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These traditional Easter dinner ideas are sure to make your family Easter dinner a big success. You can’t go wrong with any of these tried-and-true classics. A traditional Easter dinner includes ham, side dishes, salads, and, of course, desserts.
As an added bonus, check out our sample Easter menu plan below (including recipes).
Traditional Easter Dinner
Every year our family gathers together on Easter Sunday to enjoy a traditional ham dinner. On the side, we serve a potato dish, a hot vegetable, and hot homemade rolls. We have our traditional menu plan below, or you can mix and match the recipes below to create your own special Easter dinner.
Easter Appetizers
As family and friends start to gather, we like to set out an appetizer or two. We’ve handpicked four fantastic recipes to elevate your Easter gathering.
Easter Main Dish Recipes
According to marthastewart.com, ham became the meat of choice for Easter dinner because it was more readily available than lamb. However, if ham isn’t your main dish of choice, a roast lamb, pork roast, or a roast beef can also be served for your Easter feast.
As mentioned above, our go-to Easter main-dish is ham. However, we have enjoyed other main dishes as well. If you are looking for a less traditional Easter meal, try one of these recipes using chicken, fish, beef, or pork.
Easter Side Dishes
Hot Potato Side Dishes
You can’t serve a ham dinner without a good hot potato side dish. Typically Easter potatoes are served “casserole-style” in a casserole dish with some kind of sauce and cheese. Some examples of this are funeral potatoes or potatoes au gratin. Our readers have commented saying that they have loved serving our creamy potatoes with peas or our parmesan crusted potato halves with their ham dinners as well. Check them all out and decide for yourself what suits your family best! Any of these Easter dinner ideas will be a winner!
Hot Vegetable Side Dishes
A hot vegetable side dish adds variety, color, and nutrition to an Easter dinner spread. Choose a hot vegetable that will complement the other side dishes on your Easter menu.
Easter Salads
The possibilities are endless when it comes to Easter salads. It’s fun to incorporate hard boiled eggs and spring flavors, like strawberry and lemon. We find ourselves using the following salads time and time again.
Easter Breads
Nothing quite compares to the aroma and taste of freshly baked bread. Homemade rolls are always a good idea. Make extra so you can have ham sandwiches for leftovers! Our classic Easter bread also looks beautiful on the table.
Easter Desserts
When it comes to Easter Desserts and Treats, we don’t mess around. In fact, we love Easter desserts and treats so much, we created an entire, separate post dedicated to them. These tasty treats can be served along with Easter dinner or even as surprises in Easter baskets. They are as fun to make as they are to eat! We featured our Chessmen Banana Pudding with our menu plan below. Here are a few more of our favorites.
Cakes
Pies
Bars and Cookies
Bonus: Leftover Ham Recipes
I don’t know about you, but we ALWAYS seem to have leftovers from Easter dinner. Here are some ideas to help you use up that delicious leftover ham:
Easy Easter Dinner Menu with Recipes
Here is a sample menu plan for a delicious and easy traditional Easter dinner. It features Slow Cooker Ham, Cheesy Potato Casserole, Sautéed Sweet Asparagus, and a Chessman Banana Pudding for dessert. See the recipe notes for tips on timing it all out perfectly. We are taking all of the stress out of it just for you! Please enjoy your beautiful, well-planned Easter dinner!
How to Make a Traditional Easter Dinner
Traditional Easter Dinner Menu
Video
Ingredients
Slow Cooker Spiral Ham
- 8 pound spiral- cut ham (cooked)
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 2/3 cup maple syrup
- 1 cup canned pineapple juice (do not use fresh)
Cheesy Potato Casserole
- 2 pounds hash browns shredded or cubed
- 3 teaspoons salt
- pepper to taste
- 1/2 cup butter melted
- 10 ounces condensed cream of chicken soup
- 2 cups sour cream
- 1/2 cup milk
- 2 cups corn flakes (optional)
- 2 tablespoons butter (optional)
- 1 1/2 cups shredded cheese (optional)
Sweet Asparagus
- 2-3 pounds asparagus
- 6 tablespoons butter
- 4 tablespoons sugar
Four Layer Banana Pudding
- 2 bags Pepperidge Farms Chessman Cookies
- 6 bananas sliced
- 2 cups milk
- 5 ounces instant vanilla pudding
- 8 ounces cream cheese
- 14 ounces sweetened condensed milk
- 12 ounces frozen whipped topping thawed
Instructions
Slow Cooker Spiral Ham
- Remove the ham from packaging and place ham, flat-side down, in a large slow cooker (7 quarts or larger).
- Generously rub brown sugar all over the ham.
- Pour maple syrup and pineapple juice over the ham.
- Place lid on slow cooker and cook for 2-3 hours on low heat.
- 30 minutes prior to serving, remove lid and spoon the juices over the ham. Cover and cook for 30 more minutes.
- Remove ham from slow cooker and serve.
Cheesy Potato Casserole
- Mix all ingredients, except optional toppings, in a large bowl. Spread mixture evenly into a 9×13 pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.
- Optional toppings: Corn flake crumb topping: BEFORE baking Sprinkle corn flake crumbs over casserole. Drizzle 2 tablespoons of melted better over the corn flake crumbs. Bake.Melted cheese topping: Prepare casserole and bake for 50 minutes. Remove casserole from oven and evenly disperse 1 ½ cups of shredded cheese over the casserole. Return the casserole to the oven and bake for 10 more minutes.
