Passover

by

Ingberlach

For favorite Passover recipes from my kitchen, please see Essential Passover from Scratch: Recipes and Stories from My Mother’s Kitchen

When I look at this fragile recipe card I can practically smell my grandmother Mollye’s home: honey and Fannie May chocolates, mixed with the subtle aroma of her mahogany furniture. This recipe, like most in her card box, is short on directions. Only because I was her helper during her later years, do I have any sense of what to do. What is omitted here is that she used to go to my grandfather’s bar and take out his bottle of whiskey. Using her hands, she’d pat down the wooden board with some of the alcohol, and would do the same to the top of the burning hot mixture. Nana claimed that the alcohol would act as a coolant. So now when I make the Passover ingberlach I open up that same bar, which I have inherited, and am met with the aroma of mahogany while I look for some of my husband’s whiskey.

I waited for a dry day, just like Nana noted on the back side of the recipe card:

This is the finished product. You need strong teeth to bite into this candy. After it cools, tear off little pieces and coat them with a mixture of sugar and ginger.

Ingredients

  • 1 c. honey
  • ½ c. sugar
  • 1 tsp. ginger
  • 2 c. matzo farfel
  • 1 c. chopped pecans
  • brandy, 1/8–¼ c.
  • Ginger-sugar
  • 1/3 c. sugar
  • 1½ tsp. ginger (or to taste)

Directions

1. Have ready a large wooden board and the brandy.

2. In a sturdy pot, stir together the honey, sugar and ginger. Bring to a boil, then add the matzo farfel and pecans. Stir constantly, for about 5 minutes, until golden brown.

3. Pour a little brandy into your hand and pat down the board. Then quickly pour out the hot farfel mixture. Spread it evenly to a thickness of about ½”. Pat it down with a little more brandy. (Be careful, as the candy will be extremely hot.) Let cool.

To finish

1. In a small bowl, mix together the ginger and sugar.

2. Tear off little pieces of the candy and coat both sides with ginger-sugar mixture.

3. Store in an airtight container.

 

by

Eingie is short for eingemacht.

For favorite Passover recipes from my kitchen, please see Essential Passover from Scratch: Recipes and Stories from My Mother’s Kitchen

With Passover beginning in three days, I continued with my preparations today by visiting several grocery stores, calling my sister every 20 minutes to ask was she bringing the horseradish? kosher wine? cucumbers? and cooking up some eingie. My grandmother, Mollye, made eingie for the entire family every year. She made it for us and also shipped it to California to her son’s family. Later my mother, Ruth, took over the eingie duty, making it ahead and shipping it to her kids. Now I make the eingie.

Eingie is short for eingemacht, which is Yiddish for preserve. In this case it is an apricot-pineapple jam, something like a marmalade in consistency. In our family we spoon it liberally on top of fried matzo and on matzo meal pancakes. Other families eat their Passover breakfast matzo plain, but to me these dishes just don’t taste right without a large spoonful of eingie.

While I was running around town today I found myself close to my mother’s nursing home. She has dementia, and visiting her always makes me sad, so I don’t go to see her very often. Today I felt the need to see her, to make that connection to the women who came before me, to hold her hand and let her know that I am making the eingie this year.

Our traditional eingie is on the left. On the right is a batch made with dried cherries — something new that I think my brother-in-law Leo will especially enjoy.

Ingredients

  • 1¾ lbs. dried apricots, soaked overnight
  • 2 20-ounce cans
    unsweetened crushed
    pineapple, drained
  • 4 c. sugar

Directions

Drain and chop the apricots, then combine all ingredients in a large pot. Cook until very hot and bubbly, and slightly thick. Spoon into hot, sterilized jars and process, or store in covered jars in refrigerator.