Tag Archive for: matzoh ball soup

Here Comes Moishe Matzoh Ball…

/in /by
Hopping down the Seder Hall
Hippity-Hoppity Pesach’s on its way.

(Song Credit (and there are more verses) to Dr. Melvin Borden, family physician extraordinaire, and an even more extraordinary father, father-in-law, and the original Pop-Pop)

It’s coming down to the wire. Next Monday, April 18, at 6 pm, we will be sitting down for the first Seder of Passover. As I write this, I am expecting 31 people to be around the table. To get to that moment has taken weeks of planning, prepping, organizing, shopping, and of course, because hey it’s me talking – worrying. And yet, I wouldn’t change a thing. I love a full table, brimming with favorite foods for each of our guests; old china and prayer books from relatives no longer with us, but always there in spirit; family and friends reconnecting to tell the story of the exodus of the Jews from Egypt – and how the lessons learned from that time still have relevance today.

Our seders are loud and lively. While we definitely read parts in Hebrew, most of it is in English, with commentary both wise and wiseass encouraged. This year there will be four children – and oh how much sweeter it makes it. There’s Ray, my sister’s oldest grandson, now 7 and able to read in English one of the prayers. There’s Hal, my sister’s younger grandson, aged 2, and a full participant in the search for the Afikoman – a hidden piece of matzoh that the children find and redeem for prizes. There’s Vivian, 18 months, the daughter of Larry, my son’s oldest friend. We met Larry when he was just a few months older than his daughter – how wonderful that the new generation becomes friends too. And then there’s my beautiful granddaughter Riley, 10 months old, no teeth but able to gum almost all foods, full of smiles that make you melt, and a whole new perspective on the Jewish phrase, L’dor Va Dor, from generation to generation. At these seders, we pass our faith, our customs, our love from one generation to the next.

The menu varies only slightly each year. Gefilte Fish with horseradish, potatoes and eggs in salt water, matzoh ball soup, a chicken dish, brisket, and salmon, salad, sweet potato casserole, and asparagus. Desserts include fruit and lots of store-bought goodies.

I would love to capture in a bottle the memories of all those seders so that I could take a whiff of the happiness of those nights during the rest of the year when times are more difficult. It’s lots of hard work but the payoff is immeasurable.

I wish for each of you a Zissen Pesach – a sweet Passover.

Marian, aka the Northern half of Evelyn David
http://www.evelyndavid.com/

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Welcome to the Matzoh Ball

/in /by


Tonight is the first seder. I’ve been cooking and cleaning for weeks. Even the recent Noreaster that tore through my town and left me without power for five days couldn’t put a dent in my holiday spirit. I confess I was momentarily panicked when the lights first went out. I had gallons of chicken soup in the freezer. I could put up with reading by candlelight, freezing showers, and indoor temps of 40 degrees. But lose my soup? Heck no. Thankfully a friend had an extra refrigerator in her basement, an empty freezer, and best of all, power. Passover was saved.

This year we are having 25 family and friends join us for the first seder, 14 for the second one. It’s a bit daunting, but the part that keeps me going is the joy and love I feel when I look around the room. I delight in all the singing, praying, laughing, and eating! I kvell, Yiddish for swoon, at the wide-eyed enchantment on the faces of the children.

The search for the Afikomen (a piece of matzoh that is hidden during the seder) is one of the highlights of the night. The matzoh is put in a little pouch, made by one of my sons when he was in nursery school, and then hidden by the adults. Once the kids find it, they hold it “ransom” because according to tradition, we cannot complete the seder without it. “Heavy duty negotiating” ensues, until a “fair price” is set – usually either a few dollars or a small gift. As the kids get older, you’ll see the teenagers “help” the younger ones hold out for a good prize. My husband and I often joke that we knew two of our sons would be good lawyers given their Afikomen negotiating skills!

And the food – Oy, the food. Five courses and my kids would seriously object if I attempted to eliminate any of them – even if they personally don’t eat some of the delicacies. Two of my four wouldn’t touch a piece of gefilte fish with a six-foot pole, yet they’d be the first to express horror at the very concept of omitting that course from the seder menu. Listening to my kids, I can almost hear the chorus from Fiddler on the Roof singing “Tradition!” I ask you, Stiletto Faithful, regardless of which holidays you observe, do your children cling more to tradition than you do?

And it’s not just the age-old traditions. I mean the ones that I added a couple of times over the years and have now been informed are set in concrete. Luckily, I looked back at my blog from two years ago and found a recipe for Persian Charoset – something I had entirely forgotten, but which son number two told me was always a family tradition (um, what family was he in?). Anyway, I’m making it, as always!

All best wishes for a Zissen Pesach (a sweet Passover) – and a wondrous spring.

Marian (the matzoh ball-making Northern Half of Evelyn David)

Murder Off the Books by Evelyn David
Murder Takes the Cake by Evelyn David
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Why Is This Night Different from All Other Nights?

/in /by


It’s that time of year again.

My house smells like chicken soup.

