The other night, my kids ate corn dogs and feta cheese for dinner.

That might seem odd unless I add that I am, and they therefore also are, Greek.

Growing up, feta was always on our table. It was ever-present, like salt, or napkins. If we ate fried chicken, there was feta. Spaghetti? Feta. Steak? Feta.

My dad was in town recently, and during dinner, he asked me to bring him the feta. When I told him I was almost out, it was like admitting I'd run out of toilet paper.

But we're Greeks. We do things differently. Which is why this Sunday, long after the last tears have been shed over egg hunts, Greeks will be stuffing their kids into fancy outfits and keeping them up past midnight for Greek Easter celebrations.

Orthodox Easter usually comes on a different day from Catholic and Protestant Easter.

Why?

Because we want to be different, and because we never admit that we're wrong.

The Julian calendar, on which Greek Easter is based, was introduced in 46 BCE, and, despite advances in astronomy that led to the more accurate Gregorian calendar, Greeks have stuck to the old one. We don't want your new-fangled "correct" calendar. Ours works perfectly fine.

But if I'm honest, I admit that it's hard having two Easters, if for no other reason than the challenge of winning over kids who have exposure to both kinds.

It doesn't help that they're usually still riding a sugar high from non-Greek Easter, when they were given so much chocolate they started politely declining it.

By the time Greek Easter rolls around, there's not much to recommend it.

"What do we do on Greek Easter, Mom?"

"We dye eggs, boys."

"Oh! Like, cool colors and glitter and stripes with stickers?"

"No, red. Only red. The color of blood."

"I see."

There's no Greek Easter bunny, so there are no egg hunts. The only sporting event is a vicious competition in which the family takes a bloody egg and slams it up against their neighbor's to see whose cracks, repeating until there's only one winner and everyone else is left crying.

There are, it must be admitted, the traditional Greek Easter treats.

The first is magiritsa — basically, Greek chitlin soup. The first time I saw my grandmother make magiritsa, I asked my dad what it was.

"Lamb intestines," he said, then seeing my horrified look, added, "But don't worry. Yia Yia washes them really well."

After you've choked down a bowl of magiritsa, it's time for dessert: koulourakia and tsoureki.

Koulourakia are cookies. What flavor cookie, you ask, thinking that surely there must be a special Easter spice or addition. Well, no. They're cookie-flavored cookies. A particularly avant-garde recipe might call for orange zest, but otherwise, they're just ... cookies. Very, very dry cookies.

Tsoureki, similarly, is bread. Slightly sweet bread, yes, but still ... bread. It does have an egg in the middle, though! A red one. For blood.

For kids, there are fancy candles. It's a newish tradition, but Greek parents now often buy their children giant, rococo candles covered in bunting and bows, swirled with tulle and dotted with fabric flowers. They cost somewhere in the neighborhood of $40, and you know children really appreciate them because after holding them in church for about an hour, the candles are transformed into what is, essentially, very frilly trash.

I can't sell any of that to my kids.

But one day, maybe, they'll get it. Because the real appeal of Greek Easter is to adults.

After days of cooking, you go to church for midnight Mass. Then you come home. You invite over family and friends. You sit and you eat: lamb, pastitsio or moussaka — maybe even koulourakia. (The kids won't touch them, so there'll be plenty left over.) Maybe you drink wine. You talk. You listen to music.

It's glorious.

It's different.

But better than all that, it's Greek.

And that they might understand.

Kalo Pasca.

To learn more about Georgia Garvey, visit GeorgiaGarvey.com.

Photo credit: Ranya at Pixabay