Dating back centuries, simnel cake is a fruit cake that was originally eaten on Sunday during Lent throughout the United Kingdom.
The cake is topped with a layer of toasted marzipan and 11 or 12 marzipan balls, which represent the 12 apostles.

United Kingdom: Simnel cake

Pascua is Spanish for Easter, so Tarta Pascualina means "Eastertime Tart." <ul><li>The savory pie is filled with ricotta, hard-boiled eggs, spinach, artichoke, and parsley. S</li><li>ince it is meatless, it's a common dish during Lent, and the many eggs used to make it symbolize the resurrection of Jesus Christ.</li></ul>

Argentina: Torta pascualina

Recipes for capirotada — a bread pudding served on Good Friday — vary across the country, but it's usually made from:<ul><li>Bread similar to a baguette (bolillo), which has been soaked in mulled syrup made from sugar, cinnamon sticks, and cloves. </li><li>Nuts, dried fruit, and sprinkles are common toppings.</li></ul>Capirotada is meant to signify the crucifixion: the cinnamon sticks represent the cross, the cloves represent the nails, and the bread represents Christ's Body.

Mexico: Capirotada

The French have a particular Easter recipe for leg of lamb known as "le gigot d'agneau Pascal:" The meat (lamb being known as a sacrificial animal) is seasoned with garlic and herbs such as rosemary and then roasted.

France: Leg of lamb

Those making mämmi for Easter need to start the preparation days in advance, as it needs to be stored chilled for three to four days before being served. The traditional dessert is made from water, molasses, malted rye, rye flour, and Seville orange zest for seasoning. It's usually eaten cold with milk or cream.

Finland: Mämmi

<ul><li>White borscht isn't exclusively made at Easter, but it's common during the holiday. Made from soured rye flour, sausage, and hard-boiled eggs, the soup is hearty and filling.</li><li>Although babka has become a year-round dessert favorite in many countries, the spongy yeast cake has traditionally been served on Easter Sunday in Poland for years. Typically, the babka is round and covered in a sweet glaze.</li></ul>

Poland: White borscht (zurek) and babka wielkanocna

Sweet breads are common holiday food in Italy. There's panettone at Christmas and colomba di Pasqua at Easter. Shaped like a dove, a symbol of peace, colomba di Pasqua is stuffed with candied fruit and then sprinkled with almonds and pearl sugar.

Italy: Colomba di Pasqua

This is a hearty soup that consists of a variety of grains and beans as well as bacalao, dry salted cod. The exact ingredients differ from household to household, but common ones include fava beans, squash, corn, rice, garlic, onions, peas, and milk.Ideally, 12 different kinds of beans are used to make the soup, representing the 12 apostles. The bacalao symbolizes Jesus.

Ecuador: Fanesca

Tsoureki is a braided sweet bread. The three-strand braid symbolizes the Holy Trinity, while the hard-boiled eggs that the bread is commonly served with are meant to symbolize the blood of Christ, which is why they're dyed red.

Greece: Tsoureki

<ul><li>Known as kerbelsuppe in German, chervil soup is made from chervil, a herb related to parsley. </li><li>The soup is typically eaten on Maundy Thursday (the Thursday before Easter), which is known as Gründonnerstag, or Green Thursday in German — hence the green soup.</li></ul>

Germany: Chervil soup

Rosquillas de Semana Santa, or Easter doughnuts, taste more like cake than doughnuts since they're made with fermented flour instead of yeast. How they're served differs across Spain, but a common preparation is a dusting of sugar on top.

Spain: Rosquillas

The ham is sweet, thanks to either a glaze made from honey and brown sugar or from being covered in sliced pineapple.Before fridges existed, animals were slaughtered in the fall, and their cured meat wasn't ready to eat until Easter — hence the tradition.

United States: Baked ham

Pinca is a popular Easter treat used to celebrate the end of Lent in many Eastern European countries, like Slovenia and Croatia. Before it's baked, the sign of the cross is carved into the dough at the top of the bread.

