Easter Dinner 2020

[Martin Fisher]

Very simple and low-carbohydrate.

 

Country ham and composed salad.

[kayb]

Close to standard here. Ham, asparagus, potato salad, green peas, corn casserole. 

 

Probably will make up plates and deliver to folks to avoid so many leftovers.

[MetsFan5]

Couldn’t find ham anywhere.  To be delivered that is. I’m not going out just for ham. 
  So it will be filet mignon, roasted cauliflower or grilled zucchini, baked potatoes and salad. 

[robirdstx]

We are thinking of doing Thanksgiving for Easter this year ~ Roasted Turkey Thigh, Mashed Potatoes and Gravy, Green Peas and Dinner Rolls

[Tri2Cook]

Just me and the kid so I told her to decide... steaks on the grill, baked spuds and an as yet undecided veggie. Also, mushrooms for me (she's not a fan). I'm gonna put the sourdough starter to work and make some form of bread as well. Probably a Quebec style sugar pie for dessert.

[Shelby]

We're having St. Patrick's for Easter.  Corned beef and all the traditional sides.  

[liamsaunt]

A Waygu beef tenderloin roast for my husband, niece and nephew.  I was going to make Ina Garten's basil-parmesan sauce to go with it, but I don't have enough basil so am thinking about her béarnaise instead.  My sister and I are having a roasted chicken breast marinated in dijon mustard, rosemary, and balsamic.  Sides are celery root-parsnip latkes, roasted broccoli, and some kind of potato in case the young adults don't like the latkes.  Most people have expressed a preference for mashed, but I am not sure that I will have enough milk to do that.

[David Ross]

I found a rack of lamb that I'll prepare.  We don't see much lamb where I live and it's always incredibly expensive, but I love to have it at Easter to signal in a new season of spring cooking.  By the way, this is one of my Easter salads/vegetables I'll be making.  I've posted it in the dinner thread before, but I'll add it here.  It's a simple dish of steamed green beans topped with deviled egg salad.  It's good with some crumbled bacon over the top or some fried onions.  I don't have the carton of fried onions, so I'll make some just for garnishing the salad. For a special dish I'll make homemade mayonnaise.  Sometimes I use Greek olive oil, but it can be a little strong and bitter so I usually try to use grapeseed oil for the mayonnaise.

 

Green Bean Deviled Egg Salad-

For the Homemade Mayonnaise-

2 large eggs

2 tsp. fresh lemon juice

2 tsp. Dijon mustard

1 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. black pepper

1-1 1/2 cups extra virgin olive oil

 

For the Green Bean Salad-

1 1/2 lbs. fresh green beans, (substitute frozen petite green beans)

1 cup fresh mayonnaise

2 chilled, hard-boiled eggs, diced

1/4 cup diced red onion

2 tbsp. chopped capers

2 tbsp. Dijon mustard

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar

1/2 tsp. celery seeds

1 tbsp. chopped fresh dill

salt and pepper to taste

fresh dill for garnish

 

Make the homemade mayonnaise-

Place the eggs, lemon juice, mustard, in a blender. Process just until ingredients are combined, about 20 seconds. With blender running at low speed, slowly drizzle in the olive oil in a slow steady stream. Continue to add enough oil until the mayonnaise thickens. This will take about 3-5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Refrigerate the mayonnaise at least one hour before using to allow it to cool and the oil to set

 

Make the Deviled Egg Salad-

Bring a saucepot of water to a simmer. Sprinkle in some Fruit Fresh and add the green beans. and cook just for 2-3 minutes until tender but still crisp. Place the beans in a bowl of ice water to cool. Drain the beans and pat dry. You can make the beans ahead of time, just place in a covered container and chill in the fridge.

 

In a separate bowl, add the mayonnaise, hard-boiled eggs, red onions, capers, mustard, apple cider vinegar, celery seed and dill. Stir to combine. Taste and season with salt and pepper to your liking.

 

Place some of the green beans on a serving plate then top with some of the deviled egg salad and garnish with fresh dill.

