To this day, every holiday throughout the year has a specific set of dinner entrees, side dishes, noshes, and desserts. But none more than Pesach! It’s always been a goal of my mom to make the holidays extra special by creating a wonderland of delicious and memorable foods. During Pesach she keeps the cupboards stocked with Pesadig candies and chocolate from Israel. As a child, when there was a birthday party to attend during the holiday, she sent us along with our own amazing treats. This also really helped to curb the difficulty of going through the American Easter holiday season with all the Easter baskets piled high with (non-Pesadig) chocolate.

Let’s see, a typical Passover day’s meals might include:

Breakfast:
The Grown-up Breakfast. This is broken up matzah in a bowl with coffee and warmed milk and sugar carefully poured over it. A Hungarian tradition. My brother, sister and I still cannot understand why any grown-up would choose this over the best pancakes every invented.

The Kids Breakfast. Matzah meal and egg white pancakes, each one a puff of love served with pure maple syrup – special for Passover.

Lunch:
Matzah Brie. Now every family has a different recipe, my mom’s is a loose scramble of sliced carmelized onions, whipped eggs, salt and pepper, and quickly soaked matzah broken up into large pieces so it stays crunchy.
OR
Moroccon Omelet. Diced potatoes, carrots, parsley and garlic baked into an egg omelet spiced with tumeric, salt and pepper.
OR
Lotsa Matzah! with a spread of cheeses and salads. Steamed artichokes left over from the artichoke petals served at seder with my mom’s home made mayonnaise – special for Pesach. My mom usually ate cottage cheese toped with diced fresh carrots, scallions, tomatoes and cucumbers so she could splurge on one whole matzah liberally spread with sweet butter and sprinkled with kosher salt. I can still picture her face as she prepared this exceptional treat for herself.

Oh yes, and the U-Bets chocolate milk! Growing up, chocolate milk was a special treat reserved only for Shabbat (no wonder I love Shabbat so much) and on Pesach we always had the jar of U-Bets Chocolate Syrup which lasted far longer than the holiday but just was not as interesting or appealing after those eight days. Special for Pesach: Brown Cows, a yummy drink of chocolate milk mixed with soda water.

NOSH:
Frequent refrigerator raids for matzah brickle (see below), chocolate covered strawberries or whatever other left overs we could slice off or dig into.
OR
Compote. A sweet dish of cooked dried fruits in their own thick syrup. One time she poured chocolate into paper muffin cups, creating chocolate shells and served the compote in those! I’m telling you, my mom holds nothing back when it comes to holiday food prep!
OR
More Matzah! with anything you can imagine on top, especially leftover charoset from the seder.

Dinner:
Matzah Ball Soup. Now my mom always makes two kinds of matzah balls. One for my dad, the traditional heavy German “cannon ball” matzah balls, a recipe passed down from his great-grandmother. And the 2nd kind is a lighter mixture based on a Hungarian recipe mixed with chopped almonds, parsley, fresh ginger and soda water. Also, because of the vegetarians at the table, French onion soup (no cheese) replaces the more traditional chicken soup.
OR
Kubeh (KU-beh)! This one we would fight over. One of the few exceptions of meat in the house, this is a Sephardic treat of thick breaded (matzah mealed) dumpling stuffed with spiced ground lamb and fried.
OR
Edam Cheese and Spinach Souffle, my sister’s and my favorite.

Desserts:
The Brickle. Quite possibly every chocolate lover’s fantasy, the brickle is a delectable sheet of broken up matzah, topped with toasted almonds, topped with home-made caramel, and topped off with a swirl of milk and dark chocolates.
OR
The Seven Layered Matzah Cake. 7 matzot soaked in wine and layered with a sauce of chocolate combined with rasberry jam, egg, butter, and brandy. One year, I completely O.D.’d on this cake and haven’t really been able to eat it since.
OR
Fresh Strawberries Dipped in Chocolate
OR
Coffee Flavored Meringues (most of these can be made non-dairy to go with the seder meal of lamb.)
OR
Flourless Chocolate Cake
OR
Pecan Bonbons. These may be a little over the top, but what else is a holiday for? They are pecan halves filled with butter cream laced with brandy, topped with a pistachio, and then dipped in chocolate.

