We did Seder at our house last night. 17 people. It was me and Janice, Danielle and Pearce, Monica and Jason, Hinda and Jon, Heather and James, James' brother Peter, Jay and Judie, Stephie and Jay, Justin, and Robbie. Seems like everyone had a good time. Everyone seemed to like the food and the company. During the evening, Jon even mentioned to me how nice it was that all the kids (meaning the generation under 30!) got along so well. I agree. If there’s anything contentious going on, it’s not apparent.
By design, I like to keep the religious side of things on the lighter side. Not everyone in the family is Jewish. We respect that and they respect that it is a Jewish holiday. We keep it more about family and enjoying our time together. I do like to bring the reason for the holiday – Passover- to the table though. The story of the Exodus is common to Judaism and Christianity, so I don’t imagine anyone minds doing that. But of course everyone is waiting for the real highlight of the evening – the meal.
That’s fine. We have made the meal the heart of the tradition in our family and at our holiday gatherings. When I was a kid, our Seders focused on the passages from the Haggadah. The traditional readings and songs. And then the food. Before our own families started to branch out, Henry and I used to do our Seders together. I miss those times when the two of us would sort of take over the Seder when we sang some of the traditional songs. Even though we haven’t done that in years, having recently lost Henry, it was a poignant vacuum this year. We always did such beautiful renditions of “V’hee shi’omdah” and “B’tsas Yisroel”.
In recent years, I’ve just winged the telling of the story of the Exodus. The Haggadah, the word means “The Telling”, is a codified prescription of how to relate the story of the Exodus – the seminal event in Jewish lore and history. I got a nice Haggadah last year, so this year, we did it a little different. I marked off passages, and we passed the book around. People read the section and passed it on. It sort of worked. We had a little fun with it and basically, the story got told.
Then we ate. Gefilte fish, not the favorite among most of the non-Jews, was the first course. As Danielle points out, if you didn’t grow up with it you probably aren’t going to like it. Seems to be true most of the time. We made a delicious Haroset (basically, apples, nuts, wine and some spices), then chopped liver, matzo ball soup, a couple different kinds of baked chicken (Soy Vay and a savory herb), orange burgundy brisket with mushrooms, kugel that Hinda made, a spicy carrot dish, salad (compliments to Judie), Moroccan spinach, and a slew of desserts. We’ve come a long way from slavery baby!
We started about 6:30 and everyone was gone by 11:00. The last couple hours was spent playing games and talking. We do all like each other. We’re fortunate that as the family grows, it grows as a family. The kids loaded up on care packages, so there wasn’t too much left to worry about how/where to store the leftovers. Janice and I cleaned up all the dishes and had the place pretty much back to normal before we both passed out in front of the TV in the family room. Something gave us strength to finally go up to bed sometime before 2:00 AM. This morning was the rest of the cleanup – putting furniture back, vacuuming, etc. All in all, a great enjoyable night with the family.
A few highlights:
Justin read the Four Questions in English.
Justin helped clear the soup plates – he asked me to tell everyone to let him know when they were done. I told him he could do that. He said, “I can’t. I’m too shy.”
Jay Downs helped serve and clear plates.
Jay Abramson always helps out in the kitchen and at the table.
We played a game called Mad Gab and Peter called me a racist – I was making fun of foreigners and their accents. Jay A said that Peter had never heard my father’s accent. It’s cool Peter – I would’ve said the same thing – even if it was an over reaction.
Heather’s gluten-free brownies were delicious.
Pearce made some home-made peppermint patty ice cream! Wow - was that good!
We went through about 3 ½ bottles of wine.
Many more, but hard to remember the day after.
