According to Numerator’s 2023 Holiday Preview Survey, as many as 85% of Americans plan to buy candy, food, and other gifts for this year’s Easter celebration.

With daffodils and tulips for sale and colorful baskets filled with candy on store shelves, Easter is springing throughout grocery stores across the country. As family and friends gather to celebrate, several traditional foods and candies will appear on tables and plates this spring.

While Easter may not be the first holiday foodies think of when daydreaming about delicious food, there are a number of delectable dishes and sweet treats to enjoy this upcoming holiday.

Candy Is Still Dandy

From jelly beans to chocolates, children’s baskets will be filled with sweet treats this year. This year, a new M&M is hitting store shelves, delighting candy lovers this upcoming holiday. M&M’s Easter Sundae blends vanilla and chocolate ice cream, a hint of cherry, and a fudge coating to approximate the taste of a traditional sundae.

If M&M’s aren’t hitting the spot, shoppers can choose from many other chocolate and candy combos for their candy fixes. For the more adventurous snackers, try a bite of Ethel M Chocolates’ Dark Chocolate Lemon Satin Crème Hearts or Milk Chocolate Bananas Foster Truffles. These chocolate bars might not be for everyone, but they’re for sure an interesting addition to anyone’s basket.

“Along with our classic Easter offerings from M&M’S and Dove, we’ve seen a growth in fruity consumption during the season, and we’re thrilled to have a variety of on-trend offerings from our beloved Starburst Jellybeans to fruity favorites like Skittles and Life Savers Gummies in our variety bags,” says Tim LeBel, President of Sales at Mars Wrigley North America.

Traditional Easter sweets like jellybeans are in nearly every Easter basket, and fruit-flavored candies have also been popular additions to Easter baskets as well. Easter baskets can be customized and filled with all the sweet treats everyone likes!

Easter Dinner Is Served

Buying Easter candy is the easy part. Since Easter often coincides with spring break, travel, and other activities for families across the country, cooking an Easter dinner can be a rushed affair.

According to a 2023 survey by the Honey Baked Ham Company, 59% of shoppers find grocery shopping for Easter dinner stressful before the holiday begins. Plus, 67% of shoppers stop at more than one store to find all the ingredients they need for Easter dinner, adding to the stress and taking away precious time from preparing the holiday meal.

To make Easter dinner even easier, look into premium gift baskets. Meal prep companies might be exactly what you’re looking for if you want to avoid the grocery store this upcoming holiday. Companies like Harry & David offer different meal options such as ham, turkey, and prime rib Easter dinners, Easter brunch, spiral sliced hams, and even wine pairings for delivery.

Many home chefs still prefer to cook their own Easter dinner, and the trending sheet pan meals are an easy way to do that. The dinner’s size can be adjusted easily to the number of guests. Since almost everything being cooked goes onto one sheet pan, cleanup is easy, too. With spring vegetables like asparagus, new potatoes, carrots, and green peas lining grocery store shelves, choosing sides for the dish is also convenient and easy!

According to the Food Network, some of the most popular Easter dinner meals include hams, cooked lamb, steamed asparagus, and cheesy potatoes. While every family has their own Easter traditions, much of the food on our tables is the same across the country for this holiday.

There are a lot of different store-bought desserts shoppers can pick up on one of their many trips to pick up ingredients. Bakers can try their hands at making spring desserts like sugar cookies or a blueberry crumble — also known by the rather inelegant name “dump cake.”

Grocery and Budget-Friendly

While many holiday dinners can get expensive, your Easter dinner doesn’t have to be. Before heading to the store, check to see if you can make any dishes with what you already have in your cabinet. If not, try to lower your time running from store to store. Every grocery store has a meat department, canned mushroom soup, pie filling, yellow cake mix, and butter.

Home cooks can also tailor their Easter recipes to their family and company’s liking. If no one likes or eats beef, the roast can be ham, chicken, pork, or lamb, with the requisite adjustments in cooking time, temperature, and some ingredients. There aren’t any rules for cooking an Easter dinner, except to enjoy the company of the others who chose to celebrate with you.

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Latif Jamani | Wealth of Geeks

This article was produced by Media Decision and syndicated by Wealth of Geeks.