quick healer from our illnesses. Free from the hand of a stranger and from every excuse of evil. Through many troubles, we have been crushed by all evil sorrows, we have gone down to the doors of death from sorrow, and have angered God with our sins, and have driven Him away from ourselves. For this reason, be our leader and intercessor, intercessor and defender, to our Lord Jesus Christ and to His merciful Father and the Holy Spirit, in three hypostases one God, that we may receive forgiveness of sins and much mercy from Him. Be, O saint of God, a supporter and intercessor of the entire Christ-loving army against all non-Orthodox and cross-hating evil and foreign enemies and adversaries, may the memory of their evil faith be consumed, may courage and strength and cities be destroyed, but do not forget our Russian country, but forever Look upon us, and beseech God for every abundance of the fruits of the earth, and be a helper and a quick healer to all those who call on you with faith in all sorrows, illnesses and misfortunes. Grant us abundant health and unflagging help to those who pray to you, through the grace and generosity and love of the Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ, to Him be glory and power, now and forever and ever. Amen.

Today, among the types of oil you can find quite a lot of its types, say, butter, sunflower (vegetable), rapeseed, etc. Let's try to see what oil can be used during fasting, and whether it is possible at all. To do this, you should turn to some canons and rules of the Church in terms of fasting.

Is it possible to use oil in fasting?

As you know, during Lent there is a categorical ban on the consumption of animal products, therefore butter and its varieties cannot be eaten. But vegetable oil (meaning all its types, including sunflower or olive oil) is not prohibited. As is already clear, these types of oils are of plant origin (this can be judged even by their name).

Is it possible to use vegetable oil during fasting?

If you look at the question of whether oil can be used during Lent, it should be noted that it is present in most recipes for salads, lean main (hot) courses, and even baked goods. However, a small caveat should be made here.

The fact is that despite the permission to use the same sunflower oil, for example, during Lent, in the first and last weeks it should be abandoned completely. On all other days, oil can be called one of the main ingredients. Included in Lenten dishes.

In general, the question of whether oil can be used during fasting, although it has a positive answer, it is necessary to remember that when using it as a component of your diet, you should not get carried away with the quantity. This is connected not so much with the fast itself, but with the fact that an increased dose, along with beneficial effects on the human body, can also cause harm.

However, not only sunflower oil can be added to prepared dishes. Quite often you can find recommendations for the use of olive oil, sesame oil, peanut oil, hazelnut oil, mustard oil, etc. in the diet. At the same time, you can even diversify the taste of a particular dish, making it completely unique.

As is already clear from the above, the question of whether oil can be used during fasting has a twofold answer. In addition to two weeks of abstinence from this product in Lent, it is worth paying attention to some days during other fasts when any vegetable oil cannot be consumed. For example, Monday, Wednesday and Friday are more stringent in this regard, when complete dry eating is implied. But in general, only certain prohibitions or recommendations should be taken into account here. Otherwise, there are no too strict restrictions on vegetable oils.

They require certain knowledge regarding the rules of abstaining from food. At the same time, if the basic requirements of any fast regarding the abstinence of animal food are known to everyone, then questions arise regarding a number of products of plant origin. In particular, one of these questions is whether it is possible to consume vegetable oil during fasting.

Is it possible to use vegetable oil during fasting?

If you need to answer the question whether vegetable oil can be used, you will need to clarify which day and week of fasting. we're talking about. Monday to Friday except holidays When indulgences are allowed, vegetable oil cannot be consumed during fasting.

You can use sunflower oil during Lent on Saturdays and Sundays, as well as on holidays - for example:

• Holy Thursday
• forty Martyrs of Sebaste
• Saint Gregory Dvoeslov.

• Clean Monday (first day of fasting)
• Good Friday (penultimate day of Lent).

Note

There are different opinions regarding whether it is possible to fast.

At the same time, most other dioceses do not practice such a ban and the use of olive oil is permitted to the same extent as other types of vegetable oil.

Thus, the answer to the question whether it is possible to use vegetable oil during Lent will be as follows: the use of this type of product is permitted on Saturdays and Sundays throughout the entire period of Lent except Holy Week, as well as on days of holidays and the veneration of saints. On other days, the use of this product is prohibited.

It is worth noting that such strict observance of fasting norms is mainly practiced only in monasteries, as well as by people who fully follow the Christian canons. In most cases, by blessing spiritual mentor if there are objective reasons, the fast may be relaxed. And don’t forget that this is not a diet at all, so even the most severe dietary restrictions without a spiritual component will not bring the desired result.

Lent is the longest and most strict of the Orthodox fasts of the year. Its goal is spiritual and physical cleansing, as well as preparing believers for happy holiday Easter. In 2019, Lent will last from March 11 to April 27.

For Orthodox believers, it consists of Lent and Holy Week. Pentecost was established in memory of the forty-day fast of Jesus Christ, and Holy Week- in memory of last days His earthly life, death and burial.

During this period, believers should observe certain restrictions in the diet, in particular, refuse to eat food of animal origin (meat, dairy products, eggs) and strong alcoholic beverages (you can only allow yourself a little red wine, but only on certain days prescribed by the church charter ).

Not everyone knows that at this time you can’t eat rich pastries, white bread, or mayonnaise. This list also includes candies and chocolate, which also contain ingredients of animal origin.

However, the list of foods that can be included in the diet is quite large. These are mushrooms, vegetables, pasta, cereals, nuts, seeds, herbs, fruits, dried fruits, honey. Recommended drinks include herbal teas, fruit juices, fruit drinks, kvass and compotes.

