In Remembrance of Messiah - Passover Pictures

It's If you follow me on Instagram you may have already seen a few of sneak peeks of my congregation's Passover meal. And speaking of Instagram, in the past week or so more than 30,000 photos have been posted under #passover. 30,000! Isn't that crazy?! I love checking out Passover photos and would love to see yours! Tag me or send some my way. :)

We had 16 people in attendance for our Seder. This worked perfectly for a square set up of regular folding tables with four people seated on each side.

We had a worship time before the meal with live music. That's not something we have each week at Shabbat service so it was extra special to us.

We did the traditional four cups of wine. To simplify things, we pour the first cup before the service begins.

Our Passover is not as complicated as most, so we stick with a one page overview of the evening instead of a textbook Haggadah.

Homemade matzah! I know I've said this many times, but this seriously ups the quality of the meal. If making it is an option, I would encourage you to give it a try!

Daffodils just started blooming here a few days before Passover!

Wondering what the colored pencils are for? We made a custom coloring page.

Not everyone made a lot of progress on theirs. haha As you can see this was more geared towards adult doodling that a children's coloring book. 

The matzah pinata of course came along; I'm not sure I will ever bring myself to destroy it. haha I made a few of these banners with different Passover related verses. Above the buffet said, "Eat to remember this," (Deuteronomy 16:3).

Reading the story of Israel. We also five lit menorahs - so beautiful!

This picture really symbolizes this year's Passover: a team effort. Many people contributed to make this a lovely and meaningful evening for all. One person brought the dishes, another made the napkins, another supplied silverware, someone else purchased and brought the glasses. Another picture of Paul speaking of the body of Messiah.

Part of our buffet. Our meal was basically the same elements as the Seder plate, plus a few more vegetables.

Menu:

Smoked lamb marinated in balsamic vinegar, garlic, and rosemary
Einkorn matzah
Romaine salad with peppers, cucumbers, and kalamata olives

Baked charoset with apples and apricots

Roasted root vegetables

Two types of hummus with lots of fresh veggies

Hard boiled eggs

Tabbouli salad of parsley and lemon

Kalamata olive tapenade

Coconut yogurt tzatziki

Something we decided to do this year was ask everyone to bring plenty of food so there would be leftovers to share. The day after Passover is a no-work day and it was so nice to be able to take delicious, kosher, organic food home for meals!

I think this is one of our best Passover meals yet.

We had two special attendees with us via Facetime. They live in the south so they were able to enjoy their Seder outside.

About to enjoy the third cup of my homemade, homegrown grape juice.
Matzah ring tutorial here.

Dessert is served: three types of cheesecake with mixed berries, chocolate, ganache, and whipped cream.

We love pavlova for Passover dessert but since it had been raining we decided to go with cheesecake. It's hard to go wrong with cheesecake and these were excellent.

Thanks so much to everyone who contributed to make this set apart time special! 

Coconut Cookies for Passover

It's Matzah Week! At least for some of us. My congregation just started observing the calendar that Torah to the Tribes uses so we are celebrating a little earlier than most this year. I wanted to share this cookie recipe today for those of you who are craving something sweet for this Feast but don't know what to make. Or if your Passover is still coming up I think this would be a great addition to the menu.

(Menorah lattes. An ongoing project in my life.)

I don't know if you've had a Passover cookie before, but often other than the name and the shape they bear no similarities to real cookies. They tend to be dry, crumbly, and not very good. These however are nice and chewy with a little bit of toasted coconut crispness on the edges. Since they contain no refined sugar or flour they fit with the GAPS diet and are Paleo friendly, so this should be a winner even for those on restricted diets. They don't taste like a diet cookie though; if you like coconut, this is the Passover cookie of your dreams!

You know how the best part of a coconut macaroon is the edge that got toasted? Flattening before baking makes the entire cookie that good!

