Matzo them a denser texture than ordinary baked foods made with flour. Hasidic Jews do not cook with matzo, believing that mixing it with water may allow leavening; this stringency is known as "gebrochts". However, Jews who avoid eating "gebrochts" will eat cooked matzo dishes on the eighth day of Passover outside the Land of Israel, as the eighth day is of rabbinic and not Torah origin. Sephardim use matzo soaked in water or stock to make pies or lasagne, known as "mina", "méguena", "mayena" or . Communion wafers used by the Catholic Church as well as in some Protestant traditions
Passover contains an instruction to eat matzo, specifically, on the first night of Passover and to eat only unleavened bread (in practice, matzo) during the entire week of Passover. Consequently, the eating of matzo figures prominently in the Passover Seder. There are several explanations for this. The Torah says that it is because the Hebrews left Egypt with such haste that there was no time to allow baked bread to rise; thus flat, unleavened bread, matzo, is a reminder of the rapid departure of the Exodus. Other scholars teach that in the time of the Exodus, matzo was commonly baked for