Preparing for Passover: Getting Rid of the Chametz

As we're busy here at The Kitchn spring cleaning with the Kitchn Cure, Jews all over the world are also busy preparing for Passover. This is the time to ritually clean your kitchens, and get rid of chametz - leavened bread and other foods that may not be eaten during the holiday.

Different people go to different lengths to prepare their houses - some are content to wipe down the counters and cover them with butcher paper, while others hunt around with a toothbrush, cleaning all crevices in the entire house. (You never know - you could accidentally dropped some bread in the upstairs light fixture!)

Whether you're an observant Jew or an atheist who's just looking for a clean house, spring cleaning makes sense. Outside, everything is in renewal, so it's time to dust everything off, and have a new clean slate. For Passover, it's likely company's coming, and it's so nice to have the entire house clean at once.

But does it make sense to both follow the Cure and kasher your kitchen for Passover? The Cure might inspire you to do a more thorough cleaning for Passover. It may have also helped you look more carefully at unused appliances and canned goods. And coming up, it will help you plan a heck of a dinner party.

Even if you're not following the Kitchn Cure, we'd love to help you with cupboard challenges as you try to use up your chametz. Here are two potential recipes: Sweet Potato Bread Pudding and Apple Walnut Bread Pudding.

How about you? If you're preparing your kitchen for Passover, how thorough do you try to be? Are you also following the Cure?

In Israel, all the major grocery stores are having huge sales on household cleaning supplies in preparation for the holiday. I personally love having Passover as an excuse to clean even though we eat bread all week.

Plus, everyone only works half-days throughout the holiday so it will be a great time for me to focus on Curing.

posted by Tel Aviv Dweller on April 10th 2008 at 10:42am
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One year, I rented a room from a Jewish woman and she "sold" me all her bread foodstuffs for the Passover period. It all sat in a box in my sitting room and I was welcome to eat any of it, but only in my suite.

It was really interesting and educational to have a front-row view of a celebration I'd known nothing about, not to mention my first invitation to a seder!

posted by Michelle of Montreal on April 10th 2008 at 12:37pm
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I am following the cure, as well as preparing for Pesach. Now, my partner is not Jewish and doesn't keep Pesach, so while I clean the whole house/kitchen I don't get rid of all the chometz in the house- just anything belonging to me. I sell my remaining chometz to my partner, and I have my own sections of the kitchen (one cupboard, half the fridge, a shelf in the freezer, the oven, and two of the four stove burners).

I'd like to keep the whole house for Pesach, but I don't want to force my partner into it as it's just not fair I don't think.

posted by Ether Maiden on April 10th 2008 at 12:44pm
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I live in Midwood, Brooklyn - second only to Boro Park, so I am extremely familiar with the process... and I must say, for me, it is a huge disruption! Wee!

posted by kdkaboom on April 10th 2008 at 2:38pm
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It can be next to impossible to clean your house for Passover if you have non-Jewish roommates. No disrespect - (I love my non-Jewish roommates) :) - but when it comes to Passover, there's just no way to ask *them* to get rid of all of the bread and such in the house for a week just b/c *you* aren't supposed to have it. I do the best I can to make a mental and physical separation from chametz (leavened stuff) without actually having a chametz-free kitchen.

Leah
The Jew & The Carrot
http://www.jcarrot.org

posted by The Jew And The Carrot on April 11th 2008 at 2:58am
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