 

[David Ross]

I'm going to make a carrot cake from a very old recipe.  The recipe doesn't include raisins, but I always add them.  Well wouldn't you know, there's been a run on raisins!  The only raisins I found early this morning were huge bags that would be an army for a month.  Then I started to thinking, what could I substitute?  I've got some chopped dates leftover from the Christmas pudding.  Then an idea struck, why not use some of the leftover mincemeat from the holidays.  It's got raisins and some other tasty fruits, so I think some mincemeat into the carrot cake it will go.

[Darienne]

Normally there'd be visitors and either a roast beef or a turkey dinner, but of course there are none.  So I have this hankering for Chile Relleno Casserole from Homesick Texan and so that's what we will have.  Oh, of course I am adding pulled pork (à la Roberto Rodriguez recipe for Puerco Pibil) from my frozen supply to the recipe.   I'm too lazy to make Chiles Rellenos and besides I have a passel of frozen Rajas in the freezer from a month ago or so.  Haven't decided on dessert yet.  I'm pretty sure it will involve chocolate.  

[suzilightning]

Just spatchcocked the "free" kosher chicken I got from Shoprite, salted it and put it in the fridge to dry brine.

I'm planning on roasting it with carrots, garlic and lemons tomorrow.

Asparagus roasted in the oven.

Still not sure of the starch...I have white potatoes, sweet potatoes, rice of several kinds, all kinds of pasta.

 

Leftover chicken for sandwiches, soup,  chicken pot pie; frame goes into the stock for soup and the sauce for the pot pie.

[blue_dolphin]

I have some short ribs in the freezer and intended to cook them for Easter but now that I have nice eggs back in the house, I was thinking Eggs Benedict might be a nice treat.  

That would be more brunch than dinner but these days I don't seem to have an interest in cooking more than one thing per day 🙃 

[Tri2Cook]

15 hours ago, Tri2Cook said:

and an as yet undecided veggie

She's a little old for me to write these things off as "from the mouths of kids"... she asked if the veggie could be homemade mac & cheese. 😆
Dessert is definitely the sugar pie, they're in the oven right now.

[gfweb]

Pork loin (SV) roast of some sort, sprouts, potatoes.

[MetsFan5]

@Tri2Cook thanks I forgot I had mushrooms. Will definitely make them they compliment steak well. 

[Kim Shook]

4 hours ago, David Ross said:

Then an idea struck, why not use some of the leftover mincemeat from the holidays.  It's got raisins and some other tasty fruits, so I think some mincemeat into the carrot cake it will go.

I think that idea is genius!  How about sharing that recipe when you finalize things? 🙂

 

Of course our Easter, like everyone's is different this year.  Just the three of us and we decided to try to do as much as we can from our freezers/pantry so as to lower the amount of time spent in stores looking for scarce goods.  The menu is:

 

Ham biscuits w/ sweet potato butter - we have a nice chunk of Edward's Ham in the freezer and I have a can of sweet potatoes and some applesauce for the "butter"

Broccoli gratin w/ streusel – all we needed was fresh broccoli and in our area, at least, fresh produce is really plentiful

Spiced peaches - a jar of these was a Christmas gift from a friend

Corn - I have a tube of creamed corn and a bag of sweet corn in the freezer and will make winter creamed corn 

Deviled eggs - two weeks ago we couldn't find eggs anywhere, now they are plentiful

 

Almond Joy Cake - All pantry/freezer stuff.  I have a bunch of cake mixes I got on sale for $.50/box.  

 

Happy Easter to everyone!

[suzilightning]

20 hours ago, Tri2Cook said:

She's a little old for me to write these things off as "from the mouths of kids"... she asked if the veggie could be homemade mac & cheese. 😆
Dessert is definitely the sugar pie, they're in the oven right now.

Well, mac and cheese IS considered one below the Mason Dixon line.

[David Ross]

The carrot cake was a disaster.  The cake and the pans, not the taste of the cake.  I wasn't paying attention and didn't prepare the pans like I normally do, which is the  old-fashioned method of buttering the pan then dusting with flour. I used a spray oil, but not the cake release spray I used to use.  Darn thing is now in shards like it dropped on the flour and kapow!  But my idea is to make a sort of carrot cake and vanilla ice cream something.  

