Carmela Soprano's Chopped Vegetable Salad and Balsamic Oregano Salad Dressing

Okay... we've all got leftovers from last Sunday.



Hope you had a nice Easter.

Time to get back to normal meals again.  

Time to use up some of the leftovers. 

I mean, did anyone eat all the radishes?





In the Adult Birthday Parties chapter of Carmela's Entertaining with The Sopranos, Carmela has a recipe for Chopped Salad. 





This must've been a recipe Carmela had from her early days

Anna Sultana's Orange Cranberry Scones

What a time this has been... and will be.

Last week was Easter, with all that entails.

This weekend started out with the Royal Wedding.

With all THAT entails.

Thank goodness that wasn't our problem.

But, didn't the bride look elegant!

God bless them.





Next Sunday is Mother's Day.

No, you can't buy marked-down Easter candy for Mom.

She knows rabbits aren't traditional for Mother's Day

Happy Easter!!

The Promise of Easter.... 



May joy fill your day



Hope light your path



And the many



blessings of Easter



warm your heart....



Wishing everyone a Happy Easter!!

A Traditional Family Easter (part 5 by Margaret Ullrich)

 Continued from part 4

   Aunt Demi announced, “We are having a traditional Maltese Easter dinner.  With a traditional figolli.”

    “Do you think our Blessed Mother baked a mermaid?” Aunt Rita sneered.  

    Demi lunged.  Liz wrote.  





    The lamb was ready.  If this dragged on much longer it would be a lump of coal.  



    Ma sighed, glared at her sisters-in-law and said, “I don’t

A Traditional Family Easter (part 4 by Margaret Ullrich)

Continued from part 3


    After forty days of fasting and scrubbing, Demi and Rita were lean, clean, Easter tradition machines.  Filled with the holiday spirit, they glared at each other.

    “What the hell is that?”  Aunt Demi spat.

    “It’s a dove, a symbol of peace, you idiot,” Aunt Rita shot back.  

    “It’s Easter.  We don’t need a damn dove.”

    “Throw that fish back in the sea.

A Traditional Family Easter (part 3 by Margaret Ullrich)

Continued from part 2


    In College Point, as Easter approached, the bakeries filled with cross buns, pretzels, braided almond loaves, Easter cookies and marzipan treats.  There were also large decorated sugar Easter eggs which had a hole in one end.  When we looked into the hole we could see tiny bunny villages.  There were also hot cross buns.  Ma knew about the cross buns.  Since Malta

A Traditional Family Easter (part 2 by Margaret Ullrich)

Continued from part 1


    During my earliest years in Corona, a small town in Queens, New York, Easter was Italian.  Palm Sunday was the Day of the Olive.  Small blessed olive branches were offered as tokens of peacemaking.  For Easter breakfast we had Colomba di Pasqua.  Colomba is bread shaped to look like a dove, the symbol of peace, and covered with almond paste and almonds.  An Italian

A Traditional Family Easter (part 1 by Margaret Ullrich)

In 2007, the following story was published in 'A/cross sections : new Manitoba writing', which was edited by Katharine Bitney and Andris Taskans and published by the Manitoba Writers Guild.  The book is still in the library system, adult nonfiction section.  Check it out.  There are lots of stories and poems by Manitoba writers in it.







    I made a loaf of soda bread to serve with the

Anna Sultana's Kwarezimal - Almond Biscotti, Maltese Style

On Saturday I posted Carmela Soprano's Quaresimali.



I know, I have a hard time picturing Carmela making them, too.

It's not that they're hard to make.

But can you picture Tony and AJ sitting down to a plate of them?

Would Christopher bring a box of them to the guys hangin' at Satriale's?

No way.

Well, maybe during Lent.





Kwarezimal is a Maltese Lent basic item.

