Yesterday, Mom had asked me to make an Easter bread. She had sent me the recipe earlier in the week, and while I thought it sounded a little bland, I know that Mom likes bland. I was supposed to dye 5 eggs and tuck them into the bread, but I was lazy (and only had brown eggs). Since I no longer needed it in wreath shape, I braided it and then curled it around itself (like my king cake from back in February). It came out quite beautiful, but like I suspected, it was a little bland. It had only 1/3 cup of sugar for flavoring. It would definitely have benefited from cardamom, vanilla, raisins, something; but then again Mom loved it. Go figure! If I do ever make it again, we definitely need to eat it all in one day. It gets stale really quickly no matter how well you wrap it!Then today I basically spent the entire day in the kitchen working on our Easter dinner. We had a ham, asparagus, twice baked potato casserole, herbed dinner rolls, and raspberry swirl sweet rolls for dessert. Besides the asparagus, I made all the rest! It was a very busy day.
The first thing I did was figure out what to do with the ham. It was a ridiculously expensive ham (that is what happens when you wait till 11 PM the night before Easter to grocery shop!), and it wasn't a spiral - but we found out today that it was definitely worth it. It was sooo good - and possibly part of why was because of my delicious glaze! I partly panicked because it said "cover ham with glaze" and I did not have any glaze, so I googled quickly: 1/2 cup water, 3 tablespoons honey, 1/3 cup brown sugar, and 1 tablespoon of mustard: voila! It was quite good. And I am now a believer in buying non-spiral hams.
Then I started on the doughs for my 2 yeast breads. I went through an insane amount of yeast today, between my rolls and my dessert. They both had to rise for 2 hours, so I got the dinner rolls rising and then made the dough for the sweet rolls, and then it was time to work on the potato casserole.
Can you imagine anything more amazing than twice baked potato casserole!? Mashed potatoes, with cream cheese. And not just cream cheese, but butter. And not just cream cheese and butter, but sour cream as well. Add chives, cheddar, pepper, and salt, and you have one amazing casserole. It was supposed to have bacon, but I was running short on time (and prefer vegetarian food anyway) so I left it out. Even my carniverous family said they didn't miss the meat. This is definitely far from being healthy, but if you want a knock-your-socks-off potato side dish, this is the one for you. As a potato lover, I could probably live on this casserole happily for the rest of my life.
We ate dinner once the potatoes were done. Unfortunately, the dinner rolls were not ready for dinner. But it's okay, because I am in love with them and plan on eating them all myself! They are soooo pretty. I had to paint them with an egg and milk wash, and then add a leaf of something to the top for decoration. I used parsley, rosemary, and cilantro. They taste great, but they look great too. These take forever, but they are worth it.
Dessert was my last step. I had found this recipe for raspberry swirl sweet rolls, and, knowing that my family loves raspberries, I knew today was the day for them. Like the rolls, they take a very long time - lots of time to proof the dough, let things rise, etc.. But they were worth the wait. Once they were out of the oven and glazed, I ran over to the Cormiers' with about 3/4 of them, and they went quickly! They may not be great for you, but it was Easter! Time to celebrate friends and family and good food :)
Recipes:
herbed dinner rolls
twice baked potato casserole
raspberry swirl sweet rolls
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