Pasta For Passover?
A little simplistic background...Passover is the Jewish holiday where (over dinner, which is called a Seder), we relive the exodus of the Jews from Egypt. Charleton Heston starred in the epic film version - The Ten Commandments. Heston played Moses AND the voice of God (which I did not know until just now).NOTE: Passover won't begin until March 29th, but every Jewish housewife is already starting to plan her menus and buy up all the Passover goodies she can find.
There is one key ingredient that we eat throughout the eight days of Passover and it symbolizes the hasty escape and wandering through the Sinai desert for 40 years. We do not eat bread, or any leavened baked goods. That, my friends, means no flour. Instead, we eat lots of matzo (photo at the top of the post - think crackers) - sheets of it - great for a snack with butter and jam, or fried - I'll have to write the recipe for ours, which is basically a cross between scrambled eggs and French toast, sounds weird but tastes awesome... farfel - large crumbs, in soups as you would crumbled crackers and traditional stuffings,
like this Farfel Stuffed Chicken Breasts with Black Currant Sauce,And matzo meal, which is ground matzo, because no Jewish feast would be complete without chicken soup with matzo balls.
or Velvet Squash & Carrot Soup with Curried Matzo Balls...
All that to say, if you're a bread addict, you'll still be fine.Fine and dandy but what about pasta? It's been a very long time since I've found kosher for Passover pasta and, being such a pasta person, I've always tried to find dishes that feel and taste like pasta, even if there isn't a noodle in sight.
Last year I made Sweet Potato & Mushroom Lasagna
and the year before that was the Spinach Lasagna (made with matzo).This year, I've already done some experimenting and was delighted when I saw a recipe for Eggplant Rollups on the cover of Bon Appetit
that really looks like cannelloni. (I know, not the best picture, but we were in a hurry to eat it, not to mention the fact that I left my camera at home. This was taken with an iPhone.) The dish was awesome! So Jewish or not, Passover or not, this should definitely be on your table soon.

And, naturally....guess what I found yesterday at the one grocery store in Halifax that actually has a supply of Passover foods.... not one but two kinds of kosher for Passover pasta.

Labels: Food+Drink, Passover, Pasta, Presto Pasta Night























Boaz has a brother (who is already over a year old!)
And Presto Pasta Night hasn't just survived that upheaval. It's thrived!!! And I couldn't have done it without you! 



