Door’s always open, come on over!

"MAKE Matza???" You ask. Yes! It’s probably one of the easiest things you’ll ever bake in your kitchen. The experience and the unique taste of home-made matzah is enough to make a family ritual out of it every year. My father is a master bread maker. So for him, the story of the Israelites speedily making unleavened bread and carrying it out of Egypt is especially interesting. He started baking matzah twenty years ago and today has perfected the process. Its most fun to do it in a group of about 8-10 people. This is an activity for ALL ages.

Ingredients:
1 part cold water
3 parts flour (approximately)

Now here’s the fun part: The entire process from when the water touches the flour to putting the matzah in the oven must be done in 18 minutes! Personally, putting in the added effort to make kosher matzot is what makes this such a fun activity. A few extra steps adds all the meaning.

Step 1: The Supplies
plenty of butcher paper and tape*
squares of sand paper*
rolling pins
hole puncher – anything from a plastic fork to a "dough docker" used for pizza preparation
1 large mixing bowl
2 measuring cups (I use styrofoam cups)
something to get the matzah in and out of the hot oven (I use a "pizza peel," a large flat wooden or metal plate with handle used for taking bread out of a brick oven
hot hot hot hot oven, as high as it goes
a timer

*You’ll want to do a few 18 minutes sessions of matzah making, so between each round (a) sand your rolling pin clean of old dough and (b) remove a layer of the butcher paper from your counters.

Prepare your kitchen and supplies.

Cover your kitchen counters or table with butcher paper and tape it down on the sides and corners. Put several layers of paper down to make it easier to change between sessions.
All bowls, measuring cups, rolling pins, hole punchers, peels, tiles are reserved for Pesach preperation. (You can use disposable stuff.)

Step 2: The Dough
Preheat the oven as high as it will go. My dad lines the oven shelves with tiles, plain red or brown bricks such as are sold for floors. This makes for some amazing matzah, but he’s hard core.

Place the flour in your bowl. Everyone should be at the ready with rolling pins in hands.
All together, recite "L’shem matzah shel mitzvah" in reference to the matzah we are commanded to eat at this time of year.
Set the timer for 18 minutes and add the water! GO!

One person (or many little hands at first) should knead the dough into a firm ball. If it seems too dry, sprinkle in a little more water at a time. Do the same with the flour if it seems too wet. Practice makes perfect.
Distribute smaller balls of dough (a little larger than a walnut) amongst the matzah makers. Roll and roll and roll out that dough until it as thin as you can get it. And then, roll it some more. Sprinkle plenty of flour onto the surface and the rolling pins to avoid sticking.
When you are sure it is as thin as you can get it, (we want our matzah to be crunchy instead of chewy, right?) punch tiny holes all over the matzah.

Step 3: Bake the Matzah
Carefully place the matzah on the floured peel and get it into that hot oven! Bake for just a few minutes, until it is browned but not burnt. It will get crispier once its taken out of the oven. Place finished matzah in a pile on more butcher paper so that it is kosher and ready for Pesach eating.
You have the remaining 18 minutes to finish using all of the dough you made and anything left over gets thrown out.
Once it’s cooled, wrap your matzah in fresh butcher paper and tape shut.
Your home-made matzah is going to blow that boxed store bought matzah out of the water. So be sure to use it during your seder and remember that its very fresh so eat it up quickly! During Pesach if your matzah feels a little stale, a few minutes in a hot oven will re-crispify it.

Enjoy!

1 lb pitted chopped dates or date paste
Sweet Kosher for Pesach wine
Ground cinnamon
Chopped walnuts

Cover dates with water in a saucepan and cook over moderate heat until the dates break down into a smooth mass. The results should be like a thick jam. Mix in enough wine to loosen the consistency slightly. Put through a Foley Mill to take out any lumps. Transfer to a serving dish and sprinkle liberally with cinnamon. Cover with a layer of finely chopped walnuts.

