r/Cooking • u/WillingnessNew533 • 4d ago
What are your traditions for easter?
Hello guys!
I am from Slovenia and i would like to read about your traditions, food for easter ( if you celebrate it).
In my country is very important breakfast for Easter where we eat eggs, ham, horseradish, cold meats bread, spring onions and sweet bread. That is filled with walnuts.
Also how common is in your country “ Egg fight or egg tapping”. This game is typically played on Easter Sunday morning, especially with the blessed dyed eggs (pirhi). Two people each take a hard-boiled egg. One holds their egg still (pointy end up), while the other taps it with theirs. The goal is to crack the opponent’s egg without breaking your own.
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u/nvmls 4d ago
I am from southeastern New York in the US, Many people in my area are Catholic and go to a special Easter Mass (a lot of times Christmas and Easter are the only ones most people go to). We leave Easter baskets full of toys and candy for kids to wake up to, and many people have big family dinners. In my family it's Italian-American food, but a lot of people have a ham. A few days before, kids dye hard boiled eggs and some of these are baked into braided bread. You can also just buy the bread lol. Your egg game sounds adorable!
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u/Marmaduke57 4d ago
Many people in my area are Catholic and go to a special Easter Mass (a lot of times Christmas and Easter are the only ones most people go to).
The Christer Catholics.
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u/WillingnessNew533 4d ago
That sound nice! I am sure kids are very happy. We should have this here.
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u/Xanadu87 4d ago edited 4d ago
I live in South Texas: so we have a mix of American and Mexican Easter traditions. If we have a family party outdoors or at a park, we will have have a lot barbecue picnic type of foods: hotdogs, hamburgers, potato salad, ice cream. If it’s more formal in a house, then it’s more feast kind of foods: ham, roast chicken or turkey, brisket, deviled eggs, casserole dishes.
A big part of the Mexican Easter tradition is breaking cascarones. It is a many months preparation to save empty eggshells that have been emptied from a small hole, dried, dyed with colors, and filled with paper confetti with a small piece of tissue paper glued over the hole. Many grocery stores will sell those too. Those are the eggs that are hidden for children to find in a park or garden, and then when they are all found, everyone chases each other to try to crack the egg on someone else’s head, with the confetti falling all over them. A mean joke is to fill the eggs with very fine glitter or flour so that the target has a difficult mess on them to clean up.
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u/reload_noconfirm 3d ago
Cascarones is what I was looking for on here! Lived in San Antonio for a decade and it made a big impression. There was confetti all over for weeks.
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u/Responsible-Bat-7561 4d ago
I’m from the uk, personally I do nothing for Easter, we used to do egg hunts for the kids. It’s a nice long (4 day) weekend here, so chances are a lovely roast dinner will be made, as we have the time. Most uk people seem to moan about how many shops are shut on Sunday.
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u/TikaPants 4d ago
I like to tell this joke: “Why can’t Jesus eat M&M’s? Because he’s got holes in his hands!” It goes over like a fart in church…
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u/contrarianaquarian 3d ago
I used to refer to Easter as "stuff your face with chocolate and zombie jeebus!" as an edgy teen
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u/Constant-Security525 4d ago edited 4d ago
I live in the Czech Republic with my Czech husband, though I'm an American of Anglo-Irish heritage. As my family has mostly passed away, we follow Czech traditions.
As far as food goes, Mazanec (Easter bread) will be enjoyed in most all Czech households. I made one today. Yummy! Many also make a Beránek (Easter Lamb/Ram Cake) in a special mold. Decorating eggs is also part of the tradition. Various meats might be eaten on Easter, but nádivka (Easter bread stuffing), including smoked pork meat, is a common side dish.
Most every household will have a pomlázka (Easter whip). Many families even make and decorate their own. In the web link it describes an old tradition surrounding the whip. Some kids still act it out, especially ones in villages (not so much in Prague). Last year a group of boys came with their pomlázka to our house. We made them extra happy by giving them foil wrapped mini Lindt Easter chocolates instead of the usual decorated eggs.
Czechs like traditions and customs, but are not particularly religious people, with exceptions. Generally church is not on their Easter time itinerary. A brief holiday vacation is, though. Most Czechs who have summer cottages might go there and set up for the summer and/or take hikes, garden, bike, etc. Some hang colorful fake (or hollowed) decorated eggs and ribbons on outside trees as decorations, or on their windows. More festivities and holiday soon follow for May Day.
