Some Interesting Facts about Traditional Easter Food

Easter is a time of happy celebrations and merriment. It is the celebration of life over death, good over evil and above all, the commemoration of Jesus’ resurrection three days after his crucifixion. For the young it all about the Easter bunny, egg hunts, chocolate cakes and cookies. For the old, it the end of the grief and mourning of Lent, a time to bring their family together and the observance of traditions and customs. Easter has a lot of religious significance and there are a lot of stories and myths associated with Easter. Everything from the flowers to the food is traditional. Especially, there are certain traditional items cooked during Easter, and most belonging to the younger generation do not know its significances.

The first food item that comes to mind when ever you talk about Easter is eggs. Eggs are eaten, painted, hunted by children and even gifted in some Christian communities. But most of us do not know how eggs got so intimately associated with Easter. It is said that the first Easter egg was gifted by Mary Magdalene to the King Tiberius after the resurrection of Jesus. When all the nobles were presenting Tiberius with gifts of gold and other precious items, Magdalene just produced the egg and said that Jesus had risen. When all, including the king, exclaimed in surprise at the absurdity of her statement, the egg immediately turned red. Everyone believed in the miracle and that is how eggs came to be associated with Easter, symbolic of the victory of life over death.

During Easter, Hot Cross Buns are eaten by people of some countries. It is said that the pagan ate small wheat cakes when they celebrated the festival of Eostre, the pagan goddess of spring. These same cakes were change to buns with the spread of Christianity and after the people were converted. The Catholic Church converted many such pagan rituals so that those converted could easily acclimatize to the new religion.

It is also the tradition in most houses to have roast lamb for dinner. But it is said that it was originally a Jewish tradition, where a lamb was offered to the gods and then was eaten by the people of the village or community. Later this was taken up as a Christian tradition and as Jesus has been known by the name of the Lamb of God, this analogy also made things easier.