Passover: In Every Generation
Food, family, memory--and Mom's Charoset!
Passover is holiday of remembrance but also finds relevance in the present moment. We are commanded to tell the story to our children and make it so vivid they will literally taste the bitterness of slavery and the sweetness of freedom, something that is symbolized by the foods we eat.
Last year I wrote about how the story of Exodus on which the Passover Hagaddah is based is similar to my own family saga. I thought I’d re-post that account since it is a tale of peril, flight and hope, something particularly topical in light of what is going on in Ukraine and in so many parts of the world.
Stay tuned to the bottom, where I share my mother’s charoset recipe—delicious, simple, and a perfect sweet topping for matzo—or to spoon right out of the bowl!
“In every generation, we should view ourselves as if we had been liberated from Egypt.” (From the Passover Haggadah)
If there was ever a holiday that speaks to our present moment, it’s the Jewish observance of Passover, which in 2022 begins at sunset this evening, April 15.
Our time includes all the elements of the original Exodus tale, as related in the Passover Haggadah, of how the Israelites escaped bondage in Egypt and fled to freedom: two years of “captivity” because of the pandemic, food insecurity, homelessness, a plague that has killed and sickened untold numbers.
Elsewhere in the world, we witness the rise of despots, and of heroes—particularly, the tragic example in 2022 of Russia’s merciless war against Ukraine. But, as in the Haggadah and on this holiday, we yearn and pray for the renewal of freedom and hope—as essential as the air we breathe.
And, if you love food—and good stories—there is no better occasion than a Passover seder in which you actually use the foods of the seder plate—the bitter and the sweet—to tell a saga of travails and triumph, and then treat yourself to a multi-course feast.
Today you can find a seder to suit your attention span—everything from a 30-minute version to one you might zip through in 2 minutes. These bear little relation to the seders I remember from childhood, many conducted by my father at my grandmother’s house in Berkeley or at ours in Palo Alto. In my memory, these went on for hours!
My father, a bit of a purist when it came to family seders, felt it was important to touch on all the important points in the Haggadah—no shortcuts. In the course of asking and answering the four questions, telling the stories of the four sons, reciting (and blotting out with drops of wine) the 10 plagues, hiding and retrieving a broken piece of matzo, and sampling and discussing the symbolic foods on the seder plate, my father maintained that the entire history of the Jewish people could be told. It was a saga of suffering and persecution, struggle, hope and, finally, freedom—and joy. And we sang a lot, often accompanied on the mandolin by my talented Uncle Phil!
For me, the story in the Haggadah was my family’s immigrant story too: escaping all but certain annihilation in Nazi Germany and coming to America to begin anew. Wasn’t that something like fleeing the evil Pharaoh en route to the Promised Land?
My second cousin Ursula remembers her grandmother Lily, one of my grandfather’s two older sisters, and her mother Elizabeth, Lily’s daughter and my father’s first cousin, knowing all the Passover melodies and prayers “backwards and forwards” because of their Orthodox upbringing in Karlsruhe, Germany, the city where my father and his siblings were also born and raised.
Ursula came to America at age 5 with her parents, sister and two brothers in late 1938 at around the same time as my grandparents, right before it became almost impossible for Jews to leave. For Ursula, as for me, that story of escaping the Nazis and emigrating to a new land was an obvious way to make the Passover story personal for her and husband Irv’s four children.
“When we came to the point in the seder when you were supposed to think of yourself as if you were in Egypt and wonder about how you would have acted, we would talk about what had happened in our family.”
That tale of immigration formed the background story of the lives of my first-generation American cousins—the sense that we were the lucky ones who grew up in a land where freedom was our birthright as citizens—unlike the darkness our parents had fled in that other place called Germany.
That consciousness of being an American was somehow part of the seder. Our parents and grandparents gloried in having achieved this new and bright chance for the next generation. Ursula’s parents could send her and her brothers and sisters to school to get an education. In the Germany they had left behind, where Hitler was on the verge of launching a war and a Holocaust, that wasn’t possible.