[Kim Shook]

6 minutes ago, David Ross said:

The carrot cake was a disaster.  The cake and the pans, not the taste of the cake.  I wasn't paying attention and didn't prepare the pans like I normally do, which is the  old-fashioned method of buttering the pan then dusting with flour. I used a spray oil, but not the cake release spray I used to use.  Darn thing is now in shards like it dropped on the flour and kapow!  But my idea is to make a sort of carrot cake and vanilla ice cream something.  

A few years ago, Jessica requested a Turtle Cake for her birthday.  I put together chocolate layers, dulce de leche filling and topping, and candied pecans.  I put it out on the dining room table and went back to the kitchen to wash dishes.  When I went back into the dining room, the top layer had slid almost entirely off of the bottom layer.  And broken in half.  I was mortified.  I chopped it up and put it in a bowl for her to taste and see that I really did try and raced off to Fresh Market and bought two very elegant (and expensive) cakes.  At her party that night the elegant cakes were all but ignored, and the "Bowl Cake", as we now call it, was completely devoured.  

[kayb]

Easter dinner in the books, as is a successful egg hunt for the grandson, since it's raining bucketfuls right now.

Deviled eggs, pickles, including pickled snow peas that were pretty good.

Ham. Basic, but good. Aldi Appleton Farms brand, the most dependable supermarket ham I've found.

 

Potato salad.

 

 

Corn casserole. I redeemed myself from Christmas, when I forgot to take the foil off.

 

 

Obligatory mac and cheese for the sons-in-law.

 

Not shown: the green things. Roasted asparagus, and lima beans.

 

Finished off with the Easter cake from the Mexican bakery, mentioned on another thread yesterday. The layers were the deepest, darkest chocolate I've ever had; flan, and tres leches. Super rich, awfully good.

[Katie Meadow]

Friday night was a Zoom seder, which was really a disjointed cocktail hour. I've never celebrated Easter, but Sunday evening we made a delicious fried rice, using all kinds of misc. items, including a little smoked ham, shitake mushrooms, shredded black fungus, carrots, cabbage, peas, chopped Chinese omelet, Chinese chives, and so forth. Satisfying comfort food. It was probably the first time I ever had ham for Easter. My daughter's Easter dinner on the other hand, far away in Atlanta, consisted of matzoh ball soup and beef short ribs. I didn't even know she knew what short ribs were. I'm so proud!

[Toliver]

On 4/10/2020 at 5:44 PM, MetsFan5 said:

Couldn’t find ham anywhere.  

I went to my Walmart Neighborhood Grocery store and came up empty, as well. The SOB's were completely sold out of ham...even sold out of those little ham portions or packages of sliced ham...nothing.

I ended up making oven baked country ribs with barbecue sauce, a baked potato with sour cream and a surprisingly nice avocado (surprising because it came from the same Walmart and based on past avocados I've bought from them I expected a brown interior ), and the last of the coleslaw made for a previous dinner.

Tillamook Strawberry Greek yogurt for dessert. Divine.

[Kim Shook]

Our Easter dinner finally happened last night.  The reason for that will be on the breakfast thread.  Jessica carb bombed us! LOL  Dinner will be on the dinner thread.  

[chromedome]

I had deadlines on Easter weekend, so we had our belated dinner last night. A duck (sheet pan method) with caramelized parsnips - only a few left now from last autumn's harvest - carrots, roasted asparagus and (of course) duck fat-roasted potatoes.

No photos, but I'll be taking my cousin's online introductory course soon (he's a pro photographer and teaches regular classes when he's not working) and may actually stir myself to start taking food pics.

[demiglace]

On 4/11/2020 at 10:37 AM, Tri2Cook said:

She's a little old for me to write these things off as "from the mouths of kids"... she asked if the veggie could be homemade mac & cheese. 😆
Dessert is definitely the sugar pie, they're in the oven right now.

How did the sugar pie turn out? Haven't had that since my Quebec years.