Wednesday night is the beginning of Passover. We’ll hold a seder, the feast that commemorates the Jews exodus from Egypt. I’ve been cooking and cleaning for weeks, and as I do, sweet memories of seders long ago come flooding back. I smile when I think of those who are no longer with us in the flesh, but whose love, warmth, and wisdom enriched seders of the past.

There’s very little variation in the menu from year to year. Homemade matzoh ball soup is a given. Gefilte fish, homemade in a local deli, is also always served. But since marriage is a blending of traditions, we serve hard-boiled eggs and potatoes as the second course. Why hard boiled eggs? According to some experts, the eggs symbolize the Jewish people. The more you cooked the eggs, the harder they become. So too the Jewish people – the harder their lives, the stronger and tougher they become. Another explanation is that eggs symbolize the circle of life, the salt water the tears of oppression, as well as the joy in freedom. My family’s tradition was just to serve hard boiled eggs. Hubby’s family served eggs and potatoes. I’ve searched to find an explanation for the potatoes, and I’m just guessing when I posit that it’s part of his Russian heritage. Anyone else know the reason?

We sing songs with traditional melodies, passed down from generation to generation. But we also sing songs that my kids learned in nursery and Hebrew school. While we say many of the prayers in Hebrew – we do most of the service in English so that all our guests can participate. We go around the table, with everyone reading aloud a portion of the Haggadah, the prayerbook for the holiday, which tells the compelling story of the Jewish exodus from Egypt, from slaves to free men.

And then there are the family tales that are also annually recounted Here’s one of my favorites which happened when my husband was a child. Let me set the scene.

Picture a table of 20 family and friends. They’ve eaten a wonderful meal and now are finishing up the final prayers of the seder. They’re reached the song about Elijah the Prophet. According to tradition, Elijah visits every Jewish home during the Seder as a “foreshadowing of his future arrival at the end of the days, when he will come to announce the coming of the Jewish Messiah.” The custom is to stand and open the front door while singing this prayer.

The family stands and my husband’s Uncle Bobby opens the front door…and there stands a complete stranger.

Everyone’s heart skips a beat. Was it possible? Was this the Messiah arriving at Baltimore National Pike?

Nope, nothing quite so dramatic. From the doorway, Uncle Bobby quickly realizes that the stranger is drunk and looking for directions to the local watering hole.

But my kids still hold their collective breaths as we open the door in own home – will someone be on the other side?

Best wishes for a Happy Passover,

Evelyn David

Why Is This Night Different From All Other Nights?

/in /by
I’ve got a ton of people coming for dinner on Saturday night. It’s the start of Passover and we celebrate with a ritual meal called a Seder. This holiday marks the Biblical exodus of the Jews from Egypt. We sing songs, say prayers, and eat certain traditional foods (yes, this is the origin of matzoh ball soup).

Holiday preparations start a month in advance. I dig out huge pots, originally owned by my husband’s grandmother, source of generations of chicken soup. I can make the broth ahead and freeze it, but the matzoh balls must be made the day of the Seder, bubbling away to perfection as we chant the opening prayers. When the crowd is large, we switch the furniture in our dining room and living room, to have space for extra tables. My husband grumbles as he schleps the folding chairs from the basement, but beams when he looks across the full room at family and friends joining in song.

Seder means “order” in Hebrew and there is an order to the evening and to the Haggadah, the prayer book we use for the holiday. But “order” and even tradition don’t have to mean stagnant. Over the years, we’ve introduced new songs, tested new recipes for familiar foods, and researched subjects we take for granted looking for new insights. We’ve tripped over our tongues trying to make the traditional prayer book gender-neutral – and for some of us, we’ve shrugged our shoulders, read aloud the traditional masculine pronoun for God, confident that She would understand. At the end of the Seder, we leave feeling satisfied that we haven’t just paid lip service to ancient traditions, but instead have made them our own.

In an odd way – and I’ll grant that it may seem a stretch –there’s a similarity between being a mystery writer and preparing the Seder. There’s a well-known “order” to books, with the traditional elements of hero, murderer, red herrings, minor characters, place, setting. But how you mix these up, how you make these basics your own, is what defines you as a writer. I don’t want my books to be any more of a formula than my Seder.

Sometimes our choices, in cooking or writing, work perfectly, pleasing the palate and the imagination. And sometimes, they are abysmal failures and our only choice is to delete, rewrite, reseason, or dump in the garbage can. That’s okay too.

One of the traditional foods for Passover is Charoset, a sweet mixture of apples, walnuts, wine, and cinnamon, to represent the mortar used by Jewish slaves to build the Egyptian storehouses. It’s a family favorite and will be on the table in my mother’s cut glass bowl, as usual. But I’m also offering something new: Persian Charoset, made with dates, pistachio nuts, pomegranate, banana, cloves and cardamom. It’s a spicy alternative that hopefully will prompt discussion about history, ancestral connections, and the meaning behind these symbolic dishes.

So this week, in addition to the usual murder and mayhem I try to create, I’m polishing silver, moving furniture, cooking, cleaning, and getting ready for a crowd. I can’t wait.

Happy Holidays to all.

Evelyn David