Slovenia and Croatia: Pinca

Made with cottage cheese and cream cheese, pashka is a savory dessert that can either be eaten alone or with bread. The cheese mound is often decorated with dried fruit and the letters XB, which mean "Christ is risen."

Russia: Pashka

A combination of both pizza and pie, pizza chiena means filled pizza in the Neapolitan dialect. The Neapolitan specialty is stuffed with a variety of cured meats and cheeses.

Naples, Italy: Pizza chiena

These sweet, spiced buns are traditionally eaten on Good Friday to signify the end of Lent, and have been an Easter tradition for centuries. Currants or raisins dot the bun, and a glaze is used to make a cross on top, which signifies the crucifixion of Jesus.

United Kingdom: Hot cross buns

This sweet and salty Brazilian candy is made from only a few simple ingredients: ground peanuts, salt, sugar, and sometimes cassava flour.

Brazil: Paçoca de amendoim

From a marzipan-topped fruit cake in the UK to a stuffed savory pie in Argentina, here's what Easter meals look like across the globe.

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What people eat for Easter in countries around the world

Prior to the Council of Nicaea (In 325 AD), churches around the world celebrated Easter at various times. In order to bring unity among the churches, council members created a formula that would calculate the date for Easter celebration around the world.
They established Easter to be held on the first Sunday that occurs after the first full moon, which follows the vernal equinox, but always after Jewish Passover. It was also determined that the vernal equinox would fall on March 21.

Calculating Easter

Jewish Passover is celebrated on the 15th day of the month of Nisan, which is the first month of the year for the Jewish calendar. It is a time practicing Jews commemorate God setting the ancient Jewish people free from captivity in Egypt. Passover is celebrated for 8 days and is made up of several ceremonial traditions.
It was important for the church to celebrate Easter after the Jewish Passover because Jesus Christ celebrated Passover with his Jewish followers the night before he was crucified.

Easter and Passover

After the Great Schism of 1054, the Catholic and Orthodox churches still believed Easter should be celebrated on the first Sunday after the first full moon to follow the vernal equinox.
<ul>
<li>But the Catholic Church no longer found that Easter had to fall after Passover. It also switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, which was presented in 1582.</li>
<li>The Orthodox Church still held to the original Nicean Council's formula for Easter as well as following the original calendar system of the Julian calendar.</li>
</ul>
The two churches now celebrated the same Easter holiday on two different days.

Same Easter, Different Day

Before the invention of calendars and other modern methods of tracking years and seasons, people relied on the position of the sun in the sky and obvious signs in nature to indicate the passing of time.
When the equator and the hemispheres of the Earth became common knowledge, it was understood that the slightly tilted rotation of the earth causes different hemispheres to experience different seasons. The vernal equinox is the event that occurs in late March, which brings spring to the parts of the earth in the Northern Hemispheres.

The Vernal Equinox

Did you know that there are two different dates for the Easter holiday? There is one for the Catholic Church and one for the Orthodox Church. On...

Why there are two Easter dates

Lent is the greatest and most solemn period of fasting on the Christian church’s calendar, leading up to the celebration of Christianity’s most important feast day: Easter.Like most practices rooted in Christianity, the way people observe Lent, or whether they observe it at all, varies wildly depending on their heritage, specific religious tradition, and preferences. Still, there are some rules and guidelines that mark the observance of Lent for Christians who observe the season. And, increasingly, even nonreligious people are picking up the ritual.

Lent Before Easter

Lent technically lasts for 46 days. The period is a mirror of the 40 days that Jesus spent in the wilderness, fasting, praying, and being tempted by Satan before he started his public ministry.The concept behind Lent is that each year, Christians will mimic Jesus’s actions in the wilderness. Lent is sometimes called the “Great Fast.” It’s a period of time in which Christians are meant to give up some comfort or adopt some spiritual practice that leads to self-examination, repentance from sin, and, ultimately, renewal of the soul.

