Any truly good Passover recipes?

<p>Actually last week or so…someone DID bump up the Passover recipe thread…go back a page or two on the posts and you’ll find it!</p>

<p>I understand this needs to be bumped again…</p>

<p>Has everyone been cleaning? We’re throwing both seders due to medical issues elsewhere so have a huge shopping list! And that doesn’t even count the Passover foods which are already waiting in the closet.</p>

<p>Do you use a springform pan?</p>

<p>I make these for Pesach or Purim. They melt in your mouth and taste wonderful. I’m copying from Machlin’s recipe. I don’t get quite so many cookies in number with these ingredients. I bake a double batch.</p>

<p>RICCIARELLI DI SIENA (Siena Almond Cookies)
(from Edda Servi Machlin, “The Classic Cuisine of the Italian Jews”)</p>

<p>2 eggwhites
dash salt
granulated sugar
Freshly grated rind of 1 orange
1 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
10 ounces (283g.) finely chopped blanched almonds (blender)
1/4 cup Passover cake meal
2 Tblsp. non-diary margarine (for pareve)
Confectioners sugar (discussed in posts #525 -527 below)</p>

<p>Beat egg whites w/ salt til stiff/dry. Gradually add 1 cup sugar. Beat to consistency of marshmallow. Add orange rind, almond and vanilla extracts, then add almonds. Stir until a rather hard paste.</p>

<p>Combine Passover cake meal with 1/4 cup sugar. Generously grease baking sheet w/ margerine; sprinkle it w/ this mixture of cakemeal/sugar.</p>

<p>Divide almond paste into 24 to 30 equal parts. W/ greased hands, shape each into a diamond. Place 2" apart on prepared bake sheet. Bake in preheated 250-degree oven for 12-13 min.</p>

<p>Remove cookies from oven while still white, and while still hot sprinkle lightly w/ confectioners sugar (optional)…a sifter helps. Carefuly rmove to cooling rack. When thoroughly cool, store in tightly closed box at room temp. YIELDS 24-30.</p>

<p>Note: Ricciarelli’s texture is best if eaten within 1-2 days. However, they can be frozen. Remove as many as needed from freezer, let stand 1 hour at room temp before serving.</p>

<p>Eager to try the above, but a little confused: “Sprinkle it with mixture of flour and sugar”–does this mean the cake meal and sugar–and the only use for the 1/4 cup cake meal and the 1/4 cup sugar is to sprinkle on the pan? What does that do, and isn’t there a lot left over? Also, I thought confectioners sugar wasn’t Kosher for Passover because of the cornstarch in it.</p>

<p>^You can make KLP confectioners sugar by combining regular sugar and potato starch in the food processor.</p>

<p>^Yes, or just skip Confectioners Sugar, as it’s an optional step.</p>

<p>The difficulty here is it’s a “Purim or Pesach” recipe in the cookbook. Likely she miswrote “flour” right there – good catch, MommaJ. I’m sure she meant Passover Cake Meal & Sugar at that juncture.</p>

<p>I’ll go back and use Edit function to fix it in my post above. Thanks for noticing.</p>

<p>All that big sprinkle of cake meal/sugar does is make a textured surface to keep the cookies from sticking greasily down onto the margerine. But yes, it kind of goes to waste across the pan.</p>

<p>These are simple and delicious. A hit every time.</p>

<p>Peanut Butter Cookies
1 cup smooth peanut butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg</p>

<p>Mix thoroughly and bake at 350 until very lightly browned (about 8-10 minutes).</p>

<p>You can roll them in balls and criss cross flatten with a fork. Or, alternatively, add in some chocolate chips and have a drop cookie. Both are delicious.</p>

<p>RE: Removal of Sponge cake. No…I don’t use a springform. I use a flat-bottom tube pan with removable top. It’s what my mother always used…although mine is non-stick. (Or…I should say…is supposed to be non-stick!)</p>

<p>I have the same problem with bundt cakes that I make in a tube pan…but it doesn’t have a removable bottom. </p>

<p>Am I cooking these cakes too long…or not long enough?</p>

<p>(Thanks for letting me know the thread had been revived…I just hadn’t been on the Cafe for a few days…)</p>

<p>The lovely peanut butter cookie recipe would be a hit for Passover for families of Sephardi/Spanish-ancestry Jews (fled Spain 1492 or Portugal 1520? from Inquisition, dispersed around the Mediterranean and South America…). </p>

<p>But if anyone now reading is brand new to Passover cooking in America, be careful to know that Jews from Western or Eastern Europe (Asheknazi) European/Russian/Polish etc. ancestries don’t eat rice or legumes (including peanuts) during Passover.</p>

<p>There are plenty of articles about these differences, and rabbinic justifications for both traditions that make sense due to climate and more. If interested, see: “kitniyot” or I’ll try to get a link here. </p>

<p>Maybe that’s why Machlin, from an old Italian family, uses cornstarch? Ah well. Lots of stuff to consider. We’re global now!</p>

