Photo by Idit
Tonight and tomorrow, Jews across the world will sit down with family and friends for Passover Seders, retelling the story of their ancestral exodus from bondage in Egypt and partaking in a festive meal. As the week carries on, many will subsist on matzo, forsaking chametz—grains and their leavened byproducts they produce (bread, pasta, and beer to name a few).
Kosher restaurants typically close up shop for the duration of the holiday—not that there are many around these parts—which lasts until sundown on April 14. For those without a seder to go to, there are several community meals being hosted by local synagogues tonight and tomorrow.
And of course every year there are also a handful of restaurants with Jewish chefs or owners that offer special Passover menus for those looking for a dining room experience. These are typically a tribute to the tradition with a twist in the spirit of the restaurant or its chef. Some are more faithful to the holiday’s dietary laws than others.
Dean Gold honors his mother every year come Passover time by welcoming diners to Dino and one-upping mom’s recipes as well as introducing diners to preparations attributed to regional Jewish populations in Italy. Gold is a Jew who makes no pig bones about loving treif. But there’s none of it on his Passover menu, which skews more faithfully toward what one should be eating on the holiday by not using chametz or blatantly mixing meat and dairy, a kosher no-no on any day of the year.
He features his “Better Than Ella’s” chopped chicken liver and “Better Than Ella’s” matzo ball soup to start the meal. Secondi include fish prepared in the traditions of the Jewish enclave in Livorno, Italy, and a hearty-sounding lamb cooked in red wine with green garlic. A handful of kosher-for-Passover sweets are available, but Gold notes on his menu that if you want to select a little something else from the dolce menu, Dino is not going to tell the rabbi. The menu is $59 per person.
Chef Amy Brandwein of Casa Nonna is getting more creative with her menu. The highlight of Casa Nonna’s Passover menu is stracciatelle, described as homemade rags of pasta made from matzo flour, egg and olive oil, baked and then cut by hand, and served with a suckling lamb ragu. The effect creates a noodle that is flat like matzo and made from matzo products, much as a Passover cake would be. Sure beats pasta made from potato starch! Brandwein is preparing an antipasto of muggine in biancho, gefilte fish in saffron gelatin, ramp aioli and chive blossoms. Her dessert, a torta di mele, is a nod to traditional charoset with a honey-walnut tart (again made with matzo flour) with apple charoset marmelata and olive oil sorbet.
Alan Popovsky started serving Passover dinners when he owned Felix in Adams Morgan and has continued that tradition at Hudson. Their a la carte menu includes straightforward holiday items like matzo ball soup, homemade gefilte fish, roast chicken and leg of lamb.
The home-dining enterprise Feastly gets in on the act with a Jewish Soul Food pop-up dinner to be held at Lost Dog Cafe on April 9. It nods to the holiday’s traditional fare, offering a peek into what cook Renee Peres would like to serve at a deli she dreams of opening some day. Fried matzo balls will be paired with crispy salami, presumably beef. Peres has made a few other choices that walk the kosher line. She’ll serve her brisket with kasha varnishkas, though the kasha (buckwheat groats) is verboten for Ashkenazi Jews, even if the egg noodles are made from potato starch. Nutella-and-challah bread pudding sounds great, but might be better enjoyed after April 14, but we’ve been told a Nutella-schmeared matzo will also be served.
This will be the 10th year that upscale chain Rosa Mexicano celebrates Passover Mexican style, with an enticing special menu available at all three of their Washington area locations. The menu combines Jewish tradition with contemporary Mexican flavors and Manischewitz-based sangria. That means red snapper gefilte fish, matzo-encrusted chicken breast and braised lamb shank with dates, baby onions, whole garlic cloves and tangerines.
Tecate-soaked pulled brisket tacos, however, are a shocker. Brisket is the beloved centerpiece of many a Passover meal. Rosa Mexicano is studding its with jicama and carrots and cooking it in a broth of habanero peppers, charred red torpedo onions, pomegranates…and beer. Beer? The corn in the tortillas they’ll use is permissible in the Passover diets of Jews of Sephardic (Spanish and Middle Eastern) descent, though not for Ashkenazi Jews descended from Eastern Europe. But beer is banned for everyone. And surely the meat would have still been delicious had beef broth or red wine been used instead. Might as well make a Mexican Beef Wellington. Since Rosa Mexicano is using beer to cook the brisket, serving duck and roasted beet borscht with a dollop of chile de árbol crema—mixing meat and dairy—should come as no surprise.
