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MY 98-year-old mother calls my Passover seder a gantzeh megillah — a big production. She’s right. For me, the seder is the hardest event of the year to prepare for. Yet it is by far the most meaningful because it commemorates the defining chapter in Judaism, when the Jews fled slavery in Egypt to freedom in the promised land.
The seder plate, clockwise from top: a burned egg, haroseth, shank bone, parsley and horseradish.
By JOAN NATHAN
Published: March 27, 2012
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Joan Nathan's Matzo Balls
Slide Show Recipes for the Passover Table
Recipes
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Pear Haroseth With Pecans and Figs (March 28, 2012)
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Horseradish and Beet Tartare (March 28, 2012)
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Joan Nathan's Matzo Balls (March 28, 2012)
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Joan Nathan's Matzo Chremsel (March 28, 2012)
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Times Topic: Passover
Shannon Jensen for The New York Times
For the seder plate, an egg is burned, symbolizing the destroyed temple in Jerusalem.
By the time the 40-plus guests arrive at my home in Washington on the evening of April 6 and are seated around the mismatched tables and chairs, I will let out a deep sigh of relief. I will also probably get chills, knowing that I’m following what was written in the Bible more than 2,500 years ago. We may not "eat the flesh that same night, roasted over fire," as the Book of Exodus says, but we still eat unleavened bread, bitter herbs and many other dishes added to the original meal.
I have been the host of this Passover meal for about three decades. I’ve mixed recipes that we’ve eaten for years with new ones, like eggs that are covered in sand and baked overnight. I have a gefilte fish party with some friends beforehand. The main course and desserts are on a buffet table. I prepare at least five variations of haroseth, a mixture of sweet fruit and nuts that symbolizes the mortar used for buildings in Egypt. (On Wednesday I will make one of them at the White House.) For the vegetarians at my table I make a vegetarian broth with matzo balls.
My seder survival tactics boil down to a few basics. Make a list. Follow it. Always accept help when offered. And remember to create your own family traditions. With my nine-day Passover countdown plan, you can give a stress-free seder for five or 50. And you can enjoy yourself.
Unlike many practicing American Jews, my husband, Allan, and I have only one formal Passover seder and do not use special dishes. But we remove all leavened products and legumes like beans from our house, and we eat matzo each day. We divide the work: he conducts the seder, buys the wines and gets the gifts for the children who find the afikomen, the hidden matzo; I prepare the food and tables.
The seder plate, holding special foods that are mentioned in the seder service, is a focal point of the table. On our seder plate the horseradish, symbolic of the bitterness of slavery, is served with matzo and haroseths whose recipes I have gathered in my trips around the world. I make versions with chestnuts, dates and cherry preserves, all representing places where Jews wandered in the diaspora. This year I’m using a recipe from a recent visit to Arkansas.
The eggs for the plate — symbolic of the sacrifice in the temple in ancient Jerusalem and of everlasting life — are left in the shell, covered in sand and cooked overnight in a tagine, a recipe I found in a French cookbook with Jewish recipes imported from North Africa. My husband’s mother started the formal meal with hard-cooked eggs, serving them peeled and in salt water, an Eastern European custom. I have followed her tradition with my eggs, which come out caramel-colored and creamy.
Then, the gefilte fish, which I make with friends in my kitchen the day before the seder at our annual "gefilte fish-in." My friends bring their own pots and their own mix of whitefish, pike and carp, and onions and carrots. We grind the fish and the onions in my KitchenAid mixer and cook them in six separate pots. With the fish I always serve homemade horseradish sauce; the root holds a place of honor in my garden. Sometimes a guest will bring great horseradish from New York, ground on the Lower East Side; this year I am using a recipe from Kutsher’s Tribeca .
For the children, the most welcome dish is the chicken soup with matzo balls. My matzo balls, neither heavy as lead nor light as a feather, are al dente, infused with fresh ginger and nutmeg. This year, with so many guests, I will freeze them, and the soup, in advance.
On the buffet is either brisket with lots of onions, carrots and wine, or one made with preserved lemon and tomato. There is also roasted chicken with fennel for those who don’t want red meat. With the meat I always serve a spring vegetable like asparagus in an orange mayonnaise that a friend brings, as well as other make-ahead dishes like roasted red-pepper salad , roasted beet salad and, lately, quinoa with vegetables. I have been omitting kugel — too heavy.
For dessert, I have a buffet of Passover chocolate roll, lemon torte, strawberries and a compote with chremsel, a fritter filled with nuts and dried fruit that my father loved when he was growing up in Germany.
Like everything in Judaism, our seder evolves each year and the props seem to pile up. A few years ago we added an orange to our seder plate, symbolizing that a woman, too, can lead a seder. I also have a collection of plastic frogs and snakes to throw when the plagues are mentioned. When we sing the Passover song "Dayenu," I give everyone a scallion, and we playfully hit each other to act out a Persian custom that symbolizes the sting of the whip from Egyptian taskmasters.
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