Duration And Meaning of Lent

<ul><li>It depends on the date of Easter. But since roughly the First Council of Nicaea in 325 CE, the date of Easter has been more or less determined by locating the first full moon following March 21 on the Gregorian calendar. And that’s how the date is determined by Western churches today.</li><li>Orthodox Christians use a slightly different system — which means that when Orthodox Easter (sometimes called Pascha) lands on the same day as Western Easter, it’s coincidental.</li><li>Once the date for Easter is fixed, all you have to do to calculate the other days of observance that fall during the Lenten period.</li></ul>

How The Dates For Lent Are Calculated

<ul><li>Western Christianity typically allows observers to pick whatever they want to fast from, based on a person’s understanding of what earthly comforts distract them from worship.</li><li>Protestants in particular tend to avoid specific church-mandated practices when it comes to fasts.</li><li>Some Catholics keep a more rigid version of the fast. The most notable and well-known practice is abstaining from eating meat on Fridays.</li><li>Orthodox Christianity is far more strict about the fast: observers fast from meat, fish, eggs, dairy products, olive oil, and alcohol every weekday, during lent.</li><li>Some don’t fast at all.</li></ul>

How People Fast During Lent

Ash Wednesday kicks off the most solemn period of fasting on the Christian church’s calendar, leading to the celebration of its most important feast day: Easter.

Lent, explained

As a predominantly Catholic country, France has various Easter traditions of note.<ul><li>According to legend, French children receive chocolates on Easter morning not from the fabled bunny, but from flying church bells. </li><li>It’s said that when the bells do not ring from Good Friday to Easter Sunday (to mourn Christ's death), they are flying to Rome to fetch the goodies. </li><li>In Alsace, charming markets are whimsically decorated and teeming with fluffy rabbits, goats, and ducks you can pet. </li><li>The village of Bessières makes a giant omelette each year from 15,000 eggs—and a dozen cooks.</li></ul>

Easter in France

The most striking Easter tradition is the intricate sand designs called alfombras that line the streets.The multi-chromatic creations come in patterns of all kinds—geometric, floral, and illustrative—and local artisans spend days creating the masterpieces using a mix of dyed sawdust and sand. They are erased on Good Friday as the procession walks over them, kicking up the sand and erasing the designs in the process.

Easter in Guatemala

<ul><li>One of the island’s most beloved is the Good Friday kite flying festival on Horseshoe Bay Beach. Hundreds of Bermudians turn out to fly their kites, which are kaleidoscopic, hexagonal wonders with long tails that hum once aloft. The wooden sticks that provide the structural integrity form a cross or star shape, and their annual flight symbolizes the resurrection.</li><li>Traditional Easter dishes in Bermuda include hot cross buns and codfish cakes.</li><li>The island grows Easter lilies and gifts bouquets of the white flowers shaped like trumpets to Buckingham palace every year.</li></ul>

Easter in Bermuda

<ul><li>It all starts on Palm Sunday when churchgoers receive dried flower bouquets or willow branches in lieu of palms. </li><li>Their version of Easter eggs is much more elaborate and intricate. Called pisanki, they are painted with delicate, ornamental floral patterns. </li><li>On Easter Monday, the Poles celebrate “Wet Monday,” in which boys and men pour water on women and girls, although in recent years the tradition has evolved into water fights where no one is safe. </li><li>Warsaw also is home to the Beethoven Easter Festival, which hosts a classical music program through Holy Week.</li></ul>

Easter in Poland

<ul>
<li>Florence holds a ritual called Scoppio del Carro, in which white oxen carry a centuries-old wagon to Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore. After mass, the archbishop sends a mechanical dove into the wagon, which explodes in a spectacular fireworks display.</li>
<li>A parade through the city follows, and most Easter celebrations don’t stop when the night ends.</li>
<li>Easter Monday, called Pasquetta (or little Easter), is for packing picnics of leftovers and getting outside to relax. Or, in the Umbrian village of Panicale, rolling four-kilogram wheels of cheeses through an obstacle course.</li>
</ul>

