Passover Seder Menu & Recipes 2026 (5786)

I intended to go small and be simple this year, but never mind.

We’ll use my family’s Baskin Haggadah, and remember fondly family friend Marty Segal’s comment every Passover, “same as last year, let’s eat!” My beloved will lead the Seder, but I plan to interrupt whenever I feel like it, and told our guests to do so too.

Anyway, I now have plans for 16 participants, 3 types of charoset and 7 or 8 desserts. Oh well. Here is my Passover Seder menu and recipes for 2026 (5786.) By the way, the number in parentheses is the year according to the Hebrew calendar.

Seder menu 2026

• Wine or water, bubbly water (Pellegrino), ginger beer, or sparkling apple cider/grape juice
• Charoset or Haroset – 3 kinds
• Matzo balls in soup
• Matzo rolls and matzo
• A vegetable plate with gefilte fish and/or a hard boiled egg
• Main course
  • Salmon with lemon and/or dressing
  • matzo pudding
  • String beans and shallots
  • Lentil salad
• Desserts
  • Coffee (decaf or regular), tea (black or herbal)
  • Coconut macaroons
  • Hazelnut macaroons a/k/a Mustachudos
  • Lemon curd
  • Berries
  • Matzo crack
  • Florentines
  • Almond horns (if I get time)
  • Flourless cake

Charoset or Haroset

However you spell it, this is one of my favorite parts of the Seder meal. I’ll do at least 3 types: Ashkenazic because that’s what I grew up with, Slightly Spicy Sephardic because I love spice, and Charoset Balls because my friends (and Seder regulars) Carole and Mark (of string beans and shallots as well as guacamole fame) love them.

But this year, I’ll take a hint from Paula Wolfert and roll at least some of the Charoset Balls in cinnamon, as she suggests in her Moroccan cookbook, The Food of Morocco. I had not rolled charoset balls in cinnamon before this month. When I brought Paula’s recipe to my cookbook club dinner, the host asked for the recipe. I too found the cinnamon coating a pleasing addition.

I love to eat matzo with charoset and horseradish, the spicier the better. That is known as a Hillel sandwich.

Matzo Balls

I’ve already used my tried-and-true recipe, made ahead of time and frozen. I’ll boil them on Seder (Wednesday) morning, and then let them warm up in the soup, chicken or vegetarian as the guests desire.

Matzo Rolls and Matzo

There is nothing like matzo rolls to bring back memories of my grandmother (my mom’s mother), serving them warm and right out of the oven. As an adult I have decided that she probably didn’t want to sit down to a Seder and preferred being the purveyor of the rolls. Whatever the reason, her typical stance was wearing an apron, carrying a pan of rolls to the table. I’ve never managed to get my rolls as airy and light as hers, but they still pass muster. This year, I’ve already made 6 dozen, with 2 dozen of those intended for friends, and 4 dozen for our own Seder and afterwards. Unlike most other products with flour, they’re fine going from the freezer to the microwave.

Always put a plate of three matzo on the table, as you need one to hide (the middle one, the afikomen.) This year the 20-somethings will have to look for it, as we won’t have any kids to enjoy that hunt.

Vegetable Plate

A hard-boiled egg is traditional, as is gefilte fish. Then I or my contributor (as this year I’m taking contributions of food and drink) go to town. Lettuce, cucumber slices, cherry or other small tomatoes – whatever floats your boat as my mom used to say. This year I’m not using canned or jarred gefilte fish. We’ll see if the store-bought, custom-made version from a deli is any better.

Main course

We’ll do salmon. And when I say “we” I mean that my beloved will grill ahead of time, so we can have room temperature fish and I won’t fuss or overcook.

The vegetables will be a string beans and shallots. I love this recipe because it can be served hot, room temperature or even cold.

My plan is to serve them at room temperature, along with lentils (a variation of David Lebovitz’s recipe (which he calls “chape caviar”), and various condiments for the salmon.

And of course we’ll have my traditional matzo pudding or kugel, which is slightly sweet but not a dessert.

Desserts

I’m planning a dessert buffet, less elaborate than a Pittsburgh wedding cookie table, but along those lines, except with berries, flourless cake, macaroons, a variation on Marcy Goldman’s orignal matzo crack, and Passover-friendly cookies. I’ve already made two kinds of macaroons – colorful coconut ones and Mustadchudos, hazelnut macaroons in the shape of pyramids. For cookies, I’ll definitely do the Passover Florentines and hope also to have time to make almond horns.

And for the weekend, they’ll definitely be matzo brei.