Is oil allowed during Lent?

Butter and animal fat are, of course, prohibited. Is it possible to add vegetable oil to food during Lent?

Yes, you can use it these days, because it is not a product of animal origin. However, there are restrictions that those who fast diligently observe.

It should be said that there are four degrees of fasting:

• very strict - dry eating, when fasting people consume only food that has not been exposed to heat
• processing vegetable foods without vegetable oil;
• strict - eat boiled vegetable food with vegetable oil;
• regular, when the diet also includes fish.

Monks who have dedicated their lives to serving the Lord are required to observe strict fasting. This is not required of the laity. In addition, concessions are provided for people with poor health: they are allowed to eat all foods except meat.

Deviations from the rules are also allowed for older people, young children and pregnant women, as well as those who work in heavy physical work.

Let us tell you in more detail when you can eat vegetable oil during Lent. Its use should be stopped first and foremost. last week post. On the first day of Lent, the strict monastic rules require complete abstinence from food.

Food without oil can be consumed on Tuesday and Thursday, and on Wednesday and Friday of the first week, dry eating is also prescribed (that is, eating food that has not been heat-treated without oil).

From the second to the sixth week inclusive, the diet should be as follows: on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, it is recommended to eat dishes made from raw foods without vegetable oil. On Tuesdays and Thursdays they eat cooked food, but without vegetable oil.

On which days of Lent is butter allowed?

From the second week of fasting, vegetable oil is included in the menu on certain days. It is allowed to be added to dishes on weekends - Saturday and Sunday, when lean food may be hot and filled with oil. (However, in the last week of Lent, in Holy Saturday Vegetable oil is not consumed before Easter).

Oil is also allowed on days of especially revered saints (for example, on the Day of Remembrance of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste - March 22). On Annunciation Holy Mother of God, which occurs during the fasting period, this product can also be used as food.

As a result, there are not so many days when you can consume vegetable oil during Lent - less than half of this entire period. At the permitted time, vegetable oil is added to porridges, first and second courses, and Lenten baked goods.

Separately, you should highlight those days when oil should be added not to cooked, but to raw food. For some people, maintaining such a diet can be difficult. However Lenten menu You can diversify it by including, for example, salads containing fresh vegetables, dried fruits, nuts and other foods allowed for consumption.

For example, you can make a cabbage and carrot salad with the addition of prunes, lemon zest, salt and sugar. Another dish is a salad based on apples, pumpkin and walnuts, where you can add a little honey for taste. Cold snacks with the addition of vegetable oil are also great for this period of dietary restriction.

So, now you know whether you can eat vegetable oil during Lent. Which one should you give preference to? Typically, believers add sunflower, olive, as well as rapeseed, flaxseed, sesame, nut, hemp and other oils to their dishes.

Unrefined oil, or, as it is also called, first cold-pressed oil, is more beneficial for health. On those days when the use of oil is allowed during Lent, it is used to season salads, cold appetizers, pasta, rice, vegetable dishes, and in the preparation of soups, sauces and marinades.

If you are looking for an answer to the question - is it possible to use vegetable oil during Lent, then this article is just for you and I advise you to read it to the end to find out all the details about fasting. I'll tell you how it affects human body observing fasting and what you can eat during it, and what is strictly prohibited. You will also learn how to behave during this holy period of time.

Post: What is it and what is it for?

During Lent, the sacred diet is strictly observed. It is aimed at cleansing the body of all unnecessary reserves of dirty food from unhealthy and excessively fatty and sweet foods. This restriction in food also helps cleanse the brain of bad thoughts, lust, debauchery and sinful desires. Thus, by observing fasting, both your soul and body will be cleansed.

It should be noted that adults can fast without fear for their health, but for a small growing body, as well as for a fragile body during adolescence, it is not at all necessary to fast; the Church cannot and does not want to accept such sacrifices from children. Therefore, do not force your children to fast; they must eat properly and eat everything they need for health, normal growth and well-being.

What can you eat during Lent?

As I have already said, during Lent there is a strict restriction on food and Lent is the most difficult in this sense, because it lasts for 47 days. Moreover, on the first day and on the last you cannot eat anything at all, and you are only allowed to drink ordinary water in any quantity. Therefore, during fasting, I advise you to avoid serious stress on your body, this applies to both mental and physical hard work.

During Lent you can afford the following products:

• absolutely all cereals;
• all vegetables;
• fruits;
• juices, jelly and compotes;
• dried fruits;
• candied fruit;
• mushrooms;
• nuts;
• seeds;
• vegetable oil.

It won’t be so difficult to observe fasting if you try to prepare as many different dishes as possible from the proposed list, so that the food does not seem boring and monotonous to you. By the way, you can also drink tea and coffee. And instead of your favorite sweets, you can take dried apricots and prunes and drink hot, invigorating drinks with them.

In addition, in Palm Sunday and the Annunciation, the Church allows you to taste a little fish, but not a lot, you shouldn’t overeat it! Prepare baked fish, for example, with potatoes. Or just boil it and eat it with a vegetable salad of tomatoes and cucumbers, dressed with vegetable oil.

All animal products are prohibited during Lent. These include:

• fish;
• meat;
• eggs;
• milk and everything that is made from it.

So I answered your question about whether vegetable oil can be used during Lent. Whether to fast or not is up to you and no one but you to decide.