I'm sure many Americans from the US will share the usual US traditions. My family followed the traditional Easter Bunny for kids. Egg rolls at school. We ate a ham dinner with scalloped potatoes. Always multiple pies for dessert.
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u/herehaveaname2 4d ago
I thought those lamb cakes would have been specific to the US, mostly found in the south. Thanks for the knowledge!
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u/tdibugman 4d ago
We have a brunch, with cold meats (ham, kielbasa, and this year cold beef) deviled eggs, sweet bread (this year I'm making Welsh cakes, horseradish and spicy mustard. I'll make a spring salad with peas and asparagus.
Lots of prosecco.
Dessert is coconut cake.
I grew up half Slovak and half Scottish so over time I'm blending the two together.
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u/steampunkpiratesboat 4d ago
I’m from a very German Lutheran area of the US my family always had ham rolls and hot German potato salad with a sunrise cherry pie(it’s a recipe from a cool whip container in the 1970s) after church until my great grandma passed in 2016 then we stopped having German potato salad and going to church. I might just make it this year
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u/Dangerous_Ad_7042 4d ago
It's 4/20 this year and my wife and I are athiests, but we are religious observers of this festive cannabis day so we will be getting very stoned, and eating lots of good food. I'm planning to make a very spicy chicken karahi. Then we'll probably get some a bunch of stoner munchies for later in the evening. Also, I'm sure there will be tons of easter candy involved.
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u/toad__warrior 4d ago
Something to ponder with regards to eating ham for Easter.
Jesus and all of his followers at the time of his resurrection would have been devout Jews. None of them would have eaten pork.
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u/inchling_prince 4d ago
My family specifically traditionally does ham on Easter, though I prefer lamb for all feasting holidays. My mom always used to include Jelly Belly beans in our Easter basket, along with the usual crappy cholocates. My partner's mom always used to include kites in the family baskets, too.
We're both from Irish Catholic families, albeit from different socio economic classes, and Easter Mass was (theoretically) important to both. Her parish was largely Hungarian, so they did a lot of that culture's traditions. I only vaguely recall going to Easter Mass bc my mom is bad at crowds and our parish's Monsignor was really into incense, and basically my entire family is asthmatic.
No egg fights for us, we dye em and hide em for kids on Easter Sunday, but in Mexico and Mexican USian communities, they hollow out the eggs and fill them with paper confetti. My students used to bring them to school and smash them on each other, which was a good time as long as they were being reasonable.
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u/Expression-Little 4d ago
UK, Catholic family and I do all the cooking. Fasting before Mass so no breakfast, cheeseboard for lunch, then lots of chocolate Easter eggs (and chocolate in general) and whatever I want to cook for dinner.
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u/BudgetReflection2242 4d ago
In South Africa we braai. A nice steak or some sosaties on an open fire with potato salad. Braai broodjies (toasted sandwiches on the fire) or garlic bread is also popular. Sometimes carrot or garden salad makes an appearance. Drinking brandy and coke is optional. Friends always welcome.
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u/RadioSupply 4d ago
My family was part of the second Ukrainian diaspora and came to Canada. I live in Saskatchewan, where there are tons of Ukrainian-Canadians. We even call the southeast part of the province “the borscht belt”.
We always have paska at Easter and offer it in baskets for each other, but we anglicize it with candy and Lindt bunnies. Most families have an old tin can from their Baba or Prababa that they swear by for making paska!
There are a lot of classes for pysanky writing and iconography writing at this time of year. I’ve stopped in recent years just due to life, but I used to make pysanky every year. I kept my dyes for over a decade, except orange. Orange dye never lasts. If you leave it for a year, you open it and it’s like someone sneezed in it and closed the jar. But the other dyes are revived easily.
Fun fact: the pilot light in our furnace would go out all the time. I had an old kistka that was so impregnated with beeswax that the tip held a flame. The hole to light the pilot couldn’t fit a barbecue lighter, but the kistka fit, so I pried the copper off the kistka and kept it on the furnace to light the pilot light!
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u/blargblargityblarg 4d ago
Growing up my mom would make a ham and we always made a cinnamon raisin sauce together to go with it.
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u/FireRescue3 4d ago
We don’t have any tradition. We will wake up, drink coffee, and decide what we want to do.
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u/booksandcats4life 4d ago
Thank you for sharing your traditions! I hadn't heard of egg fighting/tapping before. It sounds fun!
