Easter Menus

[Cook456]

Easter dinner is up to me this year, and I have no idea of what to cook. In the past I've done Rack of lamb, and Baked Ham, but want to do something different..perhaps with lamb, but am not a fan of lamb laced with garlic.

Any ideas? The dinner is being prepared for siblings who have culinary degrees, so it's hard to come up with something that will present well HELP..

[rooftop1000]

Personally I am doing a boneless leg of lamb on the grill, lasagna, and either a regular ham or may shoot the day and smoke a fresh ham myself. I did the fresh ham last fall and it was great.....smoking some ribs right now : )

tracey

[Betts]

I am going to be exhausted by the week from hell before I get to Easter so it will be really simple.

Personally, I like Julia Child's Grilled butterflied leg of lamb on the grill. Marinate in 4 TB olive oil, 2TB soy, juice of 1/2 lemon, 2 pounded garlic cloves, sprig of rosemary and plenty of black pepper and grill. Serve with gratin of potatoes and grilled asparagus or steamed with hollandaise. Dessert - Eton Mess - smushed sweetened strawberries mixed with whipped cream and fold in some crumbled meringues and serve in wine glasses.

[snowangel]

I'm smoking turkey for Easter and am getting desperate for ideas for sides. I'm thinking roasted new potatoes, asparagus. But, what else?

And, my husband thinks we can't have smoked turkey without cole slaw. And, he's worried that I'm not doing the typical ham and scalloped potato thing. But, Easter is late this year, so what I'm planning seems more appropriate.

Help, please. Oh, and I suppose people will want dessert, too. I'm having 20 people. Need to keep things fairly simple since the kids are home next week for spring break, and Saturday is sort of a hit or miss day because the teen has a volleyball tourney on Saturday.

[Abra]

Ok, Susan, here's a super-easy, make-ahead menu for you. Should suit kids and adults, and it's festive but not at all fussy.

Appetizers/nibbles

Cornets of a really good spiral-sliced ham wrapped around some good cheese

Creamy Artichoke Dip with Pita Chips

Main

Smoked Turkey

Your favorite macaroni and cheese

Roasted asparagus spears with a balsamic reduction drizzle

Zesty Carrot Gratin (with horseradish)

Spinach Salad with Oranges and Almonds

Dessert

Texas Chocolate Sheetcake

Hummingbird Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting (with banana and pineapple)

Let me know if you want any recipes.

[Kim Shook]

Abra is the BEST. Those are great ideas! Sounds like a perfect and easy and delicious Easter/Spring menu! The only thing that I would add is some really good yeast rolls from a local bakery (or you can cheat and use the frozen SISTER SCHUBERT rolls - they are really, really good!).

[legourmet]

Our Easter lunch will be a mixture of typical Italian dishes

Antipasto:

Torta pasqualina (Liguria) -Easter tart (Filo dough, ricotta, spinach, eggs)-

Primo:

Penne all arrabbiata (Latio) -Penne with Chili sauce-

Secondo:

Abbacchio alla romana (Latio) -whole suckling lamb with garlic sauce-

Dolce:

Zuppa romana (Latio) -cake soaked up with various liquors-

Edited April 10, 2006 by legourmet (log)

[PicnicChef]

Easter dinner is up to me this year, and I have no idea of what to cook.  In the past I've done Rack of lamb, and Baked Ham, but want to do something different..perhaps with lamb, but am not a fan of lamb laced with garlic.

Any ideas?  The dinner is being prepared for siblings who have culinary degrees, so it's  hard to come up with something that will present well  HELP..

←

Here's my crowd pleaser: Crowned roast of lamb. doesn't get more Easter than that...your butcher will get it in shape for you if its beyond your norm...

Add to that a lovely platter of room temp asparagus...cooked, as I would say, correctly; meaning all the way through and bright green. Hollandaise to top it off.

Roast up some baby red bliss potatoes with a hint of rosemary and lots of cracked pepper and salt.

Saute some Swiss chard, or if not, some spinach...

Finish it off with a nice big plate of devilled eggs.

That's Easter in my family....

[Cook456]

Here's my menu:

Spring Pea Soup

Salad of Arugula, mint and mache with a fennel seed vinagrette

Rack of lamb with Cabernet/ Ruby Port Sauce

Roasted Asparagus

Potatoe and Fennel Gratin

for dessert:

Coconut Cupcakes from The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook

Chocolates

Edited April 14, 2006 by Cook456 (log)

[Lori in PA]

Easter is also ds#3's 11th birthday -- he was born on an Easter, as well. In our family, the birthday person gets to choose the menu for the day. Initially, he requested hot dogs for lunch but was "guided" toward ham instead. His final choices:

Baked Ham

Mashed Potato Baked in a Casserole

Green Beans -- "Plain, please."