You will need:
1 egg
2 tablespoons honey
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 cup finely shredded coconut flakes (unsweetened)
3 tablespoons almond meal or almond flour
2 tablespoons chocolate chips (I used 100% cacao but feel free to use whatever kind  you like)

Preheat your oven to 350°.
Mix together the egg, honey, and salt until smooth. Then add in the remaining ingredients. You will end up with a sticky mixture that is not as together as a typical cookie dough. This is what you want.
Since it is so sticky you'll want to line your baking sheet with parchment paper or a silpat. Scoop about two tablespoons of your dough per cookie. I ended up with 9 cookies. Then using a clean, wet hand pat your cookies until they are flat. Since they have no leavening they will stay whatever shape they are.
Bake for 14-16 minutes. Your cookies are done once the coconut is nicely toasted and golden brown. When your house starts smelling heavenly of toasted coconut it's time to take them out.
Let cool before eating.

I really like that these aren't cloyingly sweet but if that's more your thing you could add an extra tablespoon of honey.

I know the food restrictions can be a little confusing during this week. If you need a little clarity or inspiration check out these posts for more meal ideas.

Happy Feast of Unleavened Bread!

Seder or Symposium?

Of the traditional six foods on the Seder plate, plus the matzah, and wine at the Passover meal, do you know how many of them are dictated by Scripture? Answer: three or four. The unleavened bread, the Pesach lamb, and the bitter herbs, with the wine being debated (since Yahusha emphasized it). Of course the other items have significance, even if not Biblically required, like charoset to recall the mortar the Israelites made into brick during their Egyptian slavery. But the Seder element on my mind today is wine.

Traditional Seder meals involve four cups of wine. Each cup symbolizes a promise from YHWH. "I will take you out," the first. "I will deliver you," is the second. Third, "I will redeem you," and the fourth cup stands for, "I will take you." This is a really beautiful part of the Passover meal, a chance to look back on the work of YHWH personally as well as for corporate Israel as a whole throughout history. When you consider the traditional Hebrew feast of wine celebration as a betrothal the symbolism goes even deeper. I like this allegory a lot. It's very meaningful. But I think we need to consider another verse before we partake:

Ephesians 5:18 - "Do not get drunk with wine."

I think we need to examine the spirit behind the idea that it's okay to get drunk during a Festival of YHWH (or ever). Obviously there are many passages of Scripture that show us the drinking of wine is generally permissible, but Ephesians also makes it clear that we need to stop before getting drunk. Should we make an exception for drunkenness during the Feasts?

According to the writings of Plato, a popular social event in ancient Greece was a symposium. Unlike cocktail parties of today symposiums had minimums on the amount of alcohol guests would consume, so party goers didn't really have the option to forgo or limit their alcohol. Obviously, this must have made for some drunk parties. Symposiums could last all night, so wine was drank literally for hours straight (raise your hand if you've ever attended a five hour Seder meal). These were not casual affairs, but heavily ritualized with precise rules. While philosophy and politics were typical discussion topics oftentimes libations were poured to gods or other rituals done as an act of worship. Do we want our worship of YHWH to look like this?

As a side note, are you familiar with the many man-made rituals observed at traditional Passover Seders? There are so many the hosts thoughtfully provide a book so you can keep up. Like with the four cups of wine, there's nothing wrong with washing your hands, hiding the afikoman, reciting blessings, dipping parsley in salt water and so on but we shouldn't treat these as commands or emphasize them over YHWH's instructions.

Seders have looked too much like symposiums. Ministries working to teach the importance of obeying YHWH's commands send a mixed message when they tolerate drunkenness at Passover. People drink too much, behave obnoxiously, and distract from the worship of YHWH at a Feast. And if Seder is nothing more than drunk discussion with made up rituals to honor some sort of Deity, how is that different from a symposium? This should concern us for obvious reasons. Scripture tells us that we are not to copy the customs of pagan cultures. Nowhere in Scripture do we have an example of righteous people getting drunk to celebrate YHWH's Feasts. Yahusha used wine at his last supper, yes. But the lengthy accounts of this feast in the Besorahs give no indication of drunkenness on anyone's part. The fact Matthew and John each remembered the night well enough to write extensively on it suggests their sobriety.