At the seder table, my father reminded us to recline on the pillows that had been added to the chairs because we were free, like other Americans, even as we dined on German china amid heavy, beautifully crafted German furniture miraculously spirited away under the nose of the Third Reich.
How did they manage it? I still don’t know. But they felt a victory had been won and they never forgot it—or let their children or grandchildren forget it either. And the seder was a place where that story was told through another much older story—the exodus from Egypt.
This year, we will surely tell that story again—and some new ones that include another despot and a people fighting for their lives, their future and their freedom. Some stories never die.
Mom’s Charoset
My mother Flora wrote down many recipes, but not for her signature charoset, the apple, almond, wine and sugar mix she made each year for the seder. Charoset, sometimes spelled “haroset” and pronounced with a guttural “H” sound in the back of the throat—the same way as “challah” and “Chanukah” (usually spelled Hanukkah)—is supposed to represent the mortar the Israelites used to make bricks when they were enslaved in Egypt. The color should be a reddish-brown, so cinnamon and apples have just the right hue.
There are many fancier charoset preparations than Flora’s, sometimes made with dried fruits, seeds, even chilis. My mother’s version was simple and no-nonsense, somewhat like she was. Basically, there are only four ingredients. I usually make it without measuring, as Mom did, tasting as I go along and adding more of whatever I think the mixture needs. But, to share a recipe, you must measure.
Depending on the apples you use, you will need more or less sweetener. But the most important ingredients are your own tastebuds. Is it too tart? Add more sugar or honey. Is it too bland? Add more cinnamon. Did you make it too sweet? Spritz on a bit of lemon juice. Do you have visitors who don’t drink alcohol? Use grape juice instead. Bored with the recipe? Try one of these eight inventive ones from Kosher Like Me. I do like a change and a challenge from time to time—and almost any kind of charoset is delicious. And, after all, it represents what’s sweet not only on Passover but in life!
Flora’s Charoset Recipe
(Makes about 3 cups)
Ingredients:
1 pound apples* (3 to 4), peeled, cored and coarsely grated
3/4 cup (90 grams) blanched slivered almonds, coarsely chopped (Optional: Toast the nuts lightly in a pan on the stove or in a toaster oven to give the charoset added flavor, but beware—nuts burn really easily!)
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon honey (Optional: If you don’t use, add another tablespoon of sugar.)
2 tablespoons sweet wine (I used Manischewitz, but feel free to sub. You can also use grape juice.)
*I sometimes add a little grated lemon rind, though my mother never did.
*Note: Depending on which types of apples you use, you’ll need more or less sweetener. I used fairly sweet apples for this recipe—mostly Pink Lady, Gala and Fuji. If you use Granny Smith, which are fairly tart, another tablespoon or two of sugar or honey will be in order.
Directions:
Peel and core apples. Grate on the coarsest setting of a hand grater. (I’ve never attempted to do it in a food processor, but it might just work.) Put into a medium-sized bowl. (Note: Some folks prefer their charoset to be the consistency of real mortar, more like paste, but my mother’s was not like that! Again, feel free to change it to suit your taste!)
Stir in chopped nuts, cinnamon, sugar and honey, if using.
Add wine or grape juice. Taste and add more sugar, cinnamon or nuts to taste. If there’s too much liquid, you can drain a little off—or just mix it in.
Keep well-covered in the fridge and use within a day or two. It’s wonderful with matzo, of course, but I know there are many other uses. Please do let me know if you come up with novel things to do with leftover charoset—though you may find you don’t have any!
Thanks for taking the time to read my newsletter on a busy holiday weekend. Happy Passover, Happy Easter and Ramadan Mubarak to all who are celebrating! Please let me know if you have special memories of holidays past, what you ate, and stories you told.
Thank you so much for sharing these memories. My Charoset is similar to your Mom's. I think the entire Ashkenazi Diaspora was on my street when I was growing up. Those foods taste like memory and like home.
Wow! These are beautiful family stories! Thank you for sharing - especially for the charoset recipe. Our familiy usually just uses apples and honey, but this year I will add in some wine and almonds too. Happy Passover!