Today’s post is about Easter Dinner. We are about three months late, but better late than never, right?
Before this year, Mr. Handsome and I had never hosted a family holiday dinner. We have hosted friends for holiday dinners, but never family. So this year for Easter, we had my brother-in-law and sister-in-law over for a big meal.
So much work goes into hosting a dinner, especially when it’s a holiday dinner. You want everything to be perfect. We got home from church and spent the entire afternoon cooking. My sister-in-law suggested we eat lamb to represent Christ’s sacrifice. Lamb on Easter isn’t a tradition that either Mr. Handsome or I held growing up, but I know some families do.
Mr. Handsome cooked a leg of lamb on the smoker, and I made most of the side dishes. We did spinach strawberry salad with lemon honey vinaigrette, sweet buns, roasted asparagus, and smoked potatoes. It all went very well and was quite delicious, but we were both exhausted by the time our relatives arrived. I have new respect for the amount of work it took my mom to make holiday dinners growing up. She was usually the one hosting.
What was the first holiday dinner you hosted? What do you eat on Easter?
Natalie
Ham and kielbasa,(with horseradish) potato salad, sweet potatoes, decorated psyanky (Easter eggs) and Easter bread.
Traditional Ukrainian food!
We also have beans or asparagus as well.
Dessert was a cake made into the shape of a cross covered with coconut and jellybeans!
Ellie
I do love coconut cake!
Anonymous
Those sweet buns look really good and fluffy. The whole meal looks good. We don’t do any special meal for Easter cause Thanksgiving and Christmas is enough and it is definitely work.
Ellie
Thank you! What do you like to cook for Christmas and Thanksgiving?
Anonymous
That delicious meal looks more like a Sunday dinner than a feast, but I’m an old school Southern cook from a long line of huge family gatherings. Thanksgiving is the star.
Ellie
What are your favorite things to cook for thanksgiving?
Regina Shea
We had a ham for Easter dinner. We would usually have leg of lamb but those have been hard to find. The first holiday dinner I hosted was Easter of 2017. We were still new to our church and out of the blue I invited a lady for Easter dinner from church who had no family in town. I was really out of my comfort zone and just blurted out ” Would you like to come for Easter dinner?”.
She graciously said said yes and thus began a beautiful friendship!
Ellie
How lovely! Good friends are to be cherished
Leina
I love hosting dinner parties and I’m always looking ways to offer delicious food without a huge hassle. My mum often helps out. I keep up with my English language skills by reading blogs and newspapers in English. So I have learned to use crock pot. It’s not common in Northern Europe. I usually cook a beef stew with it like I did last Easter, I had some venison cooking in red wine sauce. Then I usually roast some veggies and potatoes in the oven and make a salad. My mum usually brings Waldorf Salad, which is one of our favourites. Every now and then we make sour milk cheese. Smoked salmon is also a stable (either cold smoked or warm smoked one) and pickled herring (which I don’t like at all).
During Christmas time we usually serve creamy casseroles made from carrot or beet root for example with lots of meats and fish. The casseroles can be made before hand and frozen. Since Christmas is a 3 day holiday around here not every meal has to be big. We have sometimes just offered rice porrige with plum sauce and smoked reindeer quiche with some sweat pastries.
Ellie
I’m curious about the reindeer quiche. Do you have a lot of reindeer in the wild where you live? They are beautiful creatures!
Leina
Reindeers are semi-domesticated animals that roam free in herds northern arctic parts of Nordic countries and Russia. Their ownership is usually marked by ear tags. They usually let you come quite close to them and some that are kept for sledge rides are very people friendly. My children got to ride them last winter holiday and they loved to pet and feed them. Up north reindeer meat is very common meal, but down south it’s more a holiday treat. And in southern parts of nordic areas we only have wild reindeers (or caribus as americans call them).
Ellie
Very interesting! Thank you for sharing!
Diana
We enjoyed ham, mashed potatoes, green beans, tossed salad, and rolls for our Easter dinner.
We’ve been hosting my parents for the holidays for a while. I love cooking but at the same time don’t want to cook myself tired and not be able to enjoy the fellowship, so I choose simple meals for that reason.
Amy
This year for Easter I just had chicken salad.
I don’t eat Ham it has 1000 grams of sodium in it.. they don’t sell Ham here were in. Live.
Anon
Aussie here. Our family doesn’t always have a special Easter meal, and of course there is no thanksgiving here. Christmas here is in summer and we have fresh seafood (prawns, smoked salmon and oysters) along with roast meat served cold (pork, turkey) and salads. For dessert plum pudding (a tradition we grew up with) and pavlova.
Ellie
Fresh seafood for Christmas sounds lovely. Australia is on my “someday” travel list. Maybe when our kids are older elementary or teenagers. Perhaps we will come at Christmas!