Easter is another time of the year where all the family gets together and makes a feast! So in our family it is normally a three day affair of prepping, cooking, eating and catching up with everyone on Good Friday, Easter Saturday and Easter Sunday.
On the Good Friday we normally have fish, no meat at all. Either for lunch or for dinner we will make a type of fish stew, containing mostly of potatoes, onions, green olives and the fish of course, what we typically use in this stew is Baccala (Cod, a white firm fish), which we coat in a seasoned flour and then fried, which is all bought together in a tomato sauce. Also on the Good Friday we traditionally make Zeppole, which is basically fried bread dough. They are crispy on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside, best had when just cooked! In our family we have these savoury, where we make most of them plain and make others with sardines. These give the Zeppole a slight fish and salty flavour.
Easter Saturday is the day we make our Easter bread. This a sweet bread dough, somewhat similar to a Brioche, soft and light but not buttery, which we braid around an egg. We normally eat this sweet bread on Easter morning for breakfast, we have the egg and what I personally like to do is cut the bread into slices and smother butter on it!
Easter Sunday is the day when all of the family, Zia’s, Zio’s and cugini, all get together. When we were growing up we did a Easter egg hunt in the morning and then we would get ready for lunch. And of course for lunch we have a three to four course meal! And yes to start with we have pasta and yes it is Lasagna! We typically make the meat sauce a day before, so the Easter Saturday. And then assemble it on Easter morning. After the Lasagna we will have a roast pork or lamb, we would either cook this in an oven, a wood fired oven outside or on a spit. We have this with plenty of sides, like roast potatoes, carrots whatever is in season, and salads. After the main course we will have a fruit platter containing of what the season has to offer, being Autumn in Australia during Easter we will have Figs, Kiwifruit, Grapes etc. After our, if you can call it a “palate cleanser”, we will have coffee and dessert, a traditional Easter dessert for us is Colomba, which is very similar and close to Panettone. We will have this and any other homemade biscuits that are made from our family members.
And that is how our Easter is done in our family. Getting together and making a feast!