<p>I use a long serrated edge knife to get the sponge cake out of the tube pan - run it along the middle and outside edges, then lift out the cake, then run it along the bottom, then flip the cake onto a plate. It’s not perfect but works pretty well.</p>

<p>We’ve used superfine sugar instead of confectioner’s for Passover - not always easy to find, but it’s just plain sugar, no additives. It’s also called bartender’s sugar. You could dust the sponge cake with this to disguise ragged parts.</p>

<p>Another suggestion for dessert is one of the Passover sorbet recipes you can find easily online. I made an orange/lemon version last year, an everyone really appreciated having a lighter alternative.</p>

<p>Are people still looking for parve vegetarian & vegan recipes? Cucina Ebraica by Joyce Goldstein has some fab Jewish Italian vegetable dishes that can be main courses. Her Passover hazelnut sponge cake is excellent. </p>

<p>Carol Field’s layered matzo dish (scacchi) with artichokes, spinach and mushrooms is a classic - takes forever to make but worth it if you’ve got vegans (and time) and don’t eat kitnyot!</p>

<p>We make a kugel with finely chopped carrot, apple and almonds - margarine, sugar, ground ginger, a dash of salt. Press into a well-greased pan, cover, and bake at 350. There’s really no recipe - about two apples & 1 carrot to 2 T nuts? it has to sort of hold together. </p>

<p>I also make gallons of sweet-and-sour cabbage borscht, compote with dried and fresh fruits, stuffed portabella mushroom caps (nuts, herbs, greens, garlic & onions). We end up having a lot of salads during the week when vegans are around - guacamole, cucumber & dill, Israeli, tomato & onion. Cashew butter and apple butter on matzo. Yams and plantains give the potatoes a break. </p>

<p>With egg-eating vegetarians you have lots more options. </p>

<p>In some Passover baking recipes (and through the year), you can replace each egg with 1 T potato starch mixed well with 3 T water and a drop of oil. If you like the way this works, stock up on potato starch at Pesach - hard to find afterward. Same goes for ground nuts, if you do a lot of baking, buy the packages (often left on the shelves and on sale at end of the holiday) and freeze.</p>

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<p>These sound good! Can you post or PM me recipes? Even for your kugel as I have no “common sense” in the kitchen!</p>

<p>Need to make my shopping list tomorrow and get going on all of this. Two seders at my house. Going to be crazy.</p>

<p>Here’s a link to the Field recipe; I’ll post the other later when I get home. What a great thread. I wish I’d discovered CC sooner!
[Pie</a>, Artichoke and Spinach](<a href=“http://www.jewishfood-list.com/recipes/vegn/piespinart01.html]Pie”>Pie, Artichoke and Spinach)
If you’re not using eggs, try filling the pan (after assembling the layers) with potato peel broth (boil your peels after making kugel or whatever with an onion and or leek, parsley, celery, carrot, a few cloves, S&P. When the onion is falling apart, it’s done. Strain. Makes a slightly cloudy, tasty broth. This can be the veg soup for matzo balls, egg noodles, soup latkes or whatever you use, as well).</p>

<p>I too am up for a new vegetarian or vegan recipe. Older d’s boyfriend is vegan- friend’s son-in-law is vegetarian. Not planning to make my glazed sweet potato this year, that one need’s a rest. I make a wonderful butternut squash dish for Thanksgiving but don’t want that dish to wear out it’s welcome either. Still will do the matzah apple and potato kugel and we can apparently serve quinoa which works and is kosher for passover…I saw a cauliflower/mushroom kugel recipe in local newspaper and suggested it to do… she said let’s just roast cauliflower and brussel sprouts. I always serve asparagus anyway. My friend has a recipe that she swears by for eggplant/green pepper kugel which I can share but dh, the traditionalist said no thanks. We are fourteen for the first seder including one child and the second night just the four of us as don’t think either boyfriend of older or younger d will want to have two seders although that is an interesting scenario, the four of us and two non-Jewish boyfriends for the second night.</p>

<p>Gefen makes kosher for Passover Confectioner’s sugar.</p>

<p>Haha – I was getting my head around some homebaked desserts, when H waltzes in with a big smile, boxes of neon-colored jelly rings and 6 cans of macaroons!</p>

<p>Love ring jells! But canned macaroons–meh. </p>

<p>Just got [300</a> Ways to Ask the Four Questions!](<a href=“http://whyisthisnight.com/]300”>http://whyisthisnight.com/) in the mail and spent a very amused evening reading the four questions in Hopi, SQL, Gulla, Flemish, and Klingon, among others. The book comes with a DVD and a CD that I’ve not even touched yet. I figure if we read from this after four cups of wine it’s going to be even more hilarious.</p>

<p>HELP!!..was just informed that charoset was on my list…usually Mom makes it but she is not joining us this year (long story)…</p>

<p>I know how to make it…how many apples do I need to buy for 10 people??</p>