Eastertreats

In Mallorca, Easter celebrations are always accompanied by traditional fare such as panades, crespells and robiols. They are delicious morsels made from recipes handed down through the generations, using the island’s most traditional produce.

Panades are small pies made from pastry and filled with pork or lamb - especially tasty at Easter - or sometimes with fish or peas. The basic dough is made with flour, lard and eggs, with optional ingredients such as orange juice and olive oil. In Palma, some households and bakeries make panades candies (sweet panades), adding sugar to the dough to create a pleasant contrast to the savoury filling.

Robiols are delicious pastries of thin dough made with flour, olive oil, lard and eggs. Semi-circular in shape, they are dusted with icing sugar and have various fillings including strawberry or apricot jam, angel hair preserve, cream, cottage cheese and chocolate. These pastries are probably Jewish in origin, since Sephardic cuisine features some very similar pastries called borekas.

During the days before Easter in households with children, one thing that is never missing is a batch of crespells, special biscuits made with flour, eggs, lard, olive oil and sugar, sometimes with added orange or lemon peel or juice. The most typical are made in the form of a flower or star.

Luckily, you can find all these delicious snacks at any time of year - a panada makes a great mid-morning snack to be enjoyed while strolling the city, while a robiolor crespell is perfect with a cup of coffee.