Easter in Italy

<ul><li>The island of Marinduque’s Moriones Festival takes place during Holy Week each year, and a major cornerstone of the festivities is inspired by Longinus, a Roman executioner of Christ.</li><li>Men and women impersonate Roman soldiers, by donning masks, helmets, and gladiator-inspired garb, and wander the streets.</li><li>According to legend, Saint Longinus was blind, and was cured when a drop of Christ’s blood fell in his eye during the crucifixion, as he pierced Christ's side with a lance. He then declared his faith and was later beheaded. This specific tale is often reenacted during the festival.</li></ul>

Easter in The Philippines

In Mexico and throughout Latin America, the Easter holiday is an opportunity to cleanse oneself of evil.<ul><li>On Holy Saturday, it’s typical to re-enact the burning of Judas by hanging an effigy and burning it at the stake.</li><li>Theatrical renditions of the rest of Easter’s tales, called passion plays, are performed, too. One of the largest and most elaborate of them all is in Iztapalapa, a borough of Mexico City, which has 5,000 participants and 150 speaking roles. The tradition began in 1843 to rejoice the end of a cholera epidemic. Now, the performances begin on Palm Sunday and last through Holy Week<warningtag>.</warningtag></li></ul>

Easter in Mexico

Eastern Orthodox communities follow the Julian calendar's holiday schedule instead of the Gregorian's. <ul><li>The Holy Fire, which is said to emit from the tomb of Jesus Christ every Holy Saturday, is flown from Jerusalem to Athens and then delivered throughout Greece. </li><li>During midnight church service, the flame is passed from the priest to worshippers’ candles. People say Christ has risen" and "Truly, He has risen".</li><li>Easter marks the end of 40 days of fasting, and the dishes served that day are appropriately indulgent and symbolic: roasted lamb, sweet and fluffy braided bread,  and red hard-boiled eggs.</li></ul>

Easter in Greece

<ul>
<li>Since 1930, Angelenos have celebrated Holy Saturday with a Blessing of the Animals on Los Angeles's Olvera Street—the procession is full of flamboyantly costumed pets and a cow decked out in flowers leads it.</li>
<li>But New York City is home to perhaps the splashiest of all Easter events in the country: the Easter Parade and Bonnet Festival. Around St. Patrick’s Cathedral in midtown, hundreds of revelers sport towering, whimsical hats.</li>
</ul>

Easter in the United States

From passion plays in Mexico to kite-flying in Bermuda, these countries have incredible Easter traditions. Here's how to recreate them at home.

How Countries Around the World Celebrate Easter

This is the Sunday before Easter Sunday. It is the first day of Holy Week and celebrates Jesus' arrival in Jerusalem riding on a colt, often referred to as a donkey.Crowds of people greeted him, throwing palm branches on the road.

Palm Sunday

This is the Thursday before Easter Day. Christians remember when Jesus shared the Passover meal with his disciples, breaking bread and drinking wine.
Many Christians remember this event by sharing bread and wine in a service called Holy Communion, Eucharist or Mass. It is a reminder that Jesus sacrificed his life for mankind.

The Last Supper

Good Friday is the Friday before Easter Sunday when Christians remember Jesus' crucifixion. During Good Friday services, they reflect on the meaning of the crucifixion and the central message of Christianity.This message is that through his death on the cross, Jesus atoned for the sin of mankind which came into the world when Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden, and through Jesus' sacrifice mankind is reconciled with God.

Good Friday

Easter Sunday marks Jesus' resurrection.
<ul>
<li>After Jesus was crucified, his body was placed in a cave, guarded by Roman soldiers and an enormous stone was put over the entrance.</li>
<li>On Sunday, Mary Magdalene followed by some of Jesus' disciples visited the tomb to find that the stone had been moved and Jesus' body had gone.</li>
<li>Christians call this the Resurrection and they believe that God raised Jesus from the dead as a sign that He accepted Jesus' sacrifice for the redemption of sin and that mankind is forgiven and will have eternal life in Heaven.</li>
</ul>

Easter Sunday

During the Holy Week, Christians remember the last week of Jesus's life

Learn and revise about the different ways Christians celebrate festivals with BBC Bitesize GCSE Religious Studies.

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