It’s estimated that nearly 4.5 billion people worldwide celebrate Easter, with religious traditions that vary by region, by faith, by family, and by a treasure trove of recipes passed down from generation to generation.
Easter dishes in Mexico include spicy chiles rellenos, salt cod-based bacalao and for dessert, capirotada, a cheesy Mexican version of bread pudding often eaten during Lent. The Ecuadorans also favor Bacalao for their Fanesca, a soup made solely for Easter and Lent with a mix of squash, fava beans, corn, peas, beans and rice, spices, peanuts, milk, cream and cheese.
Ethiopians break the fast with a spicy, slow-cooked chicken stew, Doro wat, topped with hard-boiled eggs and served with injera, a traditional Ethiopian flatbread.
In Argentina, Torta Pascualina, a baked puff pastry dish layered with spinach, ricotta, mozzarella, parmigiana, mushrooms and whole, hard-boiled eggs is traditional, resembling a souped up Greek Spanakopita. Highlights of Greek Easter meals often includes a whole, slow-roasted lamb on a spit. Eastern Europeans celebrate with Kielbasa, and pierogis with various fillings.
France and Germany are said to have been the first to create egg-shaped chocolates for the occasion, while the Dutch make a special Easter eggnog made strictly from yolks. At noon on the day before Easter, many Italians serve a savory, meaty Easter Pie filled with basket cheese (a firmer form of ricotta made only for the holiday) and other cheeses, onion, pepperoni, Italian sausage, hard salami and prosciutto.
Bologna-born Marco Minieri, co-owner of Bottega Bocconi in Middletown and Portsmouth told Newport Buzz that for Easter, the normally minimal Italian breakfast becomes a sit-down affair. “We sit at the table and eat boiled eggs, salami, quiche, bread. It’s a richer, more American style breakfast for Easter,” he said, and it goes on from there with a big mid-afternoon meal.
“For lunch, in my family, there’s lasagna, and also grilled or roasted lamb. We don’t eat much lamb (otherwise); it’s specifically for Easter.”
At dessert, Minieri’s family serves Colomba (Italian for dove), a cake made with almonds, topped with sugar, with candied fruit inside, and for both children and adults there is the tradition of large chocolate eggs filled with little gifts.
At home and abroad, lamb, ham and eggs all play a central role in Easter rituals and recipes, representing varying facets of the religious tenets associated with the holiday. Easter breads represent faith, hope and renewal, sharing and community. In Ukraine, they bake Paska, a lightly sweetened yeast bread studded with Easter symbols. There are hot cross buns in the U.K.; Folar, an egg-topped, airy sweet bread from Portugal; sausage and egg-stuffed Hornazo from Spain; and Polish cinnamon Babka.
For Newport’s own Sarah Fitch, regional chef for the Inked restaurant group, from childhood to this day, the holiday meal has been all about her grandmother’s sweet potato casserole.
“Easter was always at my Grandma’s house on Sheffield Ave. The egg hunt was first. (We’d snack on) pickles and olives and somehow the deviled eggs would always disappear before dinner started. Then we’d all sit down and of course there was a kid’s table I’d have to sit at. It was in her bedroom.
“Anyway, there was always a browned sugar glazed ham and a turkey, too. That was our routine for Thanksgiving and Easter, but the star was always my Grandma’s sweet potato casserole. It’s topped with buttery candied pecans. Everybody fights for the leftovers.”
Today, Fitch says the family still gathers at her Grandmother’s but the actual cooking is done elsewhere, with a rotating roster of who-brings-what, though as the chef in the family, there’s a bit of extra pressure on her.
“It’s ‘Who’s getting the turkey and dropping it off at Sarah’s house?’” she muses. “I can spend a whole night prepping for (the gathering of 12-16).”
“I make the casserole now,” she added. “More recently, we argue over who makes the best deviled eggs. I prefer mine, my mom prefers hers.”
Curious egg lovers can taste a slightly amended version of her recipe at Wharf Southern Kitchen.
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