Carrots -- "Not roasted, not sauteed -- just those baby carrots, plain, please, Mom."

Yeast cheese bread

Birthday Cake made from a mix by the birthday boy

Icecream

In desperation, I'm adding an apple/date chutney as a side for the ham. I think I get the award for most boring Easter dinner, yes?

[Kris]

Originally hubby and I were going to have Easter dinner with my parents, siblings, niece & nephew. However a vandal scuddled those plans, so the car is still at the mechanic.

So we're home for Easter this year and I'm making a little something for the two of us:

Glazed baked ham (hubby's favorite)

Braised brisket - an odd choice for Easter I know, but I love brisket and since there is a large Jewish population in my neighborhood & it's Passover, there were a lot of them available. So, I decided to try something new. I've never made a brisket before, so wish me luck!

Baked macaroni & cheese (with some smoked gouda cheese mixed in with the cheddar)

Scalloped potatoes

Roasted asparagus

I may try my hand at a tres leches cake too.

Edited April 15, 2006 by Kris (log)

[joiei]

THe family I work for has requested

rootbeer glazed ham

I have added guacamole stuffed eggs (green eggs and ham)

West indies crab salad

Tabbouleh

artichoke pasta salad

crunchy russian fingerling potato salad

assorted finger sandwiches including

pimento

pepper pecan cheese

dilled egg

tuna with capers

assorted cookies

strawberry cheesecake (from family recipe)

easter angel food cake

[jamiemaw]

Easter.  What's the traditional fare?  We usually just had chocolate when I was growing up.

←

Easter is necessarily of pagan construction here at Treetops, Lucy—we feature Stonehenge on our hot cross buns. It’s also a promise from Mother Nature—a sort of IOU repaid—especially for middle-aged men who have survived the bite of another winter. If you’re a child though, Easter weekend is like Friday afternoon at the closing school bell, the entire summer laid out ahead, full of freshly budded opportunities and the mischief that will surely make them.

Higher on the hills, the snow still lies in the wildfire scars of three summers ago. For every springtime promise there is also threat, the risk of growth, the rendering of the dream caught in candling pine trees that turmed the night bright as noon and made the Valley sound like war.

We’re celebrating the advent of songbirds, including ceaselessly cheerful robins—I’ve yet to meet a depressed one. The quail busily sprint through the orchard, rushing from meeting to meeting like freshly hatched MBA’s. Carpets of purple crocuses and lipstick tulips, witchhazel, forsythia, dogwood and primrose are underfoot. So too the vestigial seasonal fevers that insistently run even through middle-aged men: Hope springs vernal.

But it's a group of purple hyacinths in a sunny spot near the front door that have caught my eye today. Purple is the universal colour of Easter; the shock of pastel after months of a grey winter livery.

Out in the still-naked orchard, the suckers were pruned off a few weeks ago and the buds are just breaking: You can feel the storehouse of energy just about to be released like Beethoven. It is still an underground charge of current. The apple trees curl over the brows of the hills like so many ballerinas plunged to earth, their toes en point, searching for the sky.

In just another fortnight, as the blossoms set, the hillside will turn from silver trunks into brilliant white crinolines. The blossoms will sit up for just a few days, and then a breeze off the lake will knock them down and the growing season will begin, forces released to flow upward and out through their limbs to hold the new fruit.

In the vineyard next door, the same forces stand ready, although the novice group that bought it last year planted new vines too late, in August instead of May—many of the young plants did not survive a cold January. Word is that the winery is for sale again.

How to mark this time of green promise? This afternoon we’ll begin with grilled asparagus, marinated in seed mustard, chillies, soy and oil and wrapped with boar prosciutto.

The main event will be grilled, butterflied leg of lamb (the uphill leg being preferred as more tender), which last night sat in the cooler under a wet rub of oil, garlic, rosemary, shallots and pepper. In the morning I added a slurry of soy, anchovy paste and orange zest. I prefer my leg of lamb on the bone, but it’s early in the season and the legs are still small; boned-out, mine barely made two kilos, hardly worth the carving fuss.

