WTSIM ... Easter basket! - ROUNDUP

Now that the family are back on their feet, it is time for me to present you with a round-up of all the fantastic contributions I have received from you marvellous bloggers out there... it is a true extravaganza of fond childhood memories, clever recipes and great ideas to make Easter this year even more special.

A clever twist to the Easter wreath, traditional in Central Europe, is to stuff it with ground nuts and syrup... as 1x umrühren bitte (aka Kochtopf) shows us in her contribution to WTSIM. Due to the omission of the ramekin in the centre, it looks more like a cake, but tastes just as delicious!

Things are green and stay green with A Foodie Froggy in Paris. Although she usually errs on the traditional side with pasta sauces, Creamy tagliolini with fava beans and peas are the perfect spring treat when you've had enough of all those eggs and chocolate.

AlaGrecque spoils us with not one, but two entries: as if a fluffy kumquat country loaf wasn't enough, family traditions are turned upside down with Achilleas taking over the reign from Mum and making traditional Greek Easter Tsourekia... how courageous is that!

It's her Swedish Easter traditions that Anne's Food shares with us, but she bakes something from the warmer climes: green garlic focaccia is sure to be a hit at this year's smorgasbord, alongside the more traditional salads and filled eggs. And she keeps traditions up by organising an egg hunt for her and her husband... and probably the cats, too!

Becks & Posh might have successfully scared off the boy scout cubs as a teenager, but these days, people from near and far will be lining the streets to get a taste of her buns... hot cross buns, that is! If you've always wondered what the fuss is about, try her recipe! (I certainly will!)

Another recipe for Easter baking, namely cinnamon buns, come all the way from Toronto, Canada. Blog from OUR kitchen also bake Luciacats and are getting in gear for trying theirfirst hot-cross buns...

Eggs are the centre of attention for Bounteous bites... the stars of the Easter holidays are fake eggs of coconut panna cotta and banana chip purée - proving that you've gotta fake it to make it in this cruel world of ours... top marks for originality!

Rabbit stew is off the menu at Boxcar Kitchen, but lemongrass black sesame cookies will be lining the Easter baskets this year... I am glad to hear it, far preferring the biscuits, even though I won't get any, seeing that I forgot to include Esther in the first round-up - apologies!

Chili und Ciabatta almost reduced me to tears when she also made a sweet Easter lamb - I can't comment on the taste, but I'll have to admit that she wins hands down in the aesthetics department... what a cutie - and it's all hand-made!

Traditions are held high in Clivia's Cuisine, as she spring-cleans the house and fills some hard-boiled eggs the Swedish way: with anchovies & chives, shrimps and caviar, who said boiled eggs were boring? They certainly aren't here!

Giving vermicelli the sweet treatment, Coconut Chutney presents us with Sweet Potato-Semiya Payasam, a truly exotic pudding with cardamom, pistachios and raisins that will please you all year round, not just for Easter.

Easter coincides with birthday celebrations for one lucky blogger Down Under, so Cook (almost) Anything at Least Once has enough reason to enjoy the sweet things in life with her dense and compact Pandolce with Apricots, Almonds and White Chocolate.

With a bit of time-travel, Cooking Debauchery found out about WTSIM before it even was announced - and therefore had plenty of time to create not one, but three entries: paska, kulich and an easter basket... a veritable crash-course in orthodox Easter traditions!

Some people are too busy sunbathing to celebrate Easter, it appears... but pansy shells found on the sunny beaches of South Africa are inspiration enough for some pretty and yummy cookies the Cook Sister! brings round to our Easter celebrations - if only she'd bring warmer temperatures, too!

Desert Candy overcomes traumatic memories of uncomfortable Easter dresses courtesy of her granny by tucking into lovingly decorated Easter nests and cupcakes. If she looked half as cute in her dress as her own creations, she must have been a real eye-catcher on Easter Sunday!

More rustic Easter baking is happening at Eating Out Loud where a visit from the Easter bunny and an overflowing basket is no longer a given, but a flaky and fruity plum tart certainly is, making ageing all the more bearable...

Egg colours unite at Feeding My Enthusiasms as she presents us with a step-to-step picture guide for dying Easter eggs... it looks so foolproof that even I could follow it, now all you have to find is some appropriate dye!

Kit of Food & Family is not speaking to me any more after I only acknowledged her submission almost two months later. Not sure what evel spirits possessed my mail box, her Easter Crown deserves all the recognition... a beautiful arrangement, flowers and all, and utterly, utterly delectable...

Two traditional Swiss Easter treats take over at The Golden Shrimp, with Osterfladli, a custard tart made with old bread, and dyed eggs... this time cleverly decorated using herbs and grasses - a beauty to behold!

Jumbo Empanadas not only dyes her own Easter eggs, she also finds time for delectable baking! Left-over bananas and a generous supply of caramel lead her to create some very tempting banana & date muffins with an adorable bunny looking over her shoulders as she bakes...