*If you do not want to use wine, just leave the liquid out.  Cook the dates in a little bit of water.  Do not substitute grape juice, it’s NOT delicious!

Preheat oven to 375 degrees

Ingredients:
Matzah
1 C butter
1 C brown sugar
Almonds – whole or chopped coarsely
2 packages Kosher l’Pesach semi-sweet chocolate and 2 packages milk chocolate chips

Grease a cookie pan with butter. Cover the pan with a layer of broken matzah pieces. Don’t leave any spaces. Sprinkle the matzah liberally with the nuts. Toast in the oven for approximately 15-20 minutes being careful that the matzah doesn’t burn. Boil together the butter and the sugar for 5 minutes, creating the toffee mixture. Remove the matzah and nuts from the oven and pour the toffee over it. Let cool to room temperature. Melt the semi-sweet chocolate and spread over the mixture in the cookie sheet. Melt the milk chocolate and swirl through the dark chocolate. Refrigerate until chocolate hardens. Break into pieces and enjoy.

Ingredients:
Ground lamb
Finely chopped onion
Finely chopped garlic
Salt
Pepper
Paprika
Cumin
Turmeric
1 egg
1 recipe of matzah ball mixture adding chopped parsley and ginger

All of the seasonings are to-taste. We make it quite spicy. Make matzah ball dough and refrigerate for at least one hour. Mix together the lamb and the following eight ingredients. Form a ball with the matzah meal dough and making an indentation at one end, stuff the dough with the meat mixture until the dough just coats the meat. Deep fry until the dough is lightly browned. Drain on paper towel and serve hot.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees

Ingredients:
6 eggs, separated
1 lb spinach
1/2 lb edam cheese, sliced
1 lb cottage cheese
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg (or to taste)
matzah

Butter the inside of a soufflé dish and cover the bottom with a double layer of matzah.

Plunge spinach into boiling water and remove almost immediately, squeezing some of the water out. Place spinach on top of the matzah, sprinkly nutmeg over the spinach and cover with the sliced Edam cheese.

Beat the egg whites until they form stiff peaks, set aside. Beat the egg yolks with the cottage cheese and fold in the egg whites. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Bake for approximately 50 minutes, until the egg whites on top are browned and not too jiggly. Serve immediately.

Seven Layer Matzah  Cake

1/2 lb semi sweet chocolate
1 tblsp unsalted butter
1/2 lb or 1 jar raspberry jam without seeds (can also use marmalade)
2 eggs
2 tblsp brandy
3/4 C white wine (can use dry Vermouth as well)
7 matzot

(the jam and chocolate should be checked to make sure it is kosher l’Pesach)

Melt chocolate, butter and jam together over hot water in double boiler

Add eggs and beat with wire whisk until mixture is smooth and consistency of sour cream

Add brandy and remove from heat.

Continue beating until mixture again thickens to consistency of sour cream

Pour wine into a 9" square dish

Dip matzah (one at a time) in wine just to moisten

Plase moistened matzah on a cake plate and coat with chocolate mixture using a knife or spatula

Top with another moistened matzah and coat with chocolate. Continue
until all seven matzot are stacked and covered with the mixture

Cover sides with remaining mixture and cover top with ground nuts – or make a design using sliced almonds.

Refrigerate until 1/2 hour before serving. The chocolate will harden a
bit and you can take all the drippings and smear with up on the sides
of the cake so that none will be wasted.

Slice in thin wedges and serve.

To this day, every holiday throughout the year has a specific set of dinner entrees, side dishes, noshes, and desserts. But none more than Pesach! It’s always been a goal of my mom to make the holidays extra special by creating a wonderland of delicious and memorable foods. During Pesach she keeps the cupboards stocked with Pesadig candies and chocolate from Israel. As a child, when there was a birthday party to attend during the holiday, she sent us along with our own amazing treats. This also really helped to curb the difficulty of going through the American Easter holiday season with all the Easter baskets piled high with (non-Pesadig) chocolate.

