Spiritual Help, Part 2*

In my opinion, the best way to pass the time when feeling blue is to coerce your friends into spending time with you, and perhaps forcing them to cook for you as well. If you force them to cook a 5 lb brisket, all the better. And, if you force them to cook brisket for you, while pretending to be Jewish, well, it just doesn't get any better than that. Mood improvement is guaranteed.

Last Wednesday I emailed ET#1 and told her we should be on the lookout for Passover Coca Cola. It is made with actual sugar, not high fructose corn syrup and thus brings about a nostalgia for so many things past (taping songs off the radio, watching movies on beta max, Atari, Sweet Valley High...). She responded that she would indeed look for it, and that also she'd had a dream about brisket. Should we have a Passover Seder? Of course. Not being Jewish is just a technicality, plus don't we all need to free ourselves from captivity at some point?

By Friday she had a 5 lb brisket, a shank bone and a full menu planned. I had invited our other former roommate, Brandi, who agreed to attend our seder without batting an eye. I collected recipes from Jewish (thanks for the charoset, Nora) and non-Jewish (the flan was a hit, Rashmi) friends alike. Saturday morning ET#1 and I met at 8:30 am at Mike's Pastry before hitting Haymarket. I ordered my standard canoli and when I mentioned it to my mom later, she snarkily replied she was glad to know it being Passover didn't stop me from eating pastries. I reminded her we aren't Jewish. Haymarket provided some necessary fruits and veggies (apples and leeks) and some non necessary ones (a 5 lb bag of salad for $2). I spent the remainder of the Sabbath preparing the flan using a dozen eggs and snacking on matzoh. I headed over to ET#1's abode and was greeted with the following menu:

Matzoh ball soup

Frisee Salad with orange

The 5 lb. Brisket

Sauteed carrots

Steamed asparagus

Charoset (apples, walnuts, dried cherries and just a touch of red wine)

Red Wine

Roasted tomatoes

Potato Kugel

Orange Almond Flan

The Seder Plate and Matzohs

I started to feel full just looking at it all. Needless to say, it was too much food for 3 people, even though we left the door open for Elijah. But eat we did, and I really did get full. And I really did not feel blue at all!

*Due to the time sensitive nature of Passover, this post is going up before the totallycatholic.com post.