sashinka | observation orientated, with a twist of lime | a blog

Oh, What A Night

I've said it before, and I'll say it again (and so have a trillion other people): all Jewish festivals follow the age-old rubric "they tried to kill us, we won, let's eat," and Passover/Pesach is no different. This time it was the Egyptians, but who are we to bear a grudge?

Lovelyseder, last night. Same again tonight (ETA 90 minutes and counting). Some say one shouldn't update one's weblog on Yom Tov, but I regard myself as my own halachic authority in this regard.

I'm staying in this great little boutique hotel, in Cheadle. I can't give you the address because they only have two rooms, so are constantly booked, but they do a fabulous bespoke breakfast, and cater well for a vegetarian diet.

The food: I'm trying to keep off the matzah, in the same way that I mostly keep of bread/pasta: because in the last year I feel that I've woken up from a deep sleep, that may or may not be some kind of carbohydrate addiction (I can't believe I said that. Ignore it).

So, the food. Really. Auntie F made fantastic-fantastic-fantastic ingber - a carrot and ginger fudge, traditionally made at passover time. Auntie F regaled us with how to make her version "you take two pounds of carrots, grated, and two pounds of sugar... If you want it less sweet, you use less sugar... you test with your eyes to see if it's sweet... cut it with a pesachdicky knife..." Well worth it - it's one of those things that's a real labour of love, but boy do we appreciate it.

The eingimach - betroot jam, googled all over the shop, can't find a reference, sorry - was also pretty good. And someone made us a plum version, which we weren't so sure about (this was breakfast, of course, not part of the seder). Last night we also had a lengthy discussion about chremsel, matzabrei and all manner of unhealthy fodder. I'm kinda imagining that some of these recipes will just fade. You've got to have a lot of time/energy/commitment for most of them, and who has that, nowadays?

Also, I did the seder plate, and made the charoset, with which people were mightily impressed.