Let’s see, a typical Passover day’s meals might include:

Breakfast:
The Grown-up Breakfast. This is broken up matzah in a bowl with coffee and warmed milk and sugar carefully poured over it. A Hungarian tradition. My brother, sister and I still cannot understand why any grown-up would choose this over the best pancakes every invented.

The Kids Breakfast. Matzah meal and egg white pancakes, each one a puff of love served with pure maple syrup – special for Passover.

Lunch:
Matzah Brie. Now every family has a different recipe, my mom’s is a loose scramble of sliced carmelized onions, whipped eggs, salt and pepper, and quickly soaked matzah broken up into large pieces so it stays crunchy.
OR
Moroccon Omelet. Diced potatoes, carrots, parsley and garlic baked into an egg omelet spiced with tumeric, salt and pepper.
OR
Lotsa Matzah! with a spread of cheeses and salads. Steamed artichokes left over from the artichoke petals served at seder with my mom’s home made mayonnaise – special for Pesach. My mom usually ate cottage cheese toped with diced fresh carrots, scallions, tomatoes and cucumbers so she could splurge on one whole matzah liberally spread with sweet butter and sprinkled with kosher salt. I can still picture her face as she prepared this exceptional treat for herself.

Oh yes, and the U-Bets chocolate milk! Growing up, chocolate milk was a special treat reserved only for Shabbat (no wonder I love Shabbat so much) and on Pesach we always had the jar of U-Bets Chocolate Syrup which lasted far longer than the holiday but just was not as interesting or appealing after those eight days. Special for Pesach: Brown Cows, a yummy drink of chocolate milk mixed with soda water.

NOSH:
Frequent refrigerator raids for matzah brickle (see below), chocolate covered strawberries or whatever other left overs we could slice off or dig into.
OR
Compote. A sweet dish of cooked dried fruits in their own thick syrup. One time she poured chocolate into paper muffin cups, creating chocolate shells and served the compote in those! I’m telling you, my mom holds nothing back when it comes to holiday food prep!
OR
More Matzah! with anything you can imagine on top, especially leftover charoset from the seder.

Dinner:
Matzah Ball Soup. Now my mom always makes two kinds of matzah balls. One for my dad, the traditional heavy German “cannon ball” matzah balls, a recipe passed down from his great-grandmother. And the 2nd kind is a lighter mixture based on a Hungarian recipe mixed with chopped almonds, parsley, fresh ginger and soda water. Also, because of the vegetarians at the table, French onion soup (no cheese) replaces the more traditional chicken soup.
OR
Kubeh (KU-beh)! This one we would fight over. One of the few exceptions of meat in the house, this is a Sephardic treat of thick breaded (matzah mealed) dumpling stuffed with spiced ground lamb and fried.
OR
Edam Cheese and Spinach Souffle, my sister’s and my favorite.

Desserts:
The Brickle. Quite possibly every chocolate lover’s fantasy, the brickle is a delectable sheet of broken up matzah, topped with toasted almonds, topped with home-made caramel, and topped off with a swirl of milk and dark chocolates.
OR
The Seven Layered Matzah Cake. 7 matzot soaked in wine and layered with a sauce of chocolate combined with rasberry jam, egg, butter, and brandy. One year, I completely O.D.’d on this cake and haven’t really been able to eat it since.
OR
Fresh Strawberries Dipped in Chocolate
OR
Coffee Flavored Meringues (most of these can be made non-dairy to go with the seder meal of lamb.)
OR
Flourless Chocolate Cake
OR
Pecan Bonbons. These may be a little over the top, but what else is a holiday for? They are pecan halves filled with butter cream laced with brandy, topped with a pistachio, and then dipped in chocolate.

Door’s always open, come on over!

Using your favorite cake or cookie dough recipe, spread the batter onto a 11 X 14 cookie sheet (one without sides so that the cookie can be slipped off onto a board).

After baking, while the dough is still slightly warm…

Cut the basic shape of a tree out of the cake (whoever works on this project gets to eat the scraps).  Begin at the top by cutting around the corners to make a round treetop.  Create the trunk by cutting into both sides to make a narrow tree trunk shape. *Keep it simple so that it’s still easy to spread the frosting. Decorate!

