Joan Nathan's classic Passover haroset recipe

Between the lines: How finely you chop the apples is a matter of taste (and how hard you want to work). Nathan pulses them in a food processor. Her mother-in-law would use a knife.

• "My family preferred haroset chunkier, the way I make it to this day," she writes.
• "The only thing I do differently is toast the nuts and use local varietal apples."

American Apple and Nut Haroset

Ingredients: Makes 5 to 6 1⁄2 cups

• 1 cup almonds and/or walnuts, toasted
• 3 flavorful tart apples (Gala, McIntosh, Granny Smith), cored, seeded, and coarsely chopped (about 1 pound/453 grams)
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• Grated zest of 1 lemon
• 2 to 3 tablespoons sweet red wine
• 11⁄2 tablespoons sugar (optional)

Directions:

• Put the nuts into a food processor fitted with a steel blade, and pulse, adding the apples, cinnamon, lemon zest, and red wine as you go along until the mixture turns into a paste with a slight crunch.
• Taste it, and add more wine and the sugar, if needed. Put a little in a small bowl on the Seder plate, and serve the rest. This haroset lasts in the refrigerator for about 2 weeks.

From My Life in Recipes: Food, Family, and Memories © 2024 by Joan Nathan. Excerpted by permission of Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.