Wines will be local pinots, but I have a nice bottle of supple Rioja that’s ready as well.

I haven’t decided the starch, although there’s lots to choose from: baby nugget potatoes from down the road, which we could roast in butter and salt; bleu cheese scalloped Yukon Golds; or, most likely, because I won’t have a gravy, a mint and pea risotto. We’ll also serve haricots vert and young carrots, bathed in butter.

We’ll have a salad of rocket and ditch cress, bosc pears and some of the local goat’s cheese snapped with a punchy vinaigrette.

Dessert will be a chocolate dacoise with ganache filling; grilled pineapple rounds will shotgun it, a delicious cliché.

Next weekend is Greek Easter. Although I’m not Greek, I always make a point to visit our friends Joe, Harry and Georgia, who are. Every year Joe and Harry spit-roast a couple of lambs and Georgia goes to town with long tables of metzes, condiments, vegetables, salads and what-have-you. The beer and wine are icey, the company much warmer. I hate to miss this feast, but, alas, I have another commitment made months ago.

So Harry and his wife will be our guests this afternoon. Question: Can a two-kilo boned leg supplant whole animals slow-roasted over wood and charcoal?

I’ll accede to the jury, which is still out. Out by the grill that is, watching the restless quail convene their urgent meetings, and the apple trees, ready to spring their confetti blossoms and release the season of growing.

Edited April 17, 2006 by jamiemaw (log)

[Lori in PA]

I hope you enjoyed your meal, Jamie, as much as I enjoyed your words. I, too, live in orchard country, and it is just as you described.

[ludja]

I'm hosting Easter this year again and so my thoughts are turning to planning the menu. I haven't decided between ham or lamb yet...

Please share your ideas and menus!

If you're leaning towards an Italian Easter menu here's a thread on Easter and Passover Traditions in Italy that Pontormo started.

For baked goods we already have a few good threads started by Filipe and jackal10 on traditional Easter baking:

Easter Pastries Around the World

and

Easter Baking Traditions

Edited March 27, 2007 by ludja (log)

[rooftop1000]

I was thinking rabbit....just kidding.

I have a loverly leg of lamb waiting and hubby will do his lasagna (off the Ronzoni box) with meatballs.

I cant decide weather to add grilled chicken or some ham.

Veg usually include grilled asparagus, eggplant, squash, etc

have to have cheese n crackers....maybe some crab salad and tomato or white bean crostini, deviled eggs...M-I-L usually does dessert

tracey

[Kim Shook]

Lamb

Ham*

Grilled Asparagus

Le Halle Potatoes Dauphonaise

Green vegetable*

Salad*

Colored deviled eggs

Biscuits

Hot Cross Buns*

Coconut Cake

Carrot Cake Bars

Pastel Cupcakes w/ Tie Dye Frosting

*Brought by others

[BertaBurtonLake]

I am planning for Easter dinner (which also happens to be my oldest DD's birthday this year):

Rolled boneless leg of lamb

confetti rice

asparagus

blanc mange bunny mold with lime jelly "grass"

birthday cake

The lamb, rosemary, garlic, cream, and butter all are grown here on our place. I am just hoping to prepare this meal in my new kitchen of our new house which is almost finished

Berta

[hummingbirdkiss]

I have to work on Easter but am trying to get my kids off and over the Saturday instead ...what a logistical nightmare gathering adult children!!! argh!

My menu is very simple and very casual ..but wonderful I think and it totally defines spring to me

one traditional thing is the herbs I use in all the dishes..because this time of year my herb garden is starting to burst and it is so fun to try to get them into everything for the first spring meal gathering!

I also put plates of fresh herbs all over the table so everyone can add more if they want ...

for a starter I usually have some kind of seafood like crab or prawns (what ever looks the best) dipped in clarified garlic chive and parsley butter

the main dish is a whole fresh fish... hopefully a

wild caught salmon stuffed with herbs and cooked on the grill

asparagus bundles tied with chives and dressed with Hollandaise

rice pilaf (made of course with fresh herbs)

spring green salad with home made Green Goddess dressing (more herbs)

orange rolls with herb butter

I serve fruit spritzers, wine and beer to drink

for dessert (NO HERBS!!! LOL unless my mint sprouts before then I will of course use that for the whipping cream!)

