Third Night of Passover: My First Mina!
(I promise this is not turning into a food blog, though)
This year, for the first time, I’m trying to stay observant for the whole eight days of Passover. This means avoiding a lot of our favorite, easy-to-grab Austrian foods and learning to cook new things. Tonight, I made a Sephardic casserole called a mina. It’s delicious!
A mina is a layered casserole with almost any sort of filling, and matzah that serves something like the noodles in a lasagna. Because we can’t get kosher meat in Salzburg, I made mine vegetarian, but it doesn’t have to be. (Although I’m not sure what sort of filling would have meat but no cheese and still hold together, I’m sure many enterprising cooks have come up with variations I haven’t thought of!)
I wanted to use what we had, so my recipe was:
10 large mushrooms
1 medium leek (could have done with a second leek, frankly)
Olive oil for sautéing
250 grams cottage or ricotta cheese
Salt and pepper
1 small jar artichoke hearts, unmarinated
3 sheets of matzah
1 egg white
I used a “template” published by NPR, which walks you through the steps but leaves the filling up to you. I halved it, because there are only two of us. It worked out perfectly in a loaf pan.
After I sautéed the leeks and mushrooms, and let them cool, I mixed them with 250 grams of ricotta cheese, salt, and pepper. Next time, I might add garlic and/or some dried herbs, but I wanted to taste this first iteration “naked.”
The next step confused me a little bit, because I thought we weren’t supposed to let the matzah come in contact with water? But I found enough recipes for minas online and in Jewish cookbooks to figure there was something I didn’t understand. So, anyway, for this step, you run warm water over each sheet of matzah for about thirty seconds per side, and then let sit on a clean dish towel for five minutes. What you get is pliant, but not soggy, matzah, perfect for lining your casserole.
Then it’s one layer of matzah, one layer of filling, one layer of matzah, a second layer of filling, and then a last layer of matzah on top. Use one egg white to brush over the matzah to help the top layer crisp up, and dust with more salt.
I baked this one at 350 degrees (Fahrenheit) for 50 minutes. It could maybe have used an extra ten minutes or another 25 degrees? But it was yummy!
Let it sit at least 15 minutes to set before serving. I paired it with a small green salad, because it’s very rich… but delicious!
What are your favorite recipes for days 3-8 of Pesach, friends? I can try to live on Hillel sandwiches and quinoa salad for the next five days, but I probably won’t succeed.
I think it looks delicious.