A feast of Heterodox Delights

The best religious symbols are the tasty ones. Lamb is at the forefront of them – amply laden with Christian theology and yet delicious at the same time. Certainly, there’s much to like about celebrating spring with a large leg of the docile beast, dotted with fragrant full cloves of garlic and lovingly rubbed with thyme and olive oil - or with little cutlets of lamb stuffed with a bare slice of strong sheep’s milk feta and doused in freshly ground black pepper. Served with a robust puy lentil salad that’s dressed simply with lemon and oil or perhaps with a few boiled and then roasted potatoes, and you’ve got yourself a dinner fit for the occasion. Or you might use lamb as my relatives do on Easter, and make shells of ground meat and bulghur wheat, filled with more lamb and cubes of fat, and then gently simmered in a yogurt soup of rice and stock.

But this year Easter has turned my mind to Italy, and to simple dishes of homely fare. Don’t get me wrong – the pharaohs may have died content in the knowledge that their pyramids survived them, but I shall be happy if the untold generations of pigs, cows, and sheep to come tremble in horror at my name. But for some reason I don’t feel like eating the usual things this time. Perhaps it’s the knowledge that spring is upon us after a grim winter, and the cultivated delights of the summer season finally within reach. Or maybe there’s something about the poignant simplicity of the Resurrection story that has turned my stomach towards the Roman heartland. Or maybe I’m just feeling fat. Whatever it is, I have no desire to hew a great joint of flesh on that most holy of Sundays.

Instead, I find myself walking to my local deli for Alici marinati – that is to say, marinated anchovies. Before you recoil, these aren’t the tinned terrors of pizza fame – though even those are wonderful melted in oil with garlic and parsley as a pasta sauce, or draped over dough with olives for a pisalladiere. These are lightly preserved fish, with much more substance and bite than their desiccated cousins. When chopped roughly, combined with mashed and boiled potatoes, raisins, garlic, parsley, pecorino cheese, bread crumbs, and an egg or two, and then shaped into rough balls fried in extra virgin olive oil, they become real delicacies fit for the Easter table, and with just as much symbolic legitimacy as lamb has ever had.

But fritters alone aren’t enough for Easter – it is, after all, a celebration. And so I’ve got a stuffed pizza as well, with dough made of salt, water, flour and yeast kneaded until substantial enough to stretch until almost transparent, and then filled with broccoli stewed in copious olive oil and garlic mixed with the freshest, fullest fat ricotta I could find. And if even that wasn’t enough (and to be clear, I’m eating all this myself), I also filled little dough paunches of cornmeal, flour, olive oil, and milk with good mozzarella, imported proscuitto, and a few dices of sun dried tomato and parmesan, before folding in a half moon shape and frying in yet more olive oil. It’s true that none of these are as sublimely dramatic as a glorious leg of lamb coming out of the oven, but they’re wonderful all the same.

No Easter meal is finished without dessert, and in this case a plate of cheese or a few ripe fruits won’t do, I’m afraid – those are good enough for the normal table, or even Sunday lunch, but not for such a feast. Of course, brioche is perhaps the most symbolic of Easter foods, traditionally representing the triumphant return of eggs to the diet after the Lenten fast. Many people I know make types of cookies, rich with butter and sugar, for the feast. But for my family, Easter has always meant ghadayif. This famed and usually home baked sweet of the middle east and Greece is simple and rich – it’s made by rubbing shredded filo dough in melted and cooled butter, and then sandwiching a mix of walnuts, cinnamon, and sugar between two layers of the dough in a casserole before baking until golden, and then dousing while warm in a heavy sugar or honey syrup until all the sweet liquid is absorbed. When cut into crunchy and sodden squares, and piled onto plates with yet more syrup and honey, it’s a real effort not to eat the entire casserole yourself. And I’ve failed that test of self control many a time.

So stuffed, happy, and with sufficient leftovers for the week, let me wish everyone out there (Christian or not) a happy Easter. Though we might not be able to share the religious holiday, the great thing about most foods is that they’re usually ecumenical – and gladly, even if our minds disagree, are stomachs can be in joyful communion. So happy Easter, and good eating – I’ll be back next week with a less festive menu.