Shopping List

Oh, what fun it is to waltz through stores on a shopping mission! The knowledge that you have to come home with certain items is a contrasting feeling to the leisurely browsing or window shopping I normally love to do. Shopping for Pesach is a whole new take on exercising one’s purchasing power. As most holiday shopping goes, the closer you get to the deadline, the more frenzied and panicked the shoppers get. Try walking through the KRM supermarket the weeks before Pesach! In the spirit of remaining calm and not overspending on what boils down to pretty much one week’s worth of camping out in one’s own kitchen, I have compiled a list of what I think I’ll need to buy for my first Pesach in my own home.

(Keep in mind that living in a two-bedroom Brooklyn apartment as I do, there isn’t exactly much storage space for hiding away Pesach wares year round. I am trying to get away with buying only what I deem absolutely necessary for this year so that I won’t be stuck with boxes of Pesach goods that I have nowhere to store. Don’t forget, there will always be other years to add more to the collection. Hopefully by then, we’ll be living in a bigger house too.)

Thus said, I am not planning to buy two sets of dishes and silverware – everything but the kitchen sink. I am only planning to buy absolute requirements and use disposable paper goods for everything else. Milchig dishes? Disposable. Cups? Disposable. Mugs for hot drinks? Styrofoam (with apologies to the environment.) Cutlery? Disposable. You get the idea. We already have a set each of a milchig and fleishig sharp knife and potato peeler from a previous Pesach when we brought the items to my parents’ house because my husband did not like their peelers or blunt knives when he helped with the cooking. So, for dairy, all we will need to get is one frying pan and a spatula. That is all.

(We happened to have won a brand new frying pan recently that I put away for Pesach. So we just need a spatula…and paper goods for milchig’s. That’s all.)

For fleishigs, we will definitely need a bit more than that. Pots and pans and silverware. I’m debating over real dishes or paper goods.

When it comes to pareve, there are some things that are necessities like mixing bowls and spoons; a mixer (most likely handheld); a hot water urn; and other things that I’m not sure how necessary they’ll be this year (say, a food processor) but would be useful if they were here.

Then there’s the need for rolls of foil and plastic sheets for covering up the countertops, sink inserts, fridge inserts, (oven inserts?) rolls of paper to line tables and cupboards and contact paper to line drawers. I have no idea how much I’ll need of all this. I do know that the rolls of contact paper I bought last year were not enough for all the cupboards in my kitchen.

Am I forgetting anything? I definitely feel as if I am.

Okay, deep breath.

Somehow everyone reaches the finish line.