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Girl on the Dnieper River

Young Love in Kiev

Child of Ukraine

Carpathian Mountains

Blessing the Basket

Easter Blessing

Ukrainian Easter Basket

The Easter Basket
There is no set formula in preparing the “Easter Basket”. The key words are “simplicity” and “immagination”. Traditionally the baskets were filled with foods that were readily accessable and quite easy to prepare. The contents of the baskets included the following foods such as: the Easter Bread (Paska), hard boiled eggs, freshly grated horseradish, beet and horseradish relish (Khrin), salt, butter, cheeses of all sorts including cream cheese, ham, sussages
( kilbassa ) and a variety of cold cuts.All of these foods were placed into a basket lined with a beautifully hand embroidered cloth ( Vyshyvka ). Placed in the center of the basket was the Easter Bread ( Paska ) and ontop of the bread was a lighted candle. The rest of the foods were placed into the basket encirculing the Easter Bread topped off with brightly decorated Ukrainian Easter Eggs
( Pysanky ).The prepared baskets of food were then brought to church for blessing. On Easter Sunday after mass services the families would gather around their table ready to begin the celebration.

Friends in Kiev

Spring in Kiev

Kiev, Ukraine