I used to feel a slight sense of failure as I deleted the fancy dishes that never materialized. Today, I look at it as a triumph of sorts

The same thing happens every year. A few days before Pesach, my oldest daughter and I create a menu. It takes the better part of the evening. First we browse through the new recipe supplements and the recipes we’ve clipped, and jot down the ones we’d like to try. Next, we look over menus from the past few years to remind ourselves of what went over well — and what didn’t.

Finally, I sit at the computer, and create a new menu using an old one as a base. My daughter tells me what she’d like to make and I slot it in, I fit in the new recipes I’d like to try, and then use old favorites to round out all the meals.

As I work, I stick makeshift bookmarks inside my huge binder of recipes to mark the ones I’ll be making, and finally, my daughter and I create a huge shopping list from all the recipes we’ll be making for the first few days.

That first day of cooking, we’re full of energy, excited to be in the gleaming kitchen with the still-shiny pots and sacks of produce. We start working our way through the list, chopping nuts, separating eggs (does anything sound more like Pesach than the high-pitched whirr of the hand mixer?), melting chocolate, squeezing citrus fruit, and peeling endless mounds of vegetables. Most of the menu for the first day unfolds exactly as planned.

Then Chol Hamoed arrives. The kids want to be entertained, the kitchen is beginning to feel hot and stuffy, and there’s so much food left over. Slowly, we chip away at the menu. We replace the brown butter scalloped potatoes brunch with matzah brei. One supper is comprised almost entirely of leftovers. We make sliders instead of chicken nuggets and save ourselves a half hour of frying.

By the time we near the second days, we just want to hang out with everyone, and we ditch entire courses. No need for egg rolls and a rich soup before the main — the soup is more than enough. We’ll have the liver blintzes but skip the fruit soup. We repurpose leftovers.

Don’t get me wrong; no one goes hungry. The food is delicious and plentiful. It’s just not as varied as we originally envisioned.

After Yom Tov, I go back to my computer and alter the menu from “original dream” to “what we actually ate,” print out a final copy, and file it at the front of my Pesach binder.

I used to feel a slight sense of failure as I deleted the fancy dishes that never materialized. Today, I look at it as a triumph of sorts. It’s about a change in focus — in being more invested in spending time with my family than in cooking for them, in demonstrating my love directly rather than through a multistep appetizer.

In her beautiful Musings, Zelda Goldfield describes the post-Pesach blues when children and grandchildren depart, and the house is now silent. There’s always something bittersweet about goodbyes at the end of Yom Tov.

But for those of you who still have little people — or big people — at home, embrace this time. You’ve shown your love in the cleaning and the cooking, in the planning and the packing. And now, you can show it in the best way of all: in your unhurried, unstressed presence.

A gezunte zummer to all.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 640)