Passover ended more than a week ago, so surely it’s time to move past Pesach. But when you’ve attended the annual Google seder — as I was lucky enough to do April 14 — well, you’ve just got to tell people about it.
Yes, the official Google employee seder, known as Koogle@Google, was held on the seventh night of Passover at the Googleplex in Mountain View, in one of those stylish, free-for-employee gastro-terias you’ve probably heard about.
While Koogle@Google isn’t the greatest name in the world, since kugel isn’t exactly Pesach-prominent, the cover of the haggadah did rock: an image of the classic Google search page, with “Koogle” in place of “Google” — each “o” on a matzah square — and with the tab “I’m Feeling Lucky” replaced by “I’m feeling passed over.”
First question: How did I get invited? No, being part of the Jewish media was not a factor. My wife, Stacey, directs an Oakland-based international nonprofit called Expanding Your Horizons (EYH) that aims to get girls interested in math and science careers, and Google has been helping out. One of her contacts, now a friend, invited us.
Upon arriving, we were led to the building that houses the Oasis Café, where tables for 18 were surrounded by Google-colored (yellow, red and blue) plastic chairs. Among the 135 or so attendees were about 75 Jooglers (a perfectly acceptable term, I was told, for Jewish Google employees) along with significant others, relatives, children and, uh … Fooglers? (Friends of Googlers?)
The Google seder started informally in 2001 under Charlie Ayers, Google’s first chef, and one of the company’s two Jewish founders, Sergey Brin, but it only became an officially sanctioned Google event in 2007. The meal is gratis, but attendees were asked to make a donation to Free the Children.
Sitting down, we eyeballed the usual setup, except it was all a little more so: humungous white porcelain bowls of hard-boiled eggs, three kinds of charoset and matzah plates stacked 25 high.
The event was strictly BYOSP — bring your own seder plate — and across the way was a stocking station with an arsenal of shank bones, oranges, bitter root pieces, etc. A group of five 20-something, male Jooglers next to me had no seder plate, so they sketched their own. Ah, brilliant young minds at work.
After the first hand-washing (brrrr … ice water from stainless steel pitchers), things got rolling. People went up to the microphone to read, the afikomen was wrapped in a napkin that looked like a matzah, a girl drew applause for a perfect chanting of the four questions. “Dayenu” was a melodic disaster, as people tried to sing the verses that are normally just read.
It was almost time to eat, and if you know anything about Google’s renowned campus cuisine, you know why I was so excited. But when we were welcomed by organizer Jenya Denissova telling us, “In this time of difficult times and recession, it’s a little bit different this year,” I got a little concerned.
No reason. Todd Koenigsberg, the chef at Google’s No Name Café, delivered the goods, along with a supporting cast of four other chefs.
His homemade gefilte fish was dense and savory, made of ling cod and rock cod. “I don’t like bottom-feeders,” Koenigsberg said. His matzah balls were slightly firm yet succulently fluffy, the soup liberally seasoned with parsley. The brisket was topped with green horseradish sauce, which a non-Joogler Googler referred to as “Jewish Chimichurri Sauce.” (See the full menu at by clicking here).
The coup de grace was Passover Tsimmis Koogle, as it was listed on the menu. “Passover kugel is not really my favorite,” Koenigsberg explained as he told me about his dessert-worthy creation of carrots and sweet potatoes, with a spices-infused cream sauce between each of the five layers.
After the meal, things disintegrated. “This happens at most seders, so you’re getting the true experience,” I told a non-Joogler. One guy made a good point: Elijah probably doesn’t have a Google card key, anyway.
During the seder, each of the young males next to me had his iPhone or gPhone out — not constantly, but a lot. At a Google seder, that’s OK. One Joogler showed me a tweet he sent: “Why is this night more Googly than all other nights?” By seder’s end, he had only one tweet back — from the guy sitting right across from him!
I nicknamed those guys the “Twitter Herbs.”
Andy Altman-Ohr is a copy editor at j. who lives in Oakland. Reach him at [email protected]. CHECK OUT the menu for the Google seder by going to my blog entry (click here).