magid

Tonight is the start of Pesach. For the first days, I’m hosting no meals at home, but bringing food to both seders and almost half a meal to Shabbat dinner. I can cook on yom tov, but prefer to minimize it, plus I’m not leaving the oven on for three days, so cooking will be on the hot tray (variable temp options) if it happens. Oh, and later I’m to go to Seder1Home to help with their prep, which is why I got up early to cook here even though I’d taken the day off.

• a lot of chocolate-matza clusters (70-80, using 4 of the six bags of chocolate chips I had to get because there were no bars of plain chocolate at the Butcherie (I did manage to avoid the other option, which was “chocolate flavored chips”)), spiced with ginger, cayenne, nutmeg, cinnamon, and salt (going to all three meals)
  
• six heads of roasted garlic
  
• a dozen hard-boiled eggs
  
• tray of roasted veggies 1: golden beets*, purple-top turnips*, potato*, carrots* (seder 2)
  
• tray of roasted veggies 2: carrots* and purple-top turnips (seder 2)
  
• tray of roasted veggies 3: potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, red beet* (Shabbat dinner)
  
• tray of roasted veggies 4: halved eggplants, which then were scraped out and drained, then got added to
  
• a spread of the eggplant, smoked paprika, sauted onions and baby bella mushrooms, some of the roasted garlic, plus walnuts and walnut meal (may add minced hard-boiled eggs at individual meals) (likely some to Shabbat dinner)
  
• potato salad (oil and vinegar dressing) with hard-boiled eggs, scallions, parsley, and cucumber (may add pickled beets* at individual meals)

Still to make: carrot*-radish* slaw (Shabbat dinner; can make Friday once I make an eruv tavshilin), and whatever food for lunches (could be matza-with-toppings (cheese, whitefish salad, egg, eggplant spread), could be matza brei (with onions and scallions) or eggs-and-vegetables, could be some form of a beef stew or tsimmes (if the former, with potatoes, onions, carrots, tomato paste, a touch of hot pepper paste, possibly zucchini and tomatoes; if the latter, with onions, carrots, sweet potatoes, prunes, diced limes).

I forget betweentimes that I really do like my Pesach chopping knife; it’s a reminder that I should be sharpening my rest-of-the-year chopping knife much more frequently.

Chag kasher v’sameach to those observing.

* locally sourced

i made it to services twice (one evening, one morning). sort of strange how it didn't feel particularly strange, though i did have to figure out how to balance the siddur at different times. good to see people, too. and i was glad to be there for birkat cohanim (blessing of the priests).

yesterday i had another doctor appointment. much has changed. the stiches were taken out. the pins are scheduled to come out on monday (HOORAY!!!), after which i start much more physical therapy. right now, i have removable splint #5 (light blue velcro, this time), which comes only up to the first joint. and i have more exercises, bending the 2 fingers in the splint at both joints. it hurts some to do, but the useful sort of hurt, pushing a bit, but not a lot. the worst of the pain is on the back of my hand, still... i'm so glad the pins are coming out, & my hand will start to heal. in the meantime, i'm on antibiotics- one of the pin sites might be infected, so to be on the safe side...

tonight is the 8th night of the omer, which is 1 week and 1 day of the omer.
such a beautiful day yesterday that after spending so much of it in the hospital, had to get out, visit friends. it was raining by the time i left, so i borrowed a plastic bag for my arm. 1 or 2 friends might've come over, but it ended up being a quiet evening reading daniel pinkwater instead (thanks, hrafn!). he's such a silly writer...

this year's was the best i've ever had.

lots of factors, including, in no particular order:

* my first painkiller-free day since the surgery (also needing to elevate the hand less while i sleep.)
* leaving work earlier than usual & getting in some last minute shopping (thanks, queue!)
* being the mellowest yet about what absolutely must be done, and what is merely preference (modified by the inability to do major cleaning)
* having a wonderful cleaning lady who knows how to clean for pesach
* having a great sister-in-waiting (hey, tigerbright!) who not only helped cover my kitcen surfaces, but hid the obligatory chametz in ... interesting places that made me laugh (1 tucked above a picture frame. 1 on the ladder she'd brought up to get my pesach pots out of hiding. 1 on the marble track magnets on my fridge. (!). etc.)
* being done w/ what i needed to do at a reasonable hour, early enough that i put things in the oven on timebake, & went off to her house, to keep her company (can't say i actually helped)
* and being out later than i have been much recently, and having a real raincoat to wear for the walk home (now if i could rewaterproof my boots, i'd be in clover...)

and teddywolf was home, and after the start of the from-scratch gefilte fish recipe (this impresses me - i'd never thought to attempt this as home), we played my first game of chez geek, which i think i'll enjoy more when not tired & allergic to cats...

I stopped at the kosher market on the way in to work this morning, to grab something for breakfast/lunch, and I shouldn't've been surprised at how most of the store is filled with passover foods, already. There were a few segregated shelves of the other stuff, but mostly, it was passover passover passover. I surveyed the aisles, even bought a couple of things (some jam that was just fruit and sugar, tuna on sale). There are so many things I will never buy for passover, cake mixes (Really, I can live an entire week, more, even, without cake. Hard to believe, but true.), breakfast cereals, other imitation-starchy foods, overpriced desserts, etc. Which is not to say I won't be back, buying some stuff in a week or 2, but my passover eating is more focused on celebrating fruits, veggies, cheese, poultry, etc, rather than on imitating the things that are not kosher for passover.

Still, it's time to start amassing passover foods. I usually try to get things wherever they're cheapest, when I see them, rather than having a day from hell doing passover shopping. Since I have no problem buying veggies during the intermediate days (I have friends who don't do this. Yes, I know some nuts..), the major items are matzah, cheese (some kinds sell out) and the prepared foods I indulge in (eggplant spreads, mostly). Also some quinoa.

At home I am already absurdly pleased when finishing a container of [fill in any food name here]. Last night I found myself making up a batch of cran-ginger chutney, partly because it would finish so many things I had around the place, bags of cranberries, brown sugar, crystallized ginger (yes, the ginger-obsession continues), some fresh ginger, walnuts, etc. It's a bit too early for my fridge to be this empty... (though I still have some almond paste left, so there will probably be some truffles soon)

Plans for the holiday itself are still undecided. Do I make a seder? Depends on who's available. If I don't, do I stay at home, or go to friends in Chicago? (I'm definitely not going to the friends in Sharon, though they invite me every year.)

And of course, I should be planning when I'm going to get the Cleaning of the Kitchen done, not to mention the Kashering of the Oven and Sink, as well as the Covering of All Horizontal Surfaces (anyone who comes over during passover gets to see my draped kitchen.). Luckily, I do not have toddlers who may deposit Cheerios in all sorts of unexpected places... nor do I feel cleaning for passover is a good time to do spring cleaning (I do not eat on my drapes, so there is no need to clean them for passover).

OK. enough rant (why does passover tend to bring out the soap box in me?). Time to attempt to be productive.