Aspects of Passover 2019

My family always hosts at least one of the two yearly Passover seders at my home.  Passover is the holiday that I have claimed for family hosting. The first year that my husband and I lived in our house, we hosted Thanksgiving.  That was simply our trial run of hosting a family event. Once we acknowledged that we could handle it, we took over a religious holiday, and I am glad that we did!  If you don’t have any idea what I am talking about when I use the term “Passover,” this link can provide some useful information. (FYI–the article in the link is from a previous year.  The date listed is not the date of Passover this year.)

The prayer/ritual part of the seder in my house does not last for several hours as it does in some homes nor does it last just a few minutes like it does in others.  Some aspects of Passover in my home have remained the same for years. We always use the same Haggadah (prayer book used for the Passover seder), and the meal always includes some type of beef, matzo ball soup (Croyden House brand specifically, with added carrots, celery, and egg white), and apple matzo kugel from a recipe I found years ago and is a favorite.  (If a Passover dish with matzo is requested during non-Passover times of the year, you know it is good!)

I have learned a few things over the years.  First, I have learned to have Passover appropriate munchies on the table so that kids (and adults) can nosh during the service part of the seder.  That has eliminated almost all of the “I’m hungry” and “When is ‘The Festive Meal’?” comments during the evening. For me, this has allowed for more sanity and less annoyance.  Second, I have learned to simplify the meal, especially when we have a large number of guests. Over the years, in addition to the previously mentioned food items, I included either frozen vegetables which I would season and heat or (this year) I chopped up, oiled, seasoned, and roasted several vegetables (red potatoes, carrots, and green beans to be specific–these three were chosen based on color, price, ease, and availability; they were delicious!).  Since Passover and Easter fell on the same weekend this year, that may have had an impact on sale prices for some vegetables. A few additional nuggets of wisdom that I have acquired are that there is no need to make several multi-ingredient dishes, and people eat a lot less than expected when it comes to side dishes. (I hope that isn’t a reflection on my cooking since I am the one who prepares the sides. My husband is in charge of the beef, and we both work on the soup.)

There was a little apple kugel hiccup this year.  While in the middle of preparing it, I realized that I was out of cinnamon.  It had been used up the night before when my husband made the kugel to bring to a different seder.  It felt strange letting someone else prepare “my dish,” but I simply wasn’t home during the day to do it and he was. Nevertheless, instead of patiently waiting for someone to run out and pick some up (I was cooking in my pajamas), I simply chose to go on-line and look up potential substitutions. In the end, I replaced the cinnamon with allspice.  The final product did not taste the same, but I still thought it was good.  Some of my guests preferred the cinnamon version. Others did not seem to care; they just enjoyed it. I feel as though the allspice added a “warmth” to the dish.  Next year I will go back to using cinnamon, but at least I now know that a lack of cinnamon is not a make or break situation.

Here is the apple matzo kugel recipe prepared each Passover.  I found it on-line years ago but can’t find the link to the original recipe now. (Every year, I refer to my printed, wrinkled, stained copy of the recipe which I keep in a 3 ring Passover recipe binder.)  I can’t take credit for creating this recipe; someone else deserves that. I just don’t know who that someone else is. Here it is:

Apple Matzo Kugel

Yield: 12 servings

Ingredients:  

• 4 matzos
• 1 cup warm water
• 2 pounds apples, peeled and sliced
• ½ cup raisins
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1 lemon (I use lemon juice and refer to the bottle to see how much juice is  the equivalent of a lemon – My husband just told me that he “sprinkles liberally,” without bothering to measure.)
• 3 tablespoons margarine
• 4 eggs, beaten

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Grease 2-3 quart casserole with 1 tbsp margarine.  Soak matzo in water until soft. Drain. Mix apples with juice from the lemon.  Mix in raisins. Mix in 3/4 of sugar and cinnamon combined. Mix in matzo. Mix in eggs.  Pour into casserole. Top with remaining margarine. Sprinkle with remaining sugar and cinnamon.  Bake for 30 minutes at 375 degrees, covered. Uncover and bake for an additional 15 minutes.

May be served warm or cold, as a side dish or a dessert.

In the past, I wanted my kids to lead parts of the seder.  That never went well. I chose a different route this year.  One of my best decisions was to put my son in charge of dessert.  He has been taking food prep classes in school all year, so I was confident that he could do it.  Plus, I know that he likes dessert. He hemmed and hawed, but, WOW! HIS DESSERTS WERE AMAZING!! He chose to make crème brûlée and flourless chocolate cake.   He had recently made a crème brûlée at school, so he had some familiarity with it. Of course, the night before the seder, he asked if we had ramekins (which we did not, and I was not about to run out to buy 20 of them), so I found him a quiche dish which did the job (the recipe did not create 20 full servings, so the one dish was just fine). (He used vanilla extract instead of vanilla beans.  Instead of following the instructions regarding the ramekins, he just poured the mixture into the larger quiche dish and baked it. ) My son learned an additional skill during all of this. He learned how to use a blowtorch. Do I have a cute little blow torch for kitchen use for little ramekins of crème brûlée?  No. My husband has a regular blow torch which was used. As my son used it to properly burn the top of the crème brûlée, he definitely had an audience! He has secured for himself (like it or not) the role of dessert maker for next year’s seder as well. Perhaps he will share his skills with his sister so that once he heads off to college, she can take on that role. Suffice it to say, the desserts were gone very fast, and there weren’t even any crumbs left.

I had my daughter help set the tables.  My request for her was to fold the napkins into pyramids, but she had to figure out how to do that.  Since the pyramids of Egypt are part of the Passover story, it seemed like an appropriate napkin fold for the holiday.  They looked great, and they were easy to do. My daughter was able to quickly and easily teach me how to do it.

Over the past few years, I have started to play videos at different times during the seder to provide some additional holiday related entertainment. Our eating space is set up so that everyone can see the TV, and, through the magic of modern technology (which my husband understands), the videos can be streamed from a laptop to the television screen.

Here are some fun ones I found and showed this year.  Enjoy!

Seder: The Movie

Six13 A Lion King Passover

La La Passover

Finally, out of curiosity, I sought out additional information.  Many Jews know about the Maxwell House (yes, the coffee) Haggadah, but most do not know how a coffee brand became affiliated with Passover.  I found the answer, and I am sharing it with you. Here is an interesting video plus a little more information.

Next year, I will again plan to keep some things the same and still try to learn something new to do, share, or understand for the holiday. Happy Passover!