- To make the bark of the tree, spread dark brown chocolate icing over the entire cake.  Another idea for the bark is to use chocolate chips.  Pack them tightly onto the “trunk” and make branches as well.
- Mix together cream cheese, powdered sugar and a few drops of green food coloring to make green icing.   Pipe it on with a decorating bag or squeeze it out of the cut-off edge of a ziplock bag, to make leaves and grass. (of course you can also just dollop it on with a spoon too!)
- Use M&Ms and other colorful candies  for fruits and flowers.
-You can also use flower or butterfuly cookie cutters on the left-over baked dough, decorated them as well and place them around the tree.

Basically, you’re making a cookie painting.  Send pictures!! ]]> http://shirlala.com/activities-for-home-and-classroom/tu-bshvat-birthday-cake/feed 0 http://shirlala.com/holidays/tu-bshvat-recipes http://shirlala.com/holidays/tu-bshvat-recipes#comments Fri, 01 Jan 2016 11:10:21 +0000 admin http://shirlalacom.setupmyblog.com/?p=13 From, “Taste of Tradition”  by Ruth Sirkis

Ruth, considered to be ‘the Julia Child of Israel” tells us, Tu B’Shvat is all about “going on a nature kick.” In Israel, “meadows, orchards and vineyards begin to blossom.” So, “foods of the holiday are related to nature and trees as well. It is traditional to serve fruits. Since few are available fresh at this time of year, dried varieties are most often used.”

Almond-Prune Sweets

40 medium size pitted prunes (you can also use dried apricots)
8 oz apricot jam (or any other kind of jam)
20 blanched almonds
20 small paper cups

1. Place a prune in each cup. Spread with jam.

2. Top with another prune. Press together with your fingers. Spread top prune with more jam and tuck an almond on top.

Date-fig-walnut treats

4 oz pitted dates
4 oz figs
2 tblsp breadcrumbs
2 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp brandy (optional)
4 oz chopped walnuts
20 small cups

1. Remove fig stems. Grind figs and dates together in a food processor. Add one tablespoon of bread crumbs. Put into medium bowl.

2. Add lemon juice and brandy. Mix well with wooden spoon. Add remaining breadcrumbs and blend until a smooth dough forms.

3. Form ropes the thickness of a finger. Cut into 2 inch strips. Spread chopped walnuts on a plate and press each “finger” into them. Place in cups walnut side up.

“Taste of Tradition” is available in the USA via Amazon and also via many Jewish book stores.  Ruth has another book in English “Popular Foods From Israel”, which covers typical Israeli dishes.

Another suggestion from my mom, Barbara Kline

1. Fill dried apricots with softened cream cheese and top with a few dried cranberries or cherries.  You can do the same with dates.

From, “Jewish Holiday Kitchen” by Joan Nathan

Poached Fruit with Wine

6 oz pitted prunes
6 oz dried figs
½ C pecan halves
1 ½ C dry red wine
¼ C sweet red wine or port
¼ C brown sugar or to taste
1 stick cinnamon
4 cloves
grated peel of 1 lemon
½ sliced orange
1 handful of juniper berries

1. Place prunes, figs, and pecan halves in saucepan, adding enough wine to cover ¼ of the way up the fruits and nuts.

2. Add remaining ingredients and simmer uncovered over low heat for about 20 minutes.

3. Serve with whipped cream. It’s all very rich so serve small portions.

She also makes a salad with

1 peeled and sliced orange in round pieces
1 avocado sliced
1 endive separated
1 bunch of watercress
½ head romaine lettuce
2 pitted dates slivered small
seeds of ½ pomegranate or ¼ C cranberries

1. Combine all in bowl.

2. 15 minutes before serving, mix in the following salad dressing (15 minutes is in honor of the 15 kinds of fruits and nuts eaten on the 15th of Shvat).

Dressing

1. Combine all ingredients except olive oil.

2. Slowly drizzle in oil, whisking until well blended.