 MARCH 19 • 2020 | 5

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jewfro
Passed Over Foods No Mo’
Y

ou can’
t blame people 
when ancient Jewish tra-
ditions happen to meet 
a particular need in their very 
contemporary lives. Shabbat 
for digital detox. Threadbare 
kabbalah for 
celebrity rebrand-
ing. Kippot for 
male-pattern 
baldness.
At least I 
hope you can’
t 
blame them for 
cherry-picking, 
because I’
m about to. For obser-
vant Jewish households, the 
weeks leading up to Passover 
involve a rigorous ritual exercise 
that prepares them to com-
memorate the deliverance from 
Egypt and differentiate those 
nights from all other nights. 
Among other things, they exile 
chametz, any leavened food 
that might be lurking in a far 
corner of the pantry, fridge or 
oven that could threaten to turn 
the holiday from unleavened to 
unlawful.
Mine is not a kosher home, 
unless you count the prohibition 
against Einstein Bagels and the 
miraculous rekindling of our 
sporadic WiFi, the password for 
which is 88888888.
And yet the coming of 
Passover, with coronavirus 
plaguing grocery aisles and 
threatening quarantine, seems 
like an opportune time to con-
front my own Pharaoh: expired 
food. As orthodox as I am to 
eating strawberry tops, apple 
cores and now mango skin, I 
still contribute to the 30-40% 
of U.S. food — more than 130 
billion pounds annually — that 
goes to waste.
Long have I hoarded chametz, 

and thus now shall I 
atone by attempting to 
eat that which plagues 
my pantry:

1. PUMPKIN BUTTER
Purchase Date: Jan. 26, 
2015
In the early weeks of 
2015, as my colleagues 
in New York were bearing 
down for a historic blizzard 
that would soon bypass the 
city, I was similarly scrambling. 
My fearful forecast was that 
Trader Joe’
s would stop stocking 
Pumpkin Butter, the only thing 
my son would eat on the only 
other thing he would eat, their 
toaster waffles. It appears I was 
overzealous in my supermarket 
sweep, as evidenced by the 13 
jars still nesting next to our 
wedding china.
Start spreadin’
 the news! I was 
uncertain at first based on some 
separation of the contents inside 
and my difficulty separating 
the top. (Belated thank you to 
JARC for their 34th anniversary 
rubber jar gripper; happy 50th, 
JARC!) While slightly darker 
than I recall, the pumpkin butter 
stood the test of time — far lon-
ger than your jack-o-lantern or 
the two-year shelf life of ground 
nutmeg, the actual flavor behind 
our perennial Pavlovian predi-
lection for pumpkin spice.

2. BRUSSELS SPROUTS
Estimated: Spring 2014
I’
m guessing these follow the 
live comic styles of Nick Kroll, 
who made a compelling case to 
the NEXTGen Detroit audience 
of the Brussels sprouts’
 remark-
able 180° turn from a boiled 
“bowl of farts” to a sliced, roast-
ed medium for transmitting 

bacon.
The presence of sproutsi-
cles did not instill confidence. 
I tasted one and am also not 
confident that this would be 
a marketable variety of Sno-
Kone® syrup. Roasting for 20-25 
minutes did not yield edges 
“just beginning to get crisp and 
dark brown,
” nor did another 
25 minutes do much other 
than permeate my kitchen with 
Brussels eau de toilette. 
Alas, these sprouts have a 
pre-Kroll mushiness and there’
s 
no bacon in sight. While edible 
strictly speaking, no — I cannot 
in good conscience recommend 
consuming six-year-old Brussels 
sprouts prepared as such. But I 
am going to honor their lega-
cy and this endeavor by using 
them as the base for:

3. THYME HONEY BALSAMIC 
VINAIGRETTE
Pack Date: April 9, 2016
Thyme is on my side, honey! I 
can’
t say whether the vinaigrette 
has improved over the last four 
years, but it has certainly held 
up better than the politics of the 
time. Like Brexit, for that matter, 
it could do without Brussels.

4. SOY VEY, VERI VERI TERIYAKI
Best Before: Jan. 15, 2011
Soy vey, indeed. Those heroic 
sesame seeds must have felt like 
Jack descending into the dark, 

salty sea of marinade among the 
Titanic’
s other detritus — so, like 
Rose, my heart will go on.

5. WHOLE WHEAT MATZAH
Passover: 2017
Tastes like matzah.

6. ROASTED VEGETABLE 
MULTIGRAIN LASAGNA
Expiration Date: Pre-Obama
Hello, old friend. It seems like 
yesterday I was packing up the 
contents of our condo to start a 
new chapter, equidistant from 
the Royal Oak Trader Joe’
s and 
yet a world away. That was 2008. 
And here we are. I do hope the 
interminable preheating didn’
t 
further bristle your freezer burn. 
The microwave seemed wholly 
inappropriate for such an occa-
sion. 
… Hot damn! After all these 
years, I suppose I could have 
waited another 10 minutes so 
the roof of my mouth wouldn’
t 
be on fire. That said, my 
remaining taste buds approve. 
Garfield would bless this 
beloved lasagna on the occasion 
of its char mitzvah, especially 
for the versatility of the ricotta 
and mozzarella between -9° 
and 350°. I, in turn, feel blessed 
— for all the good humor and 
Good Humor we enjoyed while 
it waited patiently behind that 
stainless-steel door. 
Still, this is a lotta lasagna, 
so maybe freezer once it finally 
cools off. 

BEN FALIK

Ben Falik
Contributing 
Writer

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3/16/20 11:53 AM
3/16/20 11:53 AM

