Most absurd Pesach-related thing you did today

sky

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 9:12 am

amother wrote:

I agreed to turn over my kitchen on Sunday. Am I insane?

Nope. Sunday is the only day I have off work. I'm thinking motzei shabbos and Sunday I'll do the main heavy cleaning (I started pre-cleaning so it will go faster). Kasher Sunday night. Monday night cover and start bringing out all the stuff - it takes a long time. I'll be lucky if I'm ready to start cooking by Tuesday.

[I find turning over hard because I have so little to give my kids to eat, we don't eat chicken on pesach and DH would rather I not bring it into the kitchen once we turn over so it limits me to what I can serve. I think I'm going to use the outside grill a lot]

amother

Jetblack

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 11:45 am

sky wrote:

Sunday is the only day my husband can help. It will be finished on Sunday. I am worried about feeding my family for the week. We are also extra limited what we eat Pesach and DH doesn't want me using anything the week before we don't eat during.

Lilibet

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 11:54 am

amother wrote:

I am worried about feeding my family for the week. We are also extra limited what we eat Pesach and DH doesn't want me using anything the week before we don't eat during.

I make and freeze meals in aluminum foil pans. Double wrapped. Bake them, serve in quarantine zone, then run the self-clean cycle on the oven.

Might ask you marriage counselor if this would work for you ;-)

Miri7

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 12:34 pm

Lilibet wrote:

Wait. There were 19 people in your community who had made no plans for the seder until yesterday?

I can procrastinate with the best of them, but how does that happen?

I'm not sure how that happens either. We are MO and have a number of friends and neighbors who are less observant, and hadn't been invited elsewhere. So they were really happy to be invited to Seder at our house. And our rav has a list of people who would like invitations who are elderly, single, new to the area or whatever.

You would be surprised how many Jewish families want to have a nice Seder but don't get invited out or feel like they can do it themselves. It makes me sad just thinking about it.

One frum close friend of mine was going to do both sedarim at her house , just their family the first night and guests the second. So now she only has to make one Seder.

But most folks in my community do have their plans lined up and preparations well underway. Hachnasat orchim is a favorite mitzvah of ours so we do tend to collect guests.

debsey

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 1:37 pm

I served grilled cheese made out of hot dog buns, really fancy penne ala vodka sauce from my freezer, and kosher'l pesach mozarella cheese (cuz that's what they had in the store) for breakfast to my children.
My son took a bite and said "tastes like it's almost Pesach." Not sure if that was a compliment or an insult, but as long as he ate it, we're all good........

Lilibet

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 3:30 pm

debsey wrote:

my son took a bite and said "tastes like it's almost Pesach." .

LOL.

My kids would recognize that taste! I have this thrifty impulse which, along with the practical advantages of eating up almost-empty packages so that there is less to put away, leads every year to a mixed-pastsa-shapes-with-unusual-sauce dinner.

Lilibet

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 3:46 pm

Miri7 wrote:

we do tend to collect guests.

Interesting. Certainly it depends on the community. I still make the sedarim, but I don't do it now the home we live in year round. Last time we did, 2 years ago, near a large university, in addition to family and almost-family, our sedarim included a young couple with a difficult pregnancy who couldn't fly home, a young couple with a premature infant who couldn't fly home, 4 or maybe 5 (I can't quite remember) individuals who were for one reason and another without a seder who were sent to me, someone's cousin who had never attended a seder and was curious, and a young, frum Israeli visiting academic (with wife and small child) who came to our second seder because they wanted to see how an American second seder works.

I don't run a Hillel or a Chabad House or anything remotely like that. We're just an ordinary family, but this used to happen. Just, I somehow thought of each last-minute, unexpected guest as having been stranded, seder-less by a special crisis of some sort. And a week ahead none of them were expected. But when I read your answer, I wondered at my own silly question.