Caribbean black cake and brownies with whipped cream

coffee

[ludja]

I am planning for Easter dinner (which also happens to be my oldest DD's birthday this year):

Rolled boneless leg of lamb

confetti rice

asparagus

blanc mange bunny mold with lime jelly "grass"

birthday cake

The lamb, rosemary, garlic, cream, and butter all are grown here on our place. I am just hoping to prepare this meal in my new kitchen of our new house which is almost finished 

Berta

←

Do you use a bunny mold that is usually used for cakes or is this a special pudding mold? This sounds really lovely. If there is any chance that you can snap and post a photo it would be wonderful to see!

Do you mind me asking where home is that you can grow you own wonderful dairy and lambs?

I do love ham, but all this talk of grilled and rolled leg of lamb is swaying me. My mom will have both but we'er only four this year so I think I'll pick one or the other. The leftovers from both are great!

Welcome to eGullet, BertaBurtonLake!

[Joni]

Any great boneless leg of lamb recipes?

[Kouign Aman]

Roast chicken

Asparagus

Carrot rings

scalloped potatoes

artichokes if I see nice ones in the store (seems early but somewhere I read they are available)

Dessert will be easter baskets. We shall all 'liberate' bits from the basket of the smallest member of the gathering, who is the only one who will have an easter basket.

Unless the husband prevails on me to make icecream...hmmmmm

[GreekCook]

I usually go to my "village" for Easter where I invariably get to eat traditional lamb on the spit at about a 100 different relatives.

This year however I am staying in Athens as we have to "babysit" my girlfriend's boxer Ramone

So I'll be cooking Greek Easter Soup (Mageritsa) but without the heart and lungs, just the liver.

Lamb in the oven ( I slow roast it for 12 hours and it comes out divine)

Potatoes with garlic and feta

Chicken in the oven with onions and tomato (My sister doesn't eat lamb)

Tzatziki (extra, extra strong with a least 12 cloves of garlic)

I'm trying to decide between cheesecake or trifle for desert

The reason I haven't posted pictures yet is because this young lady chewed the usb cable and still waiting for a new one

[BertaBurtonLake]

I am planning for Easter dinner (which also happens to be my oldest DD's birthday this year):

Rolled boneless leg of lamb

confetti rice

asparagus

blanc mange bunny mold with lime jelly "grass"

birthday cake

The lamb, rosemary, garlic, cream, and butter all are grown here on our place. I am just hoping to prepare this meal in my new kitchen of our new house which is almost finished 

Berta

←

Do you use a bunny mold that is usually used for cakes or is this a special pudding mold? This sounds really lovely. If there is any chance that you can snap and post a photo it would be wonderful to see!

Do you mind me asking where home is that you can grow you own wonderful dairy and lambs?

I do love ham, but all this talk of grilled and rolled leg of lamb is swaying me. My mom will have both but we'er only four this year so I think I'll pick one or the other. The leftovers from both are great!

Welcome to eGullet, BertaBurtonLake!

←

Thanks for the welcome, ludja! The mold I use is a pudding mold my mother always used at Easter. She would unmold the blanc mange ona large platter and put the rough chopped jelly all around it. I now do the same since inheriting her mold.

I live in rural Southern Virginia. We have a Jersey milk cow for our own use and have 6 Katahdin ewes and a flock sire. So far this year we have 4 ram freezer lambs. We have one left in the frezzer from last year and his will be the leg of lamb for this year's Easter dinner. We also have a flock of chickens which supply all our eggs and the extra roosters amke the most lovely stock.

I will try and figure out the pic posting thing as I would love to contribute that way as well. I see so many appetizing, beautiful culinary offerings from so many of the members here!

All the best,

~Berta

[Marmish]

I usually go to my "village" for Easter where I invariably get to eat traditional lamb on the spit at about a 100 different relatives.

This year however I am staying in Athens as we have to "babysit" my girlfriend's boxer Ramone

So I'll be cooking Greek Easter Soup (Mageritsa) but without the heart and lungs, just the liver.

Lamb in the oven ( I slow roast it for 12 hours and it comes out divine)

Potatoes with garlic and feta

Chicken in the oven with onions and tomato (My sister doesn't eat lamb)

Tzatziki (extra, extra strong with a least 12 cloves of garlic)

I'm trying to decide between cheesecake or trifle for desert

...

Sounds delicious Greekcook! We are invited to our Greek friend's family Easter again this year. I always ask if I can bring something and they always graciously tell me no. There is TONS of food, so I don't need to take something, but I'm trying to come up with an appetizer to take. They have, of course, all the expected Greek dishes.