Easter recipes: Blanche Vaughan’s guide to the slow breakfasts, fast bakes and ultimate Sunday roast you need

It’s a big weekend for cooking, and House and Garden’s Blanche Vaughan is here to help.

The Sette

As the long Easter weekend stretches out in front of us and the prospect of some gentle days filled with friends and family comes into view, so too does the quietly pressing question of what on earth to feed everyone. For some of us, tradition must play its part – fish on Good Friday, lamb on Easter Sunday. But as this is such an exciting time of year for produce, there is room for flexibility when it comes to the flavours and ingredients we lean on. I love an old fashioned roast lamb and a hot cross bun, but this weekend, when picking my Easter recipes, I’m planning to weave in big flavours and some slightly off-piste ideas to keep things feeling fresh. You can play with an Easter menu more than a Christmas menu, I find.

It is, after all, a transitional moment in the year. The weather can be gloriously bright or stubbornly wintry, sometimes both in the same afternoon, and our appetites follow suit. We crave dishes that feel light and spring-like, but with enough warmth and comfort to anchor a still-chilly day. These Easter recipes are designed to sit comfortably in that in-between space when we need our food to be seasonal, generous and unfussy. There are ideas for crowd-pleasing fishy feasts, sweet treats to cut through all the Mini Eggs, and my ultimate Easter Sunday lunch menu.

The Good Friday dinner

Fish is traditional for Good Friday, but for many of us it doesn’t tend to be a go-to when feeding a crowd. These recipes all lend themselves to a couple of bottles of cold white wine and a table filled with hungry people. There is a crowd-pleasing gratin, with smoked haddock and celeriac, a great pan of chowder which would make a perfect lunch with some good bread and butter or a starter, and a real showstopper: a grand aïoli. The recipe suggests this could be a starter, but in fact I think it’s a perfect celebratory main course. Put the platters in the centre of the table, make sure there is plenty of bread, and let everyone dive in.