The Portland Press Herald ran a story over the weekend that featured various Jewish families getting ready for the Passover holiday. Reading about all of the cleaning, and cooking, and removing of chametz, I found myself wondering when they were going to get to the point of Passover-- the food! There's a brief mention at the end of the article of gefilte fish, never my favorite traditional food (in a word: blech), but so much was left out. I'd wager that for most American Jews, like those in my family, Passover doesn't actually include any wall-washing or sink-bleaching, or even abstaining from leavened bread. What it does include is a celebration of friends, family, and freedom.

But most importantly, it's a celebration of food.

When else do we have the opportunity or reason to prepare those recipes our grandmothers and great-grandmothers brought over from whatever 'old country' they called home? When I was a child my family spent every Passover on Long Island with my paternal grandparents. Under normal circumstances the fare at "Nanni and Grandpa's" was as American as it comes--my grandpa Gerry was a particular fan of pork chops, if I remember correctly. But come Passover my grandmother became the quintessential Jewish grandma--she made her own horseradish by grinding the roots by hand; her matzoh ball soup featured both soft and hard matzoh balls; her chopped liver was the highlight of the meal for my dad (again: blech).

This year, inspired by our on-again, off-again Sunday night dinners we enjoy with some dear friends, a group of us came together and created our own seder, complete with haggadahs cobbled together from the internet (I particularly enjoyed the Open Source Haggadah). Only two of us of the six at the meal were raised Jewish, but I think that everyone who attended got the flavor of the traditions, and had a great time. Not to mention got to eat some phenomenal food.

The menu included a beef brisket smothered in caramelized onions (adapted from a recipe in the Hannaford Fresh magazine), carrot-leek soup, my own charoset, a vegetarian faux-chopped liver made with green beans (can someone send me that recipe, btw? not blech), potato kugel, carrot/prune tsimmes, and a salad. And, of course, the symbolic foods: salt water, matzoh, horseradish, a piece of paper that was supposed to be a lamb shank, a roasted egg, and a piece of lettuce. If you're interested in all of these symbolic foods and what function they serve in the seder, look here.

Everything was delicious, we all drank a bunch of red wine (not Manishevitz), and we ended the night with an intense debate about Ironman triathlons, and whether people who do them have issues. (It's a fairly sedentary group, so our conclusions were undoubtedly biased.)

Here's my recipe for charoset. And a note to the Press Herald: writing an article about Passover and only interviewing people who either clean out the chametz, create special kitchens, or eat off paper plates is sort of like writing an article about Christmas and only interviewing people who go to midnight Mass--you're missing a lot of peoples' perspectives!

Ingredients

3 apples, chopped into 1 cm pieces (I like to use a mix of apples; this year I used gala, granny smith, and fuji)
2 t ground cinnamon
1 cup chopped walnuts
2 T honey
Zest of 1 lemon, grated
Juice of 1 lemon
Splash sweet vermouth

Mix everything in a bowl. Let sit at room temperature at least an hour so the flavors can meld.

Easter is traditionally one of those food holidays, probably growing out of its roots and connection to Passover. It's also always been one of my favorites, especially because it usually features ham, one of my favorite meats. (There was some paranoia in my household when I was a child about nitrates or nitrites or something like that, which lead to me being unjustly denied my rightful amount of ham. I've been spending the rest of my life trying to make up for that early disappointment. Sniff.)

Under normal circumstances, Otis and I head to Chicopee, MA, where his Gramma lives. However, this year I just felt spent-- starting a new job, a lot of wedding-related activities coming up for my friend Alysia, and and overall case of the 'spring' blahs-- so I played the bad wife and stayed home. At the last minute, my friend Kendall invited me to an Easter dinner hosted by her BFF, the lovely Leslie of Aurora Provisions.

And what a lucky Easter ducky I was! An incredibly diverse and fascinating group of 20+ folks came together to feast, toast, and chat. A lot of the attendees are active in the Slow Food Portland group. Some were farmers, including John and Stacy of Broadturn Farm and their daughters. Some were restauranteurs, including the couple who are opening Bonobo Pizza, a brick oven pizzeria, in the former Supreme location on the corner of Pine and Brackett. (Otis wants to know the connection between sex-crazed monkeys and pizza. If anyone knows, please advise.) Tom and Sarah Flanagan of Flanagan Fine Art were there, along with their charming children. I also met Karl and Margaret Hathaway Schatz, and got to learn about her upcoming book, the Year of the Goat, and meet their sweet baby Charlotte.

All in all it was a lovely afternoon. Not to mention the delicious, delicious food, most of which was kosher for Passover and chametz-free...morroccan spiced lamb roast, savory matzoh brie, fish balls, roasted asparagus, chicken with preserved lemon, potato kugel, and much more. I rolled on home about 5 with a full belly and the glow of having had a day of great conversation. I still feel a little bit guilty about missing the Baron family Easter, though. I hope they'll forgive me.

Unfortunately, since I didn't do any of the cooking, I have no recipes from Easter. But, Kendall came over for chicken curry on Tuesday, and suggested I share that recipe since she enjoyed it so much.

Here it is!

Karl sent me a link to some great photos of our Easter/Passover party at Aurora. This adorable shot of the babies demonstrates what it's all about. Food. Sharing. Bonnets.

And also, of course... a toast.

The past week has been so full of deliciousness I don't even know where to begin. Friday night was Tu Casa with Ron and Diane. Otis and Ron both destroyed enormous Plato Montaneros (steak, rice, beans, plantain, avocado, fried egg) while Diane had some taquitos and I attempted, and failed, to eat an entire burrito. As usual, everything was delicious, cheap, and the hot sauce flowed like water. Mmm.

Sunday was the wedding shower for my dear friend Alysia, at her parents' house in Falmouth. The spread was incredible, with fruit salad, shrimp salad, bagels, cream cheese, and lox, pound cake, pineapple walnut cake, and the two quiches and a strata thing brought by yours truly. The quiche was a big hit-- it's the same recipe my mother has always made, and it's absurdly easy and completely non-authentic (no custard needed!). I'm going to include that recipe below. The strata/baked bread is my mother-in-law Jane's recipe, and it's delish, with lots of cheese and linguica.

Luckily for us, we never lost power during the crazy storm, although the wind was blowing so hard it was hard to hear the dialogue on the James Bond movie we were watching. Oh, the humanity! It was such a nasty day even the dog didn't want to go outside. Which made it perfect for comfort food: roasted garlic mashed potatoes, roasted asparagus, and chicken breast with a black-pepper/balsamic reduction pan sauce. Even though I overcooked the asparagus (bad Marya! Shocking!) it was a delicious and cozy meal to enjoy while the wind howled outside.

On Tuesday we met Ravinder and Katey for burgers at Wild Willy's in South Portland, on a tip that they serve the best burger in town. I wouldn't go that far, but they were tasty and pretty cheap. My main complaint was that my medium-rare was more like medium, which is pretty damn annoying.

And finally, last night Otis prepared mustard-crusted wild salmon, adapted from Mario Batali's wonderful Babbo Cookbook, with scallion quinoa and fennel salad.

We are so spoiled.

I'll try to get it together to include more recipes later. For now, here's my mom's quiche. The fun thing about this recipe is that you can do whatever you want with it, and it's practically impossible to mess up. (Once I forgot to add the eggs. It ened up pretty watery, but still tasted pretty good.) It doesn't rely on a traditional custard base, so it's not going to break. I like it vegetarian, but you could toss in some ham or cooked bacon lardons. Or use a mix of cheddar and monterey jack, use red and green peppers for the vegetables, and add some minced chipotles in adobo.