The new-to-me thought in your response is the idea of people who are daunted by the idea of making a seder, and end up without one. that's a shame.

amother

Red

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 5:55 pm

Dismantled my candelabra and put it in the dishwasher.
It's silver plated cost about $65 and was really sticky and disgusting.
DH was planning to get me a new one.
If it comes out clean and I'm able to put it together again , I'll ask for something else

mille

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 6:06 pm

I'm sure others would call this insane or absurd. I've done nothing. Absolutely nothing! I don't plan on moving a finger until next Thursday. As in, a week from tomorrow!

Well, I guess the only thing I did do was brought out the box of pesach stuff to sit in the corner and accumulate new stuff (plastic table cloths and other things we had to buy).

sky

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 7:57 pm

Washed the fabric vertical blinds in the dining room that are right next to the table, and cream, and textured, that came with the house. (not practical for a family of kids eating in such close proximity)

I'm embarrassed to say how long we have lived here and never washed them other then dusting. But they were filthy and looking at a clean room made the dirtiness jump out. So I washed them slowly in my bathtub.

b'h for Pesach or I would never attempt such cleaning (I can blame it on pesach because there was food on the blinds)

imasinger

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 8:29 pm

I'm sorry! I'll do it tonight. Thanks to Relish for pointing me back here.

I've been on a tear, either working or cooking, and not doing much sleeping. Thus far, I have made and frozen: the aforementioned cookies, spicy ratatoille, matbuchka, minted zucchini potato soup, chicken soup, brownies, sweet and sour meatballs, and almond schnitzel. I hope to make two nut cakes, maybe cashew butter cookies, and the base layer for yodels before tomorrow afternoon.

Those of you who wait until bedikas chometz to clean, when do you cook?!

The chocolate chip cookies are nothing unusual, really. I don't know why my kids go so crazy about them.

Stay tuned.

imasinger

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 8:59 pm

I'm back.

Pesach chocolate chip cookies

Preheat oven to 375.

1/3 C walnut oil
1/3 C sugar
1/2 C brown sugar
1 egg
2 t vanilla sugar (I use 1.5-2 t real vanilla, not imitation. It's expensive, but really makes a difference in taste).
Mix together.

In a separate bowl, mix:
1/3 C potato starch (if you are making this non gebrochts, use 2/3 C )
2/3 C matzo cake meal (if making gebrochts)
1 t baking powder
1/2 t salt (add or subtract to taste)

Add dry ingredients to wet. Add chocolate chips. Drop onto baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

Bake for 6 minutes, then switch racks (put the pan that was on the top rack onto the bottom, and vice versa). Bake for another 6 minutes.

Remove paper from hot pan, and cool.

Enjoy!

33055

Wed, Mar 25 2015, 11:18 pm

imasinger wrote:

Looking forward to trying this recipe. I would like to understand about the real vanilla.

How do you use real vanilla? Do you seep the beans in not water? Would you kindly post how?

amother

Powderblue

Thu, Mar 26 2015, 12:02 am

mille wrote:

I'm sure others would call this insane or absurd. I've done nothing. Absolutely nothing! .

That makes two of us, unless you count bringing home from work my packets of emergency instant oatmeal so that they can be consumed this week. So far my Pesach prep has consisted of consuming the genuine chometz lying around, so by now B"H there's very little genuine chometz left in the house, but all the odds and ends of chometzdik food remain to use up. No fun stuff like leftover Purim candy, just boring things cluttering up the fridge like half an apple, what looks like a penicillin factory but is probably some ancient salad and half a jar each of pickles, jam, soy sauce and chrain. My friend Shelly would combine them all into a relish of some sort and serve it with grilled chicken but I'm not that adventurous or creative. It'll probably all end up as landfill.

m in Israel

Thu, Mar 26 2015, 5:38 am

imasinger wrote:

Thanks for posting! Which version tastes better, the gebrochts or non-gebrochts? We eat gebrochts, so I can definitely make it that way, but somehow I find that in cakes and cookies often the shehakol stuff ends up tasting better.
Do you know which one is better in this recipe?