Saturday, April 1, 2023

Foolproof Easy-Peel Hard-Cooked Eggs + Favorite Carrot Cake, Orange-Ricotta Pound Cake, Baked Ham & More Easter Favorites

If you are dyeing eggs in the week ahead or are considering deviled eggs for the holiday table, I can't recommend the egg-steaming method enough.

It's simple: insert a steamer basket into a large pot, fill it with an inch of water, bring to a simmer, add your eggs, cover, steam for 12 minutes, then plunge the eggs into an ice bath.

The shells will slip right off. Since learning the method from J. Kenji Lopez-Alt via my mother, I haven't looked back.

These deviled eggs share many of the flavors included in my favorite egg salad: pickle juice for acidity, lots of chopped chives and a modest amount of mustard. For every two eggs, a tablespoon of mayonnaise is about right.

Classic Deviled Eggs

PS: You can use your Instant Pot to steam eggs, too: Instant Pot Soft-Boiled Eggs | Instant Pot Hard-Boiled Eggs

Easter Menu 2023

I've updated my Easter Menu post to include a few new festive favorites: hasselback potato gratin, better-than-classic pound cake, 5-ingredient apple cider vinaigrette, and a few others.

Friends, there will be no big Easter dinner for us this year. I am headed to California as I type for the pizza book photoshoot (🍕🍕), and then Ben and I are taking the kids to the Grand Canyon for a few days. I've never been and the non-thrill seeker in me is feeling anxious, but it's beautiful (and safe?!) right?

Hope all is well 💗

In this post, I've rounded up all of my favorite Easter recipes, from baked ham and mustard sauce to rack of lamb with tzatziki to scalloped potatoes and punch to buttermilk pull-apart rolls and hot cross buns to easy-to-peel hard-boiled eggs and more.

Find all of them here as well as a few highlights below:

Favorite Easter Recipes

Baked Ham with Brown Sugar Glaze

If you've ever toiled over a roast turkey — from the brining to the basting to the carving — a baked ham feels like a complete dream. For one, there's no marinating or brining. Second, you can't overcook it, because it's already cooked! You're simply heating it through.

Get the recipe and watch the video here:

Baked Ham with Brown Sugar Glaze

Mustard Sauce

In my family, this mustard sauce is as essential as the ham on the holiday table. It takes no time to whisk together, and it is so nice to have on hand for leftover ham sandwiches.

Split Pea and Ham Soup

A perfect use for your leftover ham bone.

Hot Cross Buns

Made with a mix of brown sugar and white and a dash of nutmeg, these Hot Cross Buns are perfectly sweet and subtly spiced. Halved and spread with butter, they are so, so delicious. Easy too: Assemble the pan of buns the night before and stick it in the fridge. On Good Friday morning, simply pop the pan in the oven.

Overnight, Refrigerator Focaccia

Though I am partial to rolls on the holiday table, it's hard to beat this overnight, refrigerator focaccia in terms of effort-to-reward ratio. It's truly so easy and so delicious.

But if you're up for making rolls, these buttermilk pull-apart rolls are a favorite. At Christmas last year, I made them slightly larger — I divided the dough into 20 portions as opposed to 24 — and the larger size was perfect for leftover ham sandwiches.

One-Bowl Orange-Ricotta Pound Cake

I've included a number of desserts in my Easter post, and of all of them this is likely the easiest: orange-ricotta pound cake. What's nice about this one is that it can be made ahead — it keeps well for days — but it also can double as a tea cake or breakfast cake or really an anytime cake.

Favorite Carrot Cake

This time last year, I revisited an old carrot cake recipe, which I had long loved but which had gotten lost in the archives. I added weight measurements, simplified the mixing process, baked it in a 9×13-inch pan (as opposed to two 8-inch pans), and I frosted it with my favorite whipped cream-cream cheese frosting, which I use in this one-bowl birthday cake recipe. This carrot cake was just as delicious as I remember, and the family devoured it. Highly recommend!

Favorite Carrot Cake