Sautéed Sweet Asparagus
- Rinse asparagus. Snap off the bottoms of each stalk and discard the bottoms.
- Melt butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add asparagus to the skillet and sprinkle sugar over the stalks.
- Sauté asparagus over medium-high for 5-7 minutes or to your preferred doneness. Serve immediately.
Four Layer Banana Pudding
- Line the bottom of a 9×13 pan with one layer of Chessmen cookies.
- Place sliced bananas on top of the cookie layer.
- In a large bowl, combine milk and pudding mix. Stir until smooth. Set aside.
- In a separate bowl, combine cream cheese and sweetened condensed milk. Stir until smooth. Fold in whipped topping.
- Add the two mixtures together and stir until well combined. Pour mixture over the banana layer.
- Top with another layer of Chessmen cookies (the picture side up) and refrigerate until ready to serve.
Notes
- Prepare the Four Layer Banana Pudding. This can be made the morning of, or the day ahead. It can also be made just after starting the Slow Cooker Ham and still have time to refrigerate so it can be served nice and cold.
- Prepare the Slow Cooker Ham and take a break for an hour. Set the table, clean the kitchen, or watch a show on Netflix. 🙂
- After the ham has been cooking for about an hour, prepare the Cheesy Potato Casserole. Once it’s in the oven, you can take another 45 minute break. If you are making a green salad or other sides, now is a good time to do it.
- At this point the ham has been cooking for about 2 hours. Take it out of the slow cooker and cut it into slices. Place the slices back in the juices in the slow cooker to keep them warm while you sauté the asparagus.
- Sauté the asparagus.
- Dinner is ready to go! Place the asparagus in a pretty serving dish with a spoon or tongs, place the sliced ham on a nice platter with a serving fork, remove the potatoes from the oven and set on the table with a serving spoon.
- When you are ready, cut the Four Layer Banana Pudding into slices and serve.
The last few years we have had BBQ ribs, Cheesy Potaoes, Baked Beans, Rolls and a
Lemon Delight for dessert.
My favorite meal for Easter is ham with dressing and butter beans or field peas also potato salad.
We typically have a spiral ham with all the sides that our family enjoys like green beans, mashed potatoes, sweet potato casserole, deviled eggs, and homemade yeast rolls. For dessert its a coconut layered cake- love spending time in the kitchen with my family around the holidays.
Please don’t use boxed pudding and ruin a great looking Nana Puddin’. The make from scratch is not that hard. Flour, sugar, butter, and vanilla. The other recipes look great.
So many recipe ideas. I like the sautéed asparagus. Then chessman cookies with bananas. The crock
Pot pork chops sounded so different and I think it would be moist and tender
Ham is usually what we’ve done in the past but this year I might try rainbow trout ( I prefer over salmon). But scalloped potatoes are always a must however I may try crock pot au gratin this year.
Delicious traditional Easter dinner. You can’t go wrong with this one.
My favorite Easter tradition is dying and hiding eggs for the kids and or dogs since the kids are grown. We now eat the dyed eggs and put out plastic eggs with treats inside for the dogs to find. Of course after they find them, we open them and get the treats out for them. Traditionally we cook ham, mashed or scalloped potatoes, green bean casserole, and homemade rolls with whipped butter and cream cheese.
amazzzzzziiiiiiinnnnnnnngggggg I love it soooo much!
Pasties 🥧 (Irish dish composed of roast beef slow cooked and potatoes in a pie crust covered in beef gravy) ♥.
That is one of our favorites as well! We have a yummy recipe for it: https://www.favfamilyrecipes.com/irish-pasties/
Traditionally I make a ham for Easter dinner, this year I am going to do a beef roast with mushroom gravy, roasted red potatoes, asparagus and a salad (not sure yet what kind). For dessert I make my single layer carrot cake with a poured glazed that soaks into the cake. My recipe makes 2 so we eat one and freeze one.
Loved the over roast… delicious!
Always deviled eggs, spiral ham, and a mac & cheese dish. The Four Layer Banana Pudding will be on my table as well – looks delicious!
Thanks for your great recipes. I appreciate all the photos and how easy they are to follow. Hope you have a blessed Easter!
My favorite Easter menu item is the ham…..juicy homemade ham! I’ll be trying this crock pot ham for sure.
I will be making the crockpot ham with maple glaze. Maple being a favorite flavor for me. The side dish of creamed potatoes and peas looks amazing! I remember having this as a child at Easter. The peas and baby potatoes make it look Spring fresh. Dessert is a toss up between a lemon Bundt or the coconut cake. Thank you for all the scrumptious recipes to make this years Easter celebration a hit.
Thanks for this great post! Everything looks amazing!! We normally have ham and baked potatoes for Easter, but this year we will be eating at a restaurant near my daughter’s college. Looking forward to a nice brunch with no dirty dishes to clean up!
Brilliant ham recipe and easy
Gotta have cheesy potatoes, ham rollups and strawberry pretzel salad at every Easter dinner
My favorite Easter meal is ham, potato, macaroni, and pasta salads, baked beans, deviled eggs, and homemade yeast rolls. For dessert, a coconut cake shaped into a lamb ( I use the same shaped cake pan my mother did) For me holiday meals are filled with tradition and family.
My favorite & what I’m planning on making is the lemon salmon with asparagus. Not sure on which side yet but banana pudding for desert. All easy & super yummy so while I’m going to be cooking I’ll still be able to relax a bit. That’s a win win in my book