Following the Eastern Orthodox traditions, the most important fasting of the year – the Great Lent just finished and to celebrate it, most Russian countries would prepare a traditional festive cake – a Paskha.
Paskha is a cheesecake, in a pyramid shape, made by a drained mixture of curds or cottage like cheese, eggs, cream, and dried candid fruits. The white colour of the cake symbolises the purity of Christ and the pyramid shape represents the church or the tomb of Christ or can also be interpreted as the Golgotha mountain where Chris was crucified.
The dessert is often decorated with religious motives from the Patriarchal cross to the ХВ initials standing for the traditional Easter Slavic Pascal Greeting: Christ is Risen!. The answer to which is: Truly, He is risen!.
Just as the pysanky eggs, the Paskha cake can officially be eaten only after it is blessed by the priest during the Good Friday liturgy.
The name of the festive dish derives from the word paska which literally means Easter in Russian and takes its roots from the post-classical Latin pascha (Easter), along the Hebrew pésakh (Passover).
Even nowadays, the Easter Orthodox cheesecake is merely known in the Western world, excluding those related to Slavic immigrant communities. But when was it initially introduced to Britain?
Obviously that happened around the middle of 19th century, as the first written reference comes from 1855, An Illustrated Description of the Russian Empire. Where the author Robert Sears describes the typical ingredients and shape, along with the importance of the paskha Easter custom: “Two dishes are indispensable at an Easter-breakfast—paskha and kulitsh. Paskha is made of curds beaten hard, and served in a pyramidal form.”
The quotations from the next century all come in reference to the cake making in Russia, with the probably most delightful one coming from the prominent Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin’s novel Memoirs of a Revolutionist: “Messengers brought..a specially prepared cream cheese for the paskha, and his cook managed to make out of it a piece of artistic confectionery.”
The Paskha recipe finally made its way to the West at the end of the 20th century to nowadays be also praised by the gluten-free communities in variations where the traditional flour is replaced by almond, coconut or millet one.