At Kitchen Delights, they're thinking ahead, preparing a delicious bread pudding with left-over hot-cross buns... but, hang on, who'd have those left over? You might want to buy them just to make this wonderful pudding!!!

It seems that the Easter bunny never actually ventures that far East, as Küchendunst aus Singapur bakes her own Easter "basket" - a dough wreath beautifully adorned with pretty sugar flowers and egg shells filled with chocolate!

If you've got egg-nogg left over from your Christmas celebrations, the time has come to convert it into something delectable:  Küchenlatein "noggs" up a Gugelhupf made with Advocaat that is sure going to be a crowd-pleaser...

Plenty of decorating is the main pastime at Little Spatula, as she dresses up cupcakes as Easter nests with M&Ms and clever grass in the form of coconut treated with food colouring. Now here's something to keep the wee ones occupied over the holidays!

Living to EAT! does me a massive favour by entering one of only two meat dishes for this event: a stunning rack of lamb, marinated with lavender and herbs on a bed of butter beans. Now if spring lamb is not a tradition where you are, here's your chance to make it one!

Italian spring flavours fill the traditional hard-boiled eggs at Lucullian Delights. These days she doesn't burn her fingers decorating eggs anymore, as she prepares Asparagus & pesto filled eggs well in advance... they not only sound great, they also look amazing as always!

Eggs are hardboiled and dyed for a stunning centre-piece for your table at Mishmash!, using readily available dyes to be found in any kitchen pantry: coffee, turmeric and beetroot make any egg look good and so much prettier "weapons" for your egg jarping!

Spring feelings are far from compulsory for Easter over in Sydney... so Morsels & Musings evoke autumnal tastes for the celebrations - with a wunderfully sticky ginger cake with chocolate sauce. Looks like for once, the prspice is right!

Mostly Eating can't quite give into complete indulgence as she offers us a healthy chocolate treat: she discovered some cute little numbers, kiwiberries, st her grocer and dunks them in chocolate before rolling them in nuts - I am sure these are more nice than naughty!

My dear friend Pille of Nami-Nami goes out of her way to show us all that Easter has to offer in Estonia: dyed eggs, pashka, quails eggs topped with fish roe and, to show just how cosmopolitan she is, greek tsoureki. It's a wonder she finds enough time for egg-jarping, really!

Tea leaves do not necessarily have to be used for reading your future, you can put them to good use by making Chinese Tea Leaf Eggs like over at Nook & Pantry. You wouldn't use them for your egg hunt, but they're perfect for sustanance nevertheless!

Once upon a tart tucks happily into not one, but two or three Easter Bunnies while the good girls are at church, but finds enough time to make a traditional Swiss Easter tart which turns out to be a sort of baked rice pudding... and a pretty one at that!

At Paulchens FoodBlog?! I am taken back in time and place to my native Austria - Osterpinzen are yeast wreaths with a dyed egg in the middle - pretty to behold and such a yummy treat on Easter Sunday, spread with home-made jam from the pantry!

A family recipe is revealed at play with food as she shares her coconut cream eggs. The original instructions call for kneading over a week, but clearly you're too busy to follow that, so stick to her simplified recipe instead - her mother-in-law won't find out...

Anaemic elks are an anagram for something quite more delectable, baked up by Raspberry Debacle: if you've always wondered about the origins of Simnel Cake, this is the place to go. She even goes to great lengths making her own marzipan... now, that's what I call dedication!

After years of deprivation, rettet das mittagessen re-discovers an old childhood treat with a beautiful eggshell filled to the brim with creamy praliné... and finds that the plain looks are a perfect disguise. There's no recipe, but I am sure you budding chocolatiers can come up with something (and let me know)!

Greek spanakopita was the inspiration for another wonderful pie dish, traditional for Easter over at Small Time Cooks. Spinach leaves and feta, topped with crispy strands of fillo sheets - what a perfect way to welcome spring!

If you are on the look-out for a recipe for "near-as-dammit" perfect Hot Cross Buns  (which I certainly am), head over to Spittoonextra. If fermenting is your thing, these will be perfect for you... Andrew's keyboard is still sticky from all that golden syrup glaze...

Another hot-cross bun comes by way of Stitched in Holland... they might not be traditional over there, but what can you do when you crave your English traditions - that Easter stollen wll have to wait!

A recipe for Bulgarian sunflower bread has been making the rounds in the blogosphere, apparently, but I have to thank Tartelette for introducing me to it. A breakfast staple has certainly never looked as good in my house, and I bet it tastes great, too!

Technicolor Kitchen braves the stifling heat to try her luck with chocolate eggs... and fails. But she creates some beautiful hearts filled with beijinho (coconut-flavoured condensed milk) that are sure to win her many admirers - I'd choose them over eggs any time!

