As I walked by the
Kosher-for-Passover section at my local supermarket, I did a double
take. There, on freshly cleaned shelves lined with pretty white paper
doilies, amid the yearly excess of coconut macaroons and
chocolate-covered matzoh, I spotted a surprising product, new to me--a
jar of Streit's ready-made haroseth.
The thick maroon-colored jam is central to the Seder, the holiday
dinner, observed next Wednesday and Thursday, in which Jews re-enact the
exodus from Egypt. Each item at the Seder table has a symbolic
importance, reminding us of our ancestors' sacrifice and redemption. And
so, for instance, matzoh, the dry crispy cracker, reminds us of the Jews
who couldn't bake their bread properly because of the rush to escape.
The bitter herbs help us to recall our years of servitude under the
Egyptian taskmasters. The hard-boiled egg reminds us of the cycle of
life, and we dip it in salty water and think of the tears we once shed.
Then there is haroseth, the most mysterious of all the Seder dishes
and perhaps the most complex. The concoction is supposed to conjure the
mortar and bricks that Hebrew slaves used in their labors and all the
blood that they spilled while doing so.
I remember that my mother would make our family's haroseth from
scratch--no jar of Streit's (or any other brand) in our Brooklyn kitchen
of the 1960s--and in her hands it became a delicious treat, so tasty
that it was hard to make the connection between the sweet substance and
the suffering of an ancient generation. According to Rabbi Raphael
Benchimol of the Manhattan Sephardic Congregation, the sweetness of the
haroseth is not central to its symbolism. The key is rather in the
ingredients: the apples because Jewish women would give birth in remote
areas under apple trees to escape the notice of the Egyptians, the wine
to symbolize the blood of Jewish male infants who were to be killed
under Pharoah's decree, the dates because they are a symbol of the
Jewish people.
My mother would devote hours to making our own Sephardic version:
pitting mounds of fresh dates, chopping them up and putting them along
with raisins in a big bowl of water to sit overnight. The next day she
would take the contents and transfer them to a massive steel pot where,
over a low flame, she would stir ever so slowly, occasionally tossing in
a cup of wine or a spoonful of sugar, until a fragrant, intoxicating
stew developed. I would shell almonds and walnuts and pound them into
fine pieces to sprinkle over the concoction.
When my father came from synagogue, he went straightaway to the
dining room table and began the service. At some point, he would chant,
and we would clink special little silver spoons against our wine
glasses. My favorite part of the night was when I could at last dip my
spoon into the haroseth bowl and eat the fruits of my mother's labor.
Now that my parents have died, I find myself yearning for the texture
and richness of my mother's dark red jam and for the musical sound one
of those gleaming spoons would make as my father tapped it against his
wine glass. I guess that is why I winced when I saw the Streit's jar.
Instant haroseth, I thought. Is nothing sacred?
Passover has always taken on a literal cast for me. I was born in Cairo,
and my family had to leave when I was 6 years old, as part of a massive,
modern-day Exodus of tens of thousands of Jews from Egypt and the Levant
in the aftermath of the creation of the State of Israel. At the Seder,
Jews read that we must regard the flight from Egypt as if it were our
own personal journey. This was no trouble for my family. We'd had our
own encounter with a Pharaoh--the dictator Gamal Abdel-Nasser. Despite
our hardships there, we also missed Egypt, perhaps never more than on
Passover. Our holiday had an inverted quality, longing for the place we
were grateful to have left.
And now a jar of premade haroseth has made me miss my mother's
homemade variety all the more. I called the Streit's company, an
81-year-old family-owned business, still in its original location on New
York's Lower East Side, and asked whether this is the first time that it
was selling this product. I tried to keep outrage from creeping into my
voice. A man whose name was Boris Glusker told me that his company has
been selling haroseth in a jar only for the past few years. Mr. Glusker
was humble: He didn't rave about his industrial haroseth, which is made
in Israel. He and the Streit cousins who run the company were actually
comforting when I confided how hard my mother had worked to produce this
delicacy. "It's America," sighed Aaron Gross, the founder's
great-great-grandson. "People want ease, efficiency."
Haroseth in a jar is fine, but Mr. Glusker acknowledged the truth
that, for him and for me, it is never as good as Mom's.
Ms. Lagnado, a Journal reporter, is writing a memoir of her
Egyptian-Jewish father for Ecco/HarperCollins.
