I wouldn’t worry about it. Anyone who is really serious about kashrut would, frankly, not eat at your house anyway, because you don’t have a kosher kitchen. Someone of a lower level of observance would probably either a. not care or b. let you know what they can and can’t eat ahead of time.
mmmm, i think i need to make matzoh brei soon …
and as I keep telling jewish buddies of mine when teasing them
You can NOT seeth a chicken in its mothers millk …
<seething a kid in its mothers milk IIRC is the way it is phrased in the book. we are not going to get into the way that not just the law is followed but also anything that is the appearance … though I dont know how anybody could mistake chicken for goat.]
Sorry, I have eaten more than my share of german cooking, and it is quite flavorful. Your former boss being cheap and a crappy cook is not indicative of any bavarian I happen to know.
i have a friend who will eat at mine … I have a kosher box … everything in it is used only to make my killer vegan minestrone, down to the can opener, cutting board, knife, ladle, pot, 4 soup bowls, spoons, dishpan and sponge. About the only stuff that gets used that isnt in the box is the water faucet and ingredients [and I tend to buy basic beans, noodles and herbs that are kosher as the quality is better much of the time] from the veggie bins at the grocery store. The contents get washed up immediately and separately from my regular stuff.
I carry it to Pennsic also, in case we have vegans or jewish guests that dont want to risk coming into contact with animal products of any sort. Common courtesy, like also keeping some gluten free stuff, and seafood free stuff when you know you may have guests with sensitivities or allergies.
That’s nice of you to do that because it goes WAY above the call of duty, but you’d probably still get a polite refusal from an Orthodox or Conservative rabbi, should you invite him or her to dinner, even if you explained this system.
Canned matzoh balls, like packaged tortillas and frozen potato pancakes, taste so different from homemade from scratch that they might as well be different foods.
Matzoh Balls
Separate 4 eggs. Add 3 oz. oil to the yolks, and beat until well blended. Add 1 cup hot chicken stock (boullion cubes are fine), and beat well. Mix 1½ cups matzoh meal with 1 tsp salt, and fold into the batter. Beat the egg whites until stiff, and fold them in too. Chill for 30 min. Wet hands with cold water and shape into small balls. Simmer matzoh balls in soup for 20-25 min.
Now isn’t that better than abusing your taste buds? People will stop you in the street and praise your delicious matzoh balls.
By how far? 
I’m not sure I’ve ever had a matzo ball. I know I had matzo at Shayna’s more than once, but IIRC those were wafers. If I did have a matzo ball, it would was there.
Are matzo balls always eaten in soup? How different are they from dumplings?
They are a kind of dumpling.
Matzos (the “wafers”) are made from a simple paste of flour and water (no leavening agents – this is the “unleavened bread” from the Bible) which is rolled flat and baked into crackers. If you grind up the matzos, you get matzo meal. Matzo balls are made from matzo meal.
According to a Jewish cookbook I once read, at least one of the Jewish communities in India takes that verse fairly literally. They allow combinations of meat and dairy so long as the two animals aren’t from the same matrilineage.
I never remember to have matzo meal around so when I really want dumpling soup, so I rinse the salt off of saltines and mash them up with an egg to make the dumpling dough. It tastes pretty damn good for what it is, but it’s inauthentic and lacks schmaltz.
or you cheat and buy the box of matzoh meal =)
Most kosher restaurants near me are either meat or dairy. Let’s see, there’s this one vegetarian Chinese place we go to, but other than that, I can’t think of any pareve ones. Actually, there’s a husband-wife team who own a dairy and a meat restaurant right across the street from each other. And there’s an Italian place that used to be dairy, then they decided there was too much competition or something and they switched to meat.
Back to the topic… my mom makes matza balls for the Passover seder. We really don’t have them the rest of the year; I guess all the matza unearths a subliminal craving or something. They’re pretty good, nice and dense.
On the other hand, the matza balls in Tabatchnik frozen soup are terrible. If you must get a Tabatchnik chicken soup, get the kind that just comes withn noodles.
Speaking of schmaltz, when I made chicken stock I skimmed off the fat and put it in the freezer. Aside from using it to make matzo balls, what can I use it for? (Not necessarily Jewish cooking; just in general.)
“… but what do they do with the rest of the matzo?”
- Marilyn Monroe, at her first exposure to Jewish cooking…
Roasted potatoes maybe? They’re good in duck and goose fat, so I think chicken fat should work as well. And if you’re making soup with your stock, you might find at the end that you want a little bit of fat for the mouth feel- it depends on how much collagen is in the broth and what meat and veg went into the soup.
Well, here’s the recipe I use - I got it off the internet somewhere. Feel free to get creative with it.
mix:
1/4 c water
1/4 c oil (or schmaltz)
3/4 tsp salt
2 beaten eggs
add to liquids:
3/4 c matza meal
mix until everything is combined and let chill in fridge for 1-2 hrs.
Once chilling is done, put a pot of water on the stove to boil (I always add a little salt). Once it’s at a rolling boil, take approx 1 tbsp of matza ball mixture, form it into a ball by hand and drop it in the water. Repeat until the entire mixture is used. Cover and simmer for 1/2 hr.
You can add parsley, dill, pepper, boiled carrot, whatever floats your boat to the initial mix before chilling.
I went to a pareve cafe in Jerusalem once. It was odd. I had never heard of such a thing and it’s the only one I’ve ever seen, but I have to assume it’s not the only one in the whole world.
Don’t forget the key to light fluffy matzo balls - give them plenty of space in the pot to expand. And a good boil. Too crowded and you get matzo balls that will get moons to orbit around them.
Story about schmaltz, back in the day of “The Frugal Gourmet” who had Yitzkak Perlman as a “Guest chef” demonstrating some traditional Jewish recipe:
“Then you take about half a cup of schmaltz …”
“What’s schmaltz?”
“Left over chicken fat. So you take the schmaltz and …”
“Our heart conscious viewers could substitute vegetable oil or margarine, right?”
“Yeah, you could do that, but it wouldn’t taste right. Look, you eat this once a year, use the damn schmaltz!”
Fry onions in them. This is especially good for any stew recipe. (I keep a jar of various fats for this purpose–it usually ends up being a mix of pork and chicken fat. I don’t bother freezing. It can last a month or two before it even starts to go rancid.) Or spread it on rye bread, top with raw onions and salt, eat (OK, maybe not to everyone’s taste, but I like it.) Pretty much anywhere you would use lard or oil for cooking, you can use the chicken fat.
I don’t have my grandmother’s exact matzo ball recipe, but I am told she swears by a) separating the eggs and beating the egg whites; and b) adding a pinch of nutmeg. And Grandmom is a FABULOUS cook, so I always listen to her when it comes to food.