Proving that pies are always in season, even if they come a month late, teczcape:I'm a foodie spices things up a notch with mini curry pies... perfect for that looming spring picnic or to take along to your egg races!

Here at thepassionatecook I've been divulging our Easter torments and delights, with a baked chocolate Easter lamb and one of the few savoury contributions to this round of WTSIM... a yummy way to use up all those hard-boiled eggs: ham & egg salad rolls.

A 14th-century recipe for "Tart de Bry" gets a make-over at The Thorngrove Table and Christina makes it so much more accessible to us who are unversed in medieval cookery. Who said they only ever ate onions before the discovery of the New World? Brie tarts were all the rage... and understandibly so!

A savoury treat that is definitely going to be a stunner on your Easter brunch table are the wasabi & salmon egg rolls over at What's For Lunch Honey. Meeta has tested them for you and is pleased with the results... I bet so will you!

Wino Sapien lays off the booze for a bit to try his luck at barbequing lamb. So if, like him, you're not really a sweet tooth, crack open a bottle of red and fire up your rusty BBQ - provided the weather gods are benign!

A fabulous cross-cultural exploration is undertaken by Writing At The Kitchen Table. Spanish Walnut and syrup cake is of Jewish origin and is perfect for your Easter table as it improves with resting for a few days... don't we all?

HOT OFF THE PRESS: The next round of "Waiter, there's something in my..." is hosted by SpittoonExtra and the theme is: BREAD. Check his blog for the announcement, to be published any time soon, and get your fingers stuck in some yeasty dough before the end of the month!!!

Comments

[Jeanne]

Wow Johanna - what a lovely roundup! And I adore both your and Chili und Ciabatta's fab fluffy lambs - too adorable! As for warmer temperatures, you can't complain about today... Thanks for all your hard work :)

[Esther]

Great round-up; makes me want to get out my egg coloring kit today! But where am I? I've been forgotten again! I sent my contribution in last Monday. http://www.boxcarkitchen.com/post/2007/03/26/Lemongrass-black-sesame-cookies

[Monisha]

Glad to hear that your family and you are feeling better!
The round-up looks absolutely spectacular, great work!

[Ash]

Everyone made such beautiful things. I'm off to browse!

[Freya]

Who would have thought how many different ways there is to celebrate easter - and I wish I could try all of them!

[Mishmash!]

Hey Johanna, i am thrilled to see so many beautiful entries and reading your footnotes, I think I am going to learn a lot about different traditions of easter in different countries...I am glad that i found out about this at the last minute and thanks for accepting mine even though i was late.

Shn

[sam]

thanks for the great roundup Johanna. Please would you edit mine to have a link to my post?

cheers
and have a great easter

-sam x

[Andrew]

A superb collection of post with such varied and inspiring recipes to boot. A great round up Johanna.

[Helen]

Great round up! I have already bookmarked quite a few recipes. Amazing talent out there!

[Pille]

What a great choice of Easter goodies!! I love both of the lambs, and have bookmarked many of the other entries. Thanks for the round-up!

[Esther]

Johanna, Thanks for adding me on and OF COURSE I'll share. You can have as many as you like :)

[Deborah Dowd]

Your roundup runs the gamut. I will be checking up on each of these posts! Thanks for hosting (and thanks for your idea about what to do with those Easter eggs!) My kids, though older,still love to dye eggs!

[Edward]

Johanna,

Many thanks for the excellent write up.
Hope you have a lovely Easter.

[Christina]

Rather like the White Rabbit (appropriate for Easter) ~ I'm late!
For which I apologise profusely! And my entry (C.14th Tart de Bry) is here;
http://thorngrove.typepad.com/table/2007/04/waiter_theres_s.html#trackback
Some very pretty food in the roundup this time!

[ilva]

Thanks for including me even though I was a bit late and thanks for a great roundup!

[Patricia Scarpin]

Johanna, what a beautiful round up! There are so many interesting (and delicious) recipes, I can't wait to see them all! :)

It was a joy taking part on this event.

[padmaja]

wonderful round up!!
My first time here and already feeling so sorry that i missed participating.
U have a great blog here!!!

[Susan from Food "Blogga"]

What a remarkably versatile round-up! This is so inspirational! I was sorry I couldn't participate last week, but I just posted my Easter ricotta pie which I had wanted to submit to you. Thanks for another great round-up!

[Elle]

Johanna, wonderful roundup and a very delightful theme. Holiday traditions are so diverse and interesting. Thanks!

[ejm]

What a wonderful roundup! I was so ridiculously late with my post that I didn't email you....

Happy Easter!

-Elizabeth

P.S. Heh. Maybe I should have kept it and used it for the next WTSIM...

[ejm]

Johanna, how very nice it is of you to add my hopelessly late entry!! And I'm ashamed to say that I STILL haven't made the luciacats OR hot-cross buns! Maybe next week... there's plenty of time at noon that week, right? (heh)

-Elizabeth