Turning Cardboard into Something Tasty

The holiday of tasteless cardboard bread is fast approaching.  Jews are commanded to eat matzo for the 8 days of Passover.  In case you haven’t had this ethnic delicacy, it is made of flour and water, baked quickly to commemorate the speedy exodus of the Jews from Egypt.  There is nothing much to recommend institutional matzo other than the fact that it is “Kosher for Passover”.

I had the idea to make my own matzo and to make it taste good, even if it can’t be leavened.  We don’t keep a kosher kitchen, so that’s not a particular concern to me (although it is possible to kosher an oven if it were necessary).

I did some reading about making matzo and learned the one important requirement if you want to be even remotely “kosher” is to do the whole process in 18 minutes, start to finish.  Why 18?  It turns out 18 is the numerical equivalent of “chai” or life in Judaism.

I shot off an e-mail to my friend and favorite chef Brock and was not at all surprised to hear that he has successfully made matzo.  He sent me this link with what looks to be a great recipe.

Since this recipe calls for a little oil (already it’s starting to sound more tasty), I somewhat jokingly sent back a message to Brock, asking if I could use my leftover goose schmaltz instead of oil, to which he replied, “MMMMMMMMMMMMmmmmmm goose schmaltz sounds awesome!”

Stay tuned for the 18-minute matzo results in a couple of weeks!