We need to examine the way we keep this Feast. There is nothing wrong with celebrating over a meal - we are told to do this. Yahusha even mentioned specifically to have the unleavened bread and wine in remembrance of him at Passover. This is important to him. But he doesn't say, "go ahead and get drunk and act like an idiot." He says, "Do this to remember me," not, "Do this and wonder what you did last night." We need to look at what else is going on surrounding the most significant Passover celebrations in Scripture: the impending deliverance of Israel from slavery and the impending death of Yahusha for a broken covenant. We would be completely remiss to overlook that and place the emphasis of the meal on drinking. Yes, YHWH put emphasis on the food and so did Yahusha but neither commanded or condoned drunkenness.

The four cups of wine are meaningful. But that's not an excuse to ignore the instruction to not get drunk. If having four cups of wine is important to you, make them small glasses. You could also water down the alcohol content by making a sangria with fruit. Alternatively you could serve grape juice throughout the evening or switch to grape juice after the first glass or two. Let's make all aspects of Seder honoring to YHWH. Let's celebrate the Feast without the old hametz of ancient Greece. Here's to a sober Seder!

Scratch Off Omer Counter

I'm excited to share with you a new way to count the omer...with scratch offs!

Why count the omer? This is actually something we are instructed to do in Leviticus 23:15-16. The fifty days we are to count link the Feast of Unleavened Bread to Shavuot or Pentecost. This is the time period that the Messiah spent still on earth after being resurrected from the dead. What is an omer? Omer is the Hebrew word for sheaf - which is a bundle of grain. First Fruits during Matzah Week is when part of the barley harvest would be waved to YHWH, and then at Shavuot the same would be done with sheaves of wheat.

This is an easy DIY to put together since it's really just two things, a print and stickers. There is also some flexibility with how you use it. I liked the large size of this, but there's no reason you couldn't print this as an 8" x 11" in a normal printer if you would prefer. If you don't have time to order the scratch off stickers, using regular stickers to cover up the days as they go by would work. Or even just cross them off with a pen. It's up to you!

You will need:
Printable omer calendar
One inch scratch off stickers (I used gold ones from here)

Directions:
Print off the omer calendar. I got an 18" x 24" engineer print at Staples, which at $2.99 was the most cost effective option I found. The paper is thin, so it's not ideal for photographs, but works just fine for our purposes.
I used scotch tape to place my counter on the wall. You could also glue it to a foam board or attach to canvas if you prefer.
Then place your scratch off stickers above the numbers and you are set to go! Each day scratch off another sticker until we get to Shavuot.

Update: A friend told me she is going to take hers to an office supply store to get it laminated. Her plan is to mark the days with dry erase markers and use it each year!

The past couple of years of counting have brought me more than a few days where I'm not sure if I already did my omer count or not. I remember doing it, but maybe that was yesterday? Anyone else with me? So I decided to put seven days in each row to make it easier to double check. Just make note of what day you started counting on and things will add up. You could also make a habit of counting at a certain time each day or even saying the traditional blessing of, "Blessed are You, YHWH Eloheinu, King of the Universe, who has sanctified us with your commandments, and commanded us concerning the counting of the omer."

If you look closely in the photos you may notice something is amiss. Funny story about assembling my counter: I expected to be left with one of my fifty stickers when I got done, but there were strangely two left. How could this be? Every row has seven numbers...with the exception of the second row which somehow has only six. Upon closer inspection of the photos I discovered that I had inadvertently left off day 13! I have no idea how that happened, but it is corrected in the downloadable version. Ha! 

Other ideas for counting the omer:
DIY Flair Calendar
Making a paper chain
Printable Cards from Torah Sisters Magazine
Kids Counter
Kosher on A Budget's Omer Counter
Writing the count in your planner