Passover Cheese Blintzes Recipe | CDKitchen.com (2024)

FAQs

Why do Jews eat blintzes? ›

One of the reasons that blintzes in particular are a beloved Shavuot food is that two blintzes laid side-by-side resemble the two tablets Moses received on Mount Sinai. Jewish grandmothers would have you believe that making blintzes is an enormous production, but it is just not true.

Certified Kosher by the Orthodox Union.

Serve the blintz: Heat a pat of butter over medium heat in a skillet. Fry blintz until browned on both sides. Transfer to a place and serve with sour cream or a fruit sauce or jam or your choice.

For land animals, the criteria are: must have split hooves and must chew cud. Cows, goats and sheep are 'kosher animals' and pigs, horses, donkeys and camels are not.

A blintz (Hebrew: חֲבִיתִית; Yiddish: בלינצע) is a rolled filled pancake in Ashkenazi Jewish cuisine, in essence a wrap based on a crepe or Russian blini .

Blintzes vs Crepes

The main difference is crepes are only cooked once, and be be served plain, without filings. Blintzes, are always served filled, usually with a cheese mixture, and are cooked twice; once when made, and again after they are filled and pan fried.

The Origin of the Blintz

The blintz originated from Eastern Europe from a Jewish community called Ashkenazi. The Slavic translation is “pancake” since it resembles a pancake. Traditional fillings include sweetened cheese with raisins.

Russian blinis tend to be thicker than blintzes (which came by way of Eastern Europe to the U.S. via Jewish immigrants) because blinis are made with a yeasted batter that's left overnight to rise, whereas blintzes — like crêpes — are made of flour, milk, and eggs.

Along with wheat, barley, rye and spelt, oats are one of the “five grains,” which can become chametz when brought into contact with water. On Passover, it is forbidden to eat or even own chametz. Oatmeal (and most other oat products) is therefore not kosher for Passover.

From a strictly Biblical standpoint there is no question that potatoes are fine. They are not grains. Funny story. Some Ashkenazic rabbis wanted to include them in the same category as beans and corn, called “kitniyot” in Hebrew, which is forbidden on Passover by the rabbis.

Can Jews eat potatoes during Passover? ›

Our Passover recipes span matzo, haroset, brisket, Gefilte Fish, plenty of potatoes, and mains like chicken or salmon. Recipes like chef Hilary Sterling's Confit Kugel Wedges offer the option to either use white rice flour or substitute in some finely ground matzo meal if avoiding rice.

Both the crêpes and the filled blintzes can be made ahead of time; just cover and chill overnight or freeze for up to one month.

Both crepes and blintzes are a thin cooked pancake made from wheat flour and prepared either sweet or savory. They can be rolled or folded and filled with all sorts of ingredients -- meats (when using non-dairy milk in the batter) or cheese and vegetables to chocolate and fruits.

Today, Jews commemorate their ancestors' flight to freedom by eating this same unleavened cracker-like flatbread. This is why Jews are forbidden to eat or keep chametz (leavened grain foods) in the home during Passover.

The first known mention of apples and honey being eaten on Rosh Hashanah comes from the 14th-century legal work Arba'ah Turim, which states that German Jews ate apples and honey in order to bring sweetness into the New Year.

Bagels are created in 17th century Poland as a response to anti-Semitic laws preventing Polish Jews from baking bread. Jewish bakers circumvented these restrictions by boiling the dough before baking it.

"By the 14th century, there's quite a strong tradition that people eat cheese on Hanukkah and it's associated with Judith giving cheese to the enemy to make him drunk," Weingarten says.