Apple Walnut Charoset (My Mother’s Passover Specialty)

Passover is not a holiday known for its food. In fact, it’s largely known for the food you can’t eat while observing it (no leavened or fermented foods; ditto for foods made with wheat, oats, barley, rye, and spelt). And yet, I find myself looking forward to it every year because there is one thing I can’t wait to stuff into my mouth: my mother’s charoset. It’s the world’s simplest recipe (chop stuff up and throw it into a bowl!) but unlike, say, matzo ball soup, which I order often at diners, I don’t get to eat it any other time of year.

Why are all good family recipes written out like this? Luckily, we have a staff of expert recipe testers who turned my mom’s gibberish into a real recipe that all of us can use.

Charoset is a paste of fruit and nuts; for another example, see our Medjool Date and Apple Charoset recipe (but I’m partial to my mother’s recipe). It’s traditionally used on the Seder plate to resemble the mortar and brick made by the Jews when they were slaves in Egypt under Pharaoh. However, the dish is not as dense or cement-like as one would think.

In fact, my mother’s recipe is sweet (but not too sweet), crunchy, and juicy. I eat it directly out of the container (using a spoon, of course!) or I pile up pieces of matzo and use them as little unleavened delivery vessels.

How do you say charoset? It can be pronounced a few different ways depending on your region or background. Many people in the US pronounce the “ch” as an “h.” But it’s also common for people to use a guttural, back-of-the-throat sound.