sarah in nyc

 Every year I begin Passover prep and it is the end of winter. The last couple of days have been unseasonably hot and muggy. Today, my corner of the world is abloom. The day after Thanksgiving  a few of my neighbors and I planted bulbs in front of our building. It was a miserably cold and grey day.  A few days ago I was worried that we would have a sad showing for our efforts. I was wrong. It's just a party out there in the tree pits. Our cold work in November has rewarded us. Spring bulbs just feel like a magic trick. Shabbat Shalom! Hoping that it is indeed a Shabbat of peace.

 Friday, what I really wanted to do was sleep all day after putting all the Passover STUFF away with my husband and kids Thursday night. Instead of napping or having a spa day, I was baking challah. Forgive me, there are no photos. Monday, I made our first Post-Passover weekday loaf. For those of you who care, I ground up some barley and added it to the dough. The crust was delightfully shattery. My husband asked me if I knew why the crust was so good. It may have been a long second rise.  Yesterday I needed to eat lunch. I cut a slice of bread, and topped it with sliced tomatoes Herbes de Provence and lots of black pepper and topped the whole thing with lots of shredded mozzarella cheese. I popped the whole thing in the nuker, and then that was my lunch. It was delicious. If my friend Miriam were still alive I would have sent her the photo and we would have reminisced about the English muffin pizzas we both ate and made hundreds of times during our youth. If you didn't grow u...

My dear friend, Arlene Eisenberg, (Yes, THE Arlene Eisenberg of What to Expect When You Are Expecting  ) grew up in a home that wasn't religious. One year while she was growing up she demanded that her family not just eat a Passover meal but also read the Haggadah. Arlene had never attended a real Seder so she and her family just read the entire book aloud before they ate. She didn't notice the "eat here ", note in her Haggadah. Seder was designed to be a multi sensory experience. Arlene's first dry rereading of the Haggadah isn't how it is actually experienced. The story is told in so many layered ways. Our family uses the Haggadah above that was produced for Jewish soldiers serving in the American armed forces during WWII. There are pages that are stained. Some of the pages have loosened from the staples. Some of the copies have my father's hand written notes of  ideas and sources that he wanted to share during a Seder long ago. In addition to the Exodus...

 THIS was the view from my window the other night. Truly the pillar of flame and cloud. But more realistically I have been getting myself ready for Passover. The main dishes are done but the side dishes and the desserts all need to be made. One of my favorite desserts of late has been  an Italian clementine tart  that i discovered on an Italian You tube channel. Below are two different iterations of the tart.(The recipe is in the link) The tart is delicious and is made with tons of nuts. Unfortunately, some of my guests each night are very nut allergic. I was trying to figure out how to recreate this without nuts. I wondered if it was possible to make a pie crust out of quinoa, and in fact, it is. I found a few recipes that weren't OK for Passover but I found one that was made with flax seeds and Quinoa. I don't have flax seeds but I do have chia seeds. I cooked up some quinoa and added some chia seeds. I added pie crust friendly flavorings to the grains and allowed them ...

 As the first night of Seder grows near I am slowly making lists and ticking things off of those lists. The second round of glass bowls are being kashered on a window sill so we can use them during Passover. The silver will have to wait until after Shabbat. I cobbled together a good enough dinner for tonight. The dress for my great niece is completed. Tim  and his wife arrived to tie his tzitzit. Both Tim and Paula were really good at the task of wrapping and tying the tzitzit. Interestingly they both had such different hands .Each did beautiful work but they each looked different from one another. We visited a friend yesterday afternoon. I loved seeing the birds perfectly reflected in her back yard window. A few bits of pretty architecture near our friend's house. Hopefully I can gets lots of sleep on Shabbat so I can tackle the rest of my list. Two sweet springtime songs for you. Shabbat Shalom!

 There are some things that are inevitable during the process of preparing for Passover. One is that some kitchen things disappear.  This year after we switched the house I was unable to find my Melita coffee filter holders.  I need to have my jolt of coffee to make it through any day. But I REALLY need my coffee on high labor days like the days before Passover. I ordered a replacement coffee filter holder from Amazon. For two days until it arrived I just dumped my usual dose of ground coffee into a large mug and then filled the mug with boiling water. Eventually, the grounds settle but cleaning a pile of damp coffee grounds is really unpleasant, not to mention the yukky sensation of straining coffee grounds through your teeth. I was so happy when the replacement filter holder arrived. Unfortunately, the base was broken which made using the filter holder a bit fiddly. Luckily later in the day I found my two Passover filter holders which had been packed away in a pot. Toda...