It is called a Lenten

F. B., or not F. B. - Being 60 (week 50 - by Margaret Ullrich)

It's Palm Sunday.Oh, crap.
I didn't do anything on my Lent List.I didn't even manage to read that little black book every day.Don't be ridiculous.Not THAT little black book.I haven't had a little black book like that for over 40 years.Well to be honest, I never had a little black book like that.At most I had a page's worth of phone numbers.Not a whole book's worth.We're talking the 60s.Now folks

Carmela Soprano's Quaresimali, Cinnamon Nut Biscotti

Hoo boy... Tomorrow is Palm Sunday.



Lent's almost over.

And all that suffering you planned to do during this Lent... well, if intentions counted for anything, they'd be printing holy pictures with your face on them right now. 



Can't exactly use "Time flies when you're having fun" as an excuse for not doing anything on your Lent List.



Okay... I'm not here to make you feel guilty.

Anna Sultana's Qassatat tal-Pizelli, Small Pies with Peas, Maltese Style

Yesterday I posted Ma's Qassatat ta I-Irkotta, small ricotta pies.



A friend e mailed and asked if there was anything similar for the lactose intolerant.

No problem.



Qassatat ta I-Irkotta can easily be prepared as Qassatat tal-Pizelli.

A Qassatat with a peas filling.

Great for the lactose intolerant and vegetarians in the crowd.

And everybody else.



                        

Anna Sultana's Qassatat ta I-Irkotta - Small Ricotta Pies, Maltese Style

On Saturday I posted Carmela Soprano's La Pastiera.

Last year it shared a post with my Ma's Qassatat ta I-Irkotta, small ricotta pies.  

Just a few sentences.

Sorry.

Live and learn, right?





They're both pie recipes, have a ricotta filling and a crust.

There the similarity ends.

Ma's recipe is 100% simpler.



You can prepare it for lunch the same day.



And, it's healthier.

Watching

Mother's Daughters - Being 60 (week 49 - by Margaret Ullrich)

I got a few emails about a piece I had written a couple of weeks ago.I had compared my childhood to Loretta Lynne's Coal Miner's Daughter.I said my siblings had the Crystal Gale experience.
I guess I wasn't clear enough.
It wasn't about the green "Alien Registration" postcard every year.It wasn't about being the go-between, the translator.It wasn't about the paper trail I have to show to explain

Carmela Soprano's La Pastiera - Easter Ricotta Pie, Italian Style

Okay... we're in the homestretch for Easter.
Time to get back to basics.
I'm not talking theology.
Nope.
Something more important.


Even people who aren't religious - the C & E relatives - are expecting you to do your bit for their holiday enjoyment.


It's time to start pulling out the Easter recipes.




Last April I just gave a quick comparison of Carmela Soprano's La Pastiera (also known

Anna Sultana's Figolli recipe / Traditional Maltese Easter Sweet with Royal Icing and Almond Filling with and without eggs

On Saturday I posted the recipe for Carmela Soprano's Easter Sweet Bread.



The picture of the Sweet Bread in Carmela's Entertaining with The Sopranos cookbook inspired me to write a post last year about the Easter Breads of my youth.  



That post was recently included in Dust & Fire, Writing & Art by Women 2011, which was published by the Women's Studies Department of Bemidji State

The Voice of Canada - Being 60 (week 48 - by Margaret Ullrich)

Last week I was in Bemidji, Minnesota, to read my story Easter Bread at the launch of Dust & Fire, Writing & Art by Women 2011.
The launch had been organized by the Women's Studies Department of Bemidji State University.  It took place on March 25 at the American Indian Resource Center, a fairly new building on campus.

This was the fifth time in my life that one of my stories had been published

Carmela Soprano's Italian Easter Sweet Bread

Last year I wrote about the Easter Breads of my childhood.



The memories were triggered by a picture of a loaf of Easter Sweet Bread in the Holidays chapter of Carmela's Entertaining with The Sopranos. 



If you're Italian, I'm sure you've sat down to an Easter Sweet Bread.  

And I'm also sure you were either pro or anti eating the colored eggs.  

That weird green circle was spooky.