Spring Feast on the Equinox!

Planning a healthy meal is simply more fun and makes most sense when done in conjunction with the changing cycles of nature. It's time to celebrate Spring and our bodies with delicious and healthy recipes that honor this great time of balance and rebirth.
Why not plan a Spring feast?



The spring (or vernal) equinox is one of the four great solar festivals of the year. Day and night are equal, poised and balanced, but about to tip over on the side of light. The spring equinox is sacred to dawn, youth, the morning star and the east. The Saxon goddess, Eostre (from whose name we get the direction East and the holiday Easter) is a dawn goddess, like Aurora and Eos. Just as the dawn is the time of new light, so the vernal equinox is the time of new life.

It is a day for all to celebrate longer daylight hours,
returning warmth and the start of planting.

So, what's on the menu for your Spring Feast?

Here's some food for thought. A Spring feast typically incorporates foods associated with birth or new life, including eggs (the promise of new animal life), seeds (the promise of new plant life) fresh greens finally growing again after a long winter, sprouts, fresh vegetables and fruits with lots of seeds.



How about a giant fresh greens salad with spinach and dandelion greens, sprouts and strawberries, sunflower seeds and some goat cheese?


You can dress it with a mixture of olive oil, vinegar, mustard, lemon, and sea salt.


Wonderful Spring veggies include asparagus (also an afrodisiac!), squashes, tomatoes, Spring onions and lettuces. Some people also include a roots soup (potatoes, carrots, beets and other roots that keep well throughout the winter) to pay respects and bid farewell to the winter veggies that keep well in the cold.




Deviled eggs are always a big hit at an Equinox feast, but you can also hard boil your eggs and decorate them to dress up your table and then add them to your salad later.

Fresh milk, cheese and butter are often present at a Spring feast to represent that young goat and cattle are being born and these foods are more readily available. If you're serving meat, lamb and fish are the traditional Spring feast choices.

Sprouts of any kind and grasses such as wheatgrass and barley grass are perfect symbolic foods and packed with nutrients and phytochemicals that ignite your immune system. You can juice them and serve them with dinner or add them on top of your salad.

Don't forget seeds! Sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, caraway seeds, pumpkin seeds! They are delicious raw or roasted and can make a great snack as well as represent new life.


Ritual and Celebration


Have fun with creating your Spring feast.

- Decorate your table with candles, greens and fresh flowers.
- Ask your guests to each bring a food that reminds them of Spring.
- Invite each guest to plant a seed of an idea for what they hope to cultivate or create for themselves in the coming season.
- Try to balance and egg on its end!
- Teach your children the importance of adding meaning to your nourishment.

Most importantly, give thanks to mother Earth for providing all that we have and for continuing to grow new plant and animal life to sustain us.

Happy Spring Equinox! Have a great feast!

Deborah