There are many historic culinary customs surrounding Easter cooking. Whether you’re planning a festive feast of biblical proportions for family and friends, or designing the ultimate Easter-egg hunt, it’s a great time to celebrate tradition in the kitchen.

Looking for the right drop to drink? Check out these food-wine matches. 

The food experts at Cooked.com.au share six recipes to put your own spin on the traditional this Easter.

1. Good Friday fish

Good Friday is traditionally a day of abstinence, so red meat is off the menu. These days, eating a delicious fish dinner is not exactly a cross to bear, so why not make an effort to choose sustainable varieties on Good Friday?

Chef Stefano de Pieri is a champion of sustainable seafood, and his rolled King George whiting stuffed with prawns is an impressive way to celebrate to the traditions of the day.

2. Slow-roasted Sunday

Eating Lamb at Easter is deeply rooted in Northern Hemisphere springtime traditions. We’re on the wrong side of the world for spring lamb, so it’s a wonderful time for slow roasting.

A classic leg roast or the tougher (but tastier) lamb shoulder, cooked for hours at a low temperature makes for a fall-apart feast on Easter Sunday.

3. Eggy Easter breads

There are countless variations of traditional Easter breads around the world: Greek tsoureki, pane di pasqua from Italy and babka from the Ukraine to name just a few.

They have different names and different, often elaborate forms, but they’re all rich, and laden with eggs and butter as a reward for fasting during Lent. Baked fresh and slathered with even more butter returns a decadent treat that’s hard to match.

4. Stick to the original 

Marked with a cross to symbolise the crucifixion, after eggs, hot cross buns are the most iconic of Easter foods.

A sweet fruit bun spiced with cinnamon and mixed spice; the addition of mixed peel is often controversial (we’re pro, for the record). Hot cross buns are now available in pretty much any variety of flavour you can imagine and filled with choc chips, but we’re purists and can’t go past Margaret Fulton’s classic hot cross bun recipe.

5. Make your own eggs

It just wouldn’t be Easter without Easter eggs – the piles of foil-wrapped booty hunted from the garden or left at the bottom of your bed by the Easter bunny. The downside is that Easter eggs always taste like, well, Easter-egg chocolate. Buy yourself some couverture and make your own Easter eggs this year.

They’re surprisingly simple to make, and you can get creative with your decoration or fill them with even more chocolate!

6. Chocolate everything

Easter’s the one time of year that everyone has a free pass to unreservedly gorge on chocolate, so you might as well make the most of it. Bake your excess Easter eggs into chocolate cupcakes, make chocolate ice cream and bake that tray of super-indulgent brownies you’ve been dreaming about.

And if you’re in the giving mood, Chocolate truffles make a beautiful and simple handmade gift, and chocolate marshmallows are a deliciously fluffy alternative to Easter eggs.

Check out Cooked.com.au‘s guide to Easter cooking. Hop to it!