April is a sweet month with lots of holidays to celebrate: Andrew Coppolino

The world's great religions serve up traditional sweets at their important celebrations and observances, many of which coincide in the last couple of weeks of April.

During Ramadan, fasting is broken by iftar and that might include sweet pastries like baklava and qatayef, which is a small pancake or cheese blintz stuffed with "ishta," a thick cream, and a sugar syrup for dipping.

At this time of the year in the Caribbean, Trinidadians will enjoy sweet coconut bread with nutmeg, cinnamon and candied fruit.

"It's really a popular sweet for all celebrations," according to Kitchener-based chef and Trinidadian food expert Arielle Neils. (See Neils' recipe below).

Of course, hot cross buns are hot sellers at this time of the year at grocery stores and independent bakeries. Grainharvest Breadhouse, COBS and Nougat all sell limited supplies of the popular buns, as does Aura-la Pastries & Provisions, who draw on an old European recipe.

"What we really like about our recipe is that we use dried currants and candy our own oranges and lemons. The yeast dough undergoes a pre-ferment for a lot of extra flavour. It's a two- to three-day process for our hot cross buns, and then there's a nice orange syrup on top," says owner Aura Hertzog.

Hertzog also observes Passover, which is the same weekend as Easter this year. She says at meals for Passover, you'll often find matzoh ball soup, sweet and sour soup and brisket. For sweets without wheat gluten, you'll find coconut as a binder.

"Coconut macaroons are very popular and lots of fresh fruit," Hertzog said.

At Sweets by Merav, Merav Levene bakes matzoh-based desserts and pastries that are covered generously in chocolate, caramel and nuts. She also prepares a flourless chocolate mousse, fudge cake, almond cookies, coconut macaroons and uses nut flours to replace the wheat flour in recipes.

Matzoh, with its historical and religious significance, is "like a cracker, or bread that didn't rise," Levene said.

"When the Jews were enslaved in Egypt and got away, they didn't have time to let bread dough rise, so they ended up with matzoh."

If you're in Spain during Easter, you may find a version of "French toast" being made. But according to Vanessa Stankiewicz of La Lola Catering in Cambridge, the sweet is called torrijas de leche, a dessert or coffee snack made with day-old bread, eggs and wine. (See La Lola Catering's recipe below.)

"You pan-fry the bread and pour over top a simple syrup with white wine and let it soak in. This is a typical sweet during Semana Santa, or Holy Week, in Spain," says Stankiewicz.

According to Paul Masbad at Nuestro 88 in Kitchener, Filipinos in various parts of the islands will enjoy pastillas de leche and yema, a soft candy made with egg yolks, milk and sugar, and polvoron which are cookies made with toasted flour.