Happy Easter to All

I spent all morning cooking up a storm for Easter dinner. My mother is making lasagna and you would think that would be enough, but she asked me to make chicken caccaitore, from my grandmother's recipe. It has become a family favorite and one dish that I can make as well as my grandmother did. So we will bring it up to my parents house for Easter dinner over there. We are also making extra to send over to my in-laws who will be eating at the convalescent home, so I made quite a bit to go around.

I was thinking that I was doing a lot of work today, but it pales in comparison to what my grandmothers would have done. They would be making home made dough for Easter bread and would braid it and place a hard boiled egg in the top center of it and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

They would also make home made Italian cookies. My grandmother had a special cookie machine that she would put the dough into and turn the crank and the dough would come out the bottom. She would lay the dough pieces onto the cookie sheet in the shape of the letter S. I haven't even tried to duplicate them, don't know where the heck her machine even went. But right now as I write, I can imagine what they tasted like when they came right out of the oven. After they cooled down she would then send them over to our house in a clear plastic bag with a white draw string. They were great to dunk in coffee.

Of course my grandmothers did not work outside the home and I think they spent the entire week before a holiday cooking.

We didn't even take down one Easter decoration this year. The holiday sort of crept up on us with it being so early I guess. And since we are not going to be here for dinner, neither one of us felt much like decorating.

But we needed to keep some traditions, so my husband and my son, took a ride to our local candy factory to buy some chocolate Easter bunnies! They taste nothing like the candy you buy in the stores because it is fresh right off of the assembly line.

I didn't mean to make this post so food oriented... lol.. but food is the center of so many traditions at holiday time.

The best part is that it is a time for family to come together and as always, it is a blessing to be together.