Easter Recipes

Two opposites collide on Easter – a strict fast and a copious abundance of food. The fast lasts until the end of Holy Saturday; then it’s time for the absolute opposite to take over.

Easter celebrations inherently include typical Czech dishes such as sprouted peas, stuffing, boiled eggs, roast lamb or mutton, spinach, Easter bread (mazanec) or sweet leavened Judas buns (jidášky). Spring brings with it a larger clutch of eggs, which form the basis of mazanec (derived from the Czech anointed pastry) - our oldest documented Easter pastry. Easter bread thus became a feast dish, a gift and a ritual device. In the past, mazanec was prepared as a savoury “Easter cheese cake” - an unsweetened pastry made from grated cheese and eggs. Naturally, its history varies according to region - in some places, cottage cheese was added, elsewhere it was smoked pork or veal (with a variety of names such as baba, babůvky, babůvečky, pelcovníky, šoldry, svěceníky, paseky...). However, there were places where sweet Easter bread was already being baked at the same time as savoury mazanec. Those we know today only started appearing in cookbooks at the end of the 18^th century.

Jidášky (sweet leavened buns) were as small as the Easter breads were large. Jidášky (meaning Judas buns) are ceremonial pastries baked from leavened dough, and can take many shapes - from simple round cakes to figurines and animals to imitations of Judas’ fatal rope. Honey was smeared on the Judas cakes (again with a protective meaning - to prevent snake or insect bites).

Like many traditional old Bohemian Christmas dishes, these also carry a hidden symbolism - sprouted peas and eggs bring fertility and abundance, green vegetables signify the oncoming spring.

And what used to appear on the Easter tables of our ancestors?

• Maundy Thursday - baked Judas cakes with honey
• Good Friday - this used to be a day of strict fasting, but you would find the following on the table at supper: soups (cabbage, garlic (oukrop), cumin or potato), boiled dried fruits, bread, legumes or porridge
• Holy Saturday - this day brings a break after the season of Lent, with the baking Easter bread and lamb-shaped cakes
• Easter Sunday - food was brought to the church to be blessed (pastries, Easter breads, lambs, goat kids, omelettes, stuffing, bacon, fish, bread, eggs, milk, wine, garlic, horseradish; the further east, the more sumptuous the menu: ham, sausages) - all the food was then divided among the family members, and sometimes even the livestock got a treat to keep them healthy (a piece of blessed food was also thrown into the well to make the water good).
• Easter Monday - Monday is a day of merrymaking, “whipping” and feasting

Easter Stuffing

1 – 1.5 kg cooked meat (about half baked pork and half stewed beef), 10 eggs, 1/2 l milk or broth, 10 rolls, nutmeg, parsley or young nettles, salt

Mix the egg yolks well in milk or broth. Cube the rolls. Pour the egg mixture over the cubes and add grated nutmeg, cubed meat, green parsley or chopped young nettles, and salt. Beat the eggwhites till stiff and gently fold into the stuffing mixture. Grease a deep baking tray and sprinkle with breadcrumbs. Now spread the stuffing out onto the tray, dot with butter and bake.

Easter lamb cake

1/4 kg butter or margarine, 170 g sugar, 1 packet (20 g) vanilla sugar, 4 eggs, 150 g pastry flour (type 1), 100 g corn starch, 1 t baking powder, zest from one lemon and one orange, 2 T rum

Beat the sugar and butter until light and fluffy. Slowly add the eggs, beating continuously. Sift the flour, corn starch and baking powder together and, one spoonful at a time, add to the batter. At the end add the zest and rum. Grease and flour a lamb baking form. Pour the batter into the form and carefully place in the oven to bake for about an hour. Half the time bake at Mark 3 (high), a quarter of the time at Mark 2 (medium) and the rest of the time at low. Remove the lamb from the oven and let stand about five minutes before turning it out of the form. Dust with sugar or glaze: In a double boiler, beat one egg white, 100 grams powdered sugar and the juice from one lemon.

Mazanec – Easter sweet bread

1 kg pastry flour (type 1), 60 g yeast, 160 g sugar, 200 g butter, 4 egg yolks, pinch of salt, 3/8 litre milk, 100 g raisins, almonds for decorating

Start the yeast. In another bowl, beat the butter with the sugar and egg yolks. Mix the salt into the flour and add to the butter mixture with the yeast starter and milk. Mix in the chopped almonds and raisins. Knead the dough on a floured surface and let rise (at least two hours in a warm place). Form the dough into a round loaf and place on a baking sheet. Decorate with almonds and brush with a beaten egg. Bake approx. one hour at 200°C.

Jidáše – Sweet Buns

1/2 kg pastry flour (type 1), 50 g sugar, 2 egg yolks, 70 g margerine or butter, 20 g yeast, milk, salt, egg to brush rolls

Start the yeast. Beat the sugar, butter and egg yolks. Add a pinch of salt, flour and the yeast. Make a firm dough and let rise. Now cut the dough into pieces and roll the pieces out into thin stips. Roll the strip into a coil, brush with an egg and bake. Spread honey on the rolls while they are still warm.

Pučálka – Sprouted peas

Pučálka is sprouted peas that have been quickly satueed in butter and either salted and peppered, sweetened or served with raisins.

Roast Easter lamb

Lamb rump roast, salt, 200 g butter, 100 g flour

Wash, dry and salt the rump roast. Melt butter in a roasting pan. Place two skewers on the bottom of the pan and place the roast on the skewers fat side down so that it is not directly touching the pan. Roast in a hot oven, basting the meat often. After a while, turn the meat over, pour hot water into the bottom of the pan and let roast till done. Slice while still warm. Add flour to the jus in the bottom of the pan, dillute, bring to a boil and pour through a sieve. Earlier lamb was usually eaten with bread.