Easter family traditions.....
I honestly don't remember any Italian traditions my family observed for Easter, other than the St. Joseph's Day table, and going to church. So I grew up with my mom's Polish family traditions.
We did the Easter baskets and colored the Easter eggs. We went to the Easter Sunday mass. (Unless we went to the marathon Easter Vigil mass on Saturday night.) We'd have a ham dinner (and no spaghetti and meatballs, as we usually had on Sundays). And mom would make a lamb cake. We had a two-piece aluminum mold in the shape of a lamb that she used. She'd mix up the ingredients for the batter, pour the batter in the mold, bake it in the oven, and frost it with white frosting, shredded coconut, and use jelly beans for the eyes and nose. (Here's a recipe and a picture from allrecipes.com.)
Strangely enough, we did not have butter lambs on our dinner table. The place to get these lamb-shaped pieces of butter was the Broadway Market, and my dad hated crowds. I didn't notice them at Tops or Wegmans until after I moved away.
And then there's Easter Monday, or Dyngus Day. This is a springtime festival celebrated in many Polish-American neighboorhoods in Buffalo, Chicago, Cleveland, etc. Girls would douse the boys they liked with water or perfume, and boys would gently whack the girls they liked with a pussywillow branch to the backside. And there was lots of feasting, drinking, and polka music being played.
Several years ago, I tried to start a tradition for myself by eating lamb on Easter. But every time I prepared it, it always tasted too gamey.
When I was last at my parents' house, I did not come across Mom's lamb cake mold. I do not know if my sister already claimed it for herself.
I also miss visiting the ethnic neighborhoods of my home town on Buffalo, NY. (Actually, the town of Tonawanda, but more people here recognize the name Buffalo.) I don't have this in the suburbs of Buffalo, or the suburbs of my current home in the suburbs of Dayton, Ohio. Everything is so homogenized, and delineated by socio-economic status.
If I can carry on these traditions, I think it would be a great way to remember my mother, her heritage, and growing up.
We did the Easter baskets and colored the Easter eggs. We went to the Easter Sunday mass. (Unless we went to the marathon Easter Vigil mass on Saturday night.) We'd have a ham dinner (and no spaghetti and meatballs, as we usually had on Sundays). And mom would make a lamb cake. We had a two-piece aluminum mold in the shape of a lamb that she used. She'd mix up the ingredients for the batter, pour the batter in the mold, bake it in the oven, and frost it with white frosting, shredded coconut, and use jelly beans for the eyes and nose. (Here's a recipe and a picture from allrecipes.com.)
Strangely enough, we did not have butter lambs on our dinner table. The place to get these lamb-shaped pieces of butter was the Broadway Market, and my dad hated crowds. I didn't notice them at Tops or Wegmans until after I moved away.
And then there's Easter Monday, or Dyngus Day. This is a springtime festival celebrated in many Polish-American neighboorhoods in Buffalo, Chicago, Cleveland, etc. Girls would douse the boys they liked with water or perfume, and boys would gently whack the girls they liked with a pussywillow branch to the backside. And there was lots of feasting, drinking, and polka music being played.
Several years ago, I tried to start a tradition for myself by eating lamb on Easter. But every time I prepared it, it always tasted too gamey.
When I was last at my parents' house, I did not come across Mom's lamb cake mold. I do not know if my sister already claimed it for herself.
I also miss visiting the ethnic neighborhoods of my home town on Buffalo, NY. (Actually, the town of Tonawanda, but more people here recognize the name Buffalo.) I don't have this in the suburbs of Buffalo, or the suburbs of my current home in the suburbs of Dayton, Ohio. Everything is so homogenized, and delineated by socio-economic status.
If I can carry on these traditions, I think it would be a great way to remember my mother, her heritage, and growing up.