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Amy Kurzweil

Op-comic: A Passover recipe

By Amy KurzweilGuest contributor 
A phone video recording of a grandmother. "Don't even try — it's expensive." "Will you just tell us the ingredients!"
"My grandmother's gefilte fish recipe lives in the oral tradition. What kind of fish? Only God knows."
"You grind in the fish. Put in eggs — I just estimate it — and a little matzah meal. Onion! Grate it in. Pepper and salt."
"Gefilte fish has historically German origins, but poor Ashkenazi Jews took to it for practical reasons."
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"Plus, fish was considered an aphrodisiac by Jewish sages. Bubbe oft repeated 'make love whenever you wannit.' " "Sugar!"
"I don't know when or how often Bubbe ate gefilte fish growing up. Surviving the Holocaust has a way of consuming stories."
"In my years, she lived mostly on tubs of whitefish from Costco forever in the freezer." "Put a carrot, onion, slowly cook."
"Since Bubbe died last April, on Passover, I realize I'll never eat Bubbe's version..." "It cooks about a hour and a half."
"...unless I make it myself." "And that's delicious! Add some horseradish."
"And to that, Bubbe reminds me..." "Feh, you not gonna do it — it's too much work."
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"Why cook when there's a whole shelf of bottled fish that will literally never go bad?" "Don't waste you energy."
"So in Bubbe's honor I will be not making gefilte fish. May memory of her non-cooking be a blessing." "Go make love instead!"

Amy Kurweil is a New Yorker cartoonist and the author of “Artificial: A Love Story.”

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