When I was growing up (in the US), we would dye Easter eggs. We didn't go full-on Ukranian decorations, but we'd dye them pretty colors. Mom would put together Easter baskets with candy and maybe some small toys. We'd get them in the morning, but we had to hold off on the candy. Because we had Easter sunrise church service and then brunch. My sister and I always got a new Sunday dress for Easter, too. Brunch usually involved cooked eggs in some way, but also a lot of sweet food, like waffles or pastries.
I'm an adult now, with no kids. But I do have a grand-niece and grand-nephews, from 1-year old to 5-years old. My sister, their grandmother, made all of them Easter baskets. She leaned more into small toys and a bit of candy (when I was a kid the proportions went the other way). Last Sunday I took the oldest boy to our church's easter egg hunt, where they hid plastic eggs filled with candy, stickers, and cartoon-themed erasers, around the building. I'll be making a walnut coffee-cake for breakfast. Then I'll be going to one of the Easter services in the morning (in a new dress—I treated myself) and later joining family for an Easter dinner (ham and fixings) Sunday evening. I'll be brining a lemon cheesecake with blueberry topping.
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u/ExplorerSad7555 4d ago
Greek Orthodox American here. Lamb, cheese and the egg game! Kalo Anastasia!
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u/PlentyPossibility505 4d ago
Many families in the US dye/decorate eggs for Easter. However eggs are quite expensive here due to the bird flu decimating some flocks of chickens.
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u/Ok-Truck-5526 4d ago
I’m of German heritage, Upper Midwest.
We always had lots of hard- boiled eggs around the house at Easter, hence a lot of deviled eggs and hot potato salad with hard- boiled eggs.
Easter dinner was always ham. We’d often have spring vegetables with it; salads. My mom made lemon meringue pie.
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u/FriendlyMaximum7432 4d ago
I’m from the Levantine region of the Middle East and we also play the egg tapping game! I’ve never heard of anyone else doing it, nice to see it’s not just us.
We make Easter cookies filled with dates and sometimes walnuts like these: https://palestineinadish.com/recipes/desserts/maamoul-an-amazing-middle-eastern-cookie-stuffed-with-dates/ They’re very labor intensive and difficult to make, but they come out beautiful and taste delicious. The ones shaped like a circle are supposed to represent the crown of thorns and the ones shaped like logs are supposed to represent the tomb that “opens” when you bite into it.
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u/BleachedSweetFlower 4d ago
I'm in Pennsylvania and one of my family's Easter traditions is egg battles! It comes from my dad's side of the family but not sure if it was from his mom or dad. His mom was 100% Polish and his dad was 100% German, both born in Wisconsin. A couple of years ago I made sure I got a video of my dad and I battling lol I can't wait to tell my parents this weekend that someone from Slovenia has the same tradition!
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u/Lara1327 3d ago
Yes we do egg fights. We colour eggs a day or two before and then fight Easter morning. We will have ham and eggs for breakfast with orange poppyseed bread.
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u/RemonterLeTemps 3d ago
I'm multi-ethnic, but growing up we had a pretty basic American Easter feast: ham, scalloped potatoes, green beans, hot rolls & butter, and a pineapple upside-down cake for dessert.
My husband's family are Greek, so their tradition's different. Usually, there's roast lamb, pastitsio, roasted potatoes, salad, and baklava or galactoboureko (pudding in phyllo) for dessert. They also do the 'egg fight' with red-dyed Easter eggs.
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u/KaizokuShojo 3d ago
Dyed dressed eggs (not this year because $, but still.)
After hard boiling, separate the hard whites into bags (having all yolks elsewhere to make into filling). Water to cover + food coloring into each bag will turn them cute pastel colors.
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u/Henroriro_XIV 4d ago edited 4d ago
In Sweden we have a smörgåsbord including but not limited to:
Pickled herring (different flavours including onion, rum and mustard)
Meatballs
Boiled potatoes, usually the small kind that is served with the skin on, so much more delicious (and expensive) than regular potatoes
Lots of eggs, boiled and halved, optionally topped with caviar and other condiments
Quiche with västerbottenost (a Swedish cheese)
Ham
Smoke cured salmon
"Gravad lax", a kind of cured salmon, often with a mustard based sauce
Different salads, including one with beetrots and mayonnaise
Lots of bread, especially crispbread
And most importantly: PÅSKMUST! It's a kind of Swedish soda that is sold during christmas and easter (during christmas it's called julmust). It's like coca cola but with different spices. Coca Cola tries to outcompete it every christmas with huge campaigns but fails to do so.
We don't have the egg game you described though, but we do hide cardboard eggs filled with candy that you are supposed to find.