Home or out, Easter dining options abound

With Easter around the corner, home chefs and pros alike are turning their thoughts to the dinner table.

If dining out is the plan, two Wasilla-area restaurants are offering lavish brunch buffets sure to please all appetites. Settlers Bay Lodge and Chop House at Lake Lucille, both under the discerning eye of co-owner and executive chef Joshua Broda, are reprising their impressive spreads for the holiday.

Settlers Bay will be offering an extensive array of breakfast and dinner fare, including gluten-free and vegetarian options, from 10 a.m. til 4 p.m. on Easter Sunday, April 20. Eggs Benedict, vegetable frittata, and waffles with fruit toppings and whipped cream anchor the breakfast side of the buffet, which will also feature all the usual sides, like bacon, sausage, and home fries.

Dinner selections include BBQ roasted chicken, Burgundy braised beef, red wine honey glazed prime rib, Alaskan Cod Olympia, pasta primavera, and roasted leg of lamb. The buffet will also offer an assortment of fresh fruit, breads, salads, appetizers, and desserts.

Reservations are strongly recommended. Cost is $59 for adults, $27 for kids 6-12, and $13 for kids 3-5.

Closer to town, Chop House will have a fully loaded omelette station as part of its breakfast choices, along with staples like French toast, scrambled eggs and Eggs Benedict. Dinner entrees will include seafood, pasta, and chicken options, as well as a carving station featuring prime rib and pineapple cherry glazed ham. Shrimp cocktail and fresh Alaskan oysters will also be served, as well as a variety of salads and desserts.

Price for adults is $65. Children 5-12 are $25. There is no charge for kids younger than 5. Chop House brunch buffets often sell out quickly, so don’t wait to make reservations. Farther north, the Talkeetna Alaskan Lodge, freshly open for the 2025 season, is also offering an Easter brunch buffet. Service runs from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. and will feature traditional holiday favorites with sweeping views of Mount Denali. The price, which includes gratuity, is $75 for adults and $35 for children. Kids 3 and under eat free.

As always, Feather and Flour in Palmer, and Everett’s in Wasilla, will be open with their usual Sunday brunch menus.

For do-it-yourselfers seeking a distinctly Alaskan dinner table, Bear Mountain Meats, in the shadow of Lazy Mountain near Palmer, is offering its custom-prepared roasts for holiday feasting. A bacon-wrapped prime rib roast is a perennial favorite, as are custom hams seasoned with the company’s own spice blends, before being fire-glazed and spiral cut.

Bear Mountain also offers 20 different flavors of sausage, as well as bacon, snack sticks and regular cuts of beef, bison, and pork. Check out Bear Mountain Meat’s website for current availability.

Bushes Bunches farmstand, located on the Old Glenn Highway just outside Palmer, continues to expand its inventory of Alaska raised meat, seafood, and produce. Whole roasting chickens from Polaris Hatchery in Palmer are in stock, alongside ground meats and assorted cuts of pork and beef.

If Alaska seafood is part of your Easter dinner plan, Bushes Bunches has flash-frozen halibut, lingcod, sablefish, rockfish, and Dungeness crab from Homer-based Invisible Fresh Market Seafood, along with salmon fillets and salmon burgers from North Soul Salmon in Palmer.

A growing variety of Alaska-made breads, pastas, and sauces are also available there.

FIND OUT MORE

www.settlersbaylodge.com

www.chophouseak.com

www.alaskacollection.com/lodging/talkeetna-alaskan-lodge/

https://bearmountainmeats.com/

www.bushesbunches.com