I don't know about you, but we always find that there's more chocolate at Easter than we know what to do with! Of course we could just have chocolate for breakfast, lunch and dinner, but this year we thought we'd look at a few creative ways to use up our chocolate Easter eggs, and some fun Easter crafting ideas too...
Easter Egg Cheesecake
What's better than chocolate? MORE chocolate! This decadent dessert is a brilliant way to use up chocolate Easter eggs, and would make for a show stopping Easter Sunday lunch pudding!
Serves 2
Ingredients:
1 Chocolate Easter Egg
165g Cream Cheese
2tbsp Icing Sugar
75g Digestive Biscuits
25g Melted Butter
2tbsp Cocoa Powder
100g Double Cream
Mini eggs, sprinkles, chocolate or caramel sauce, and other treats to serve.
Method:
Take the chocolate Easter egg and carefully cut it in half along the join. Tip: Run the knife under hot water before cutting to help separate the two halves of the egg without breaking it.
Place the biscuits into a bowl and break into crumbs using a rolling pin (or blitz the biscuits in a food processor). Pour the melted butter into the biscuit crumbs, and stir until combined. Split the biscuit crumb mixture between the two Easter egg halves and gently press it down into the base of each half, careful not to break the chocolate shell.
To make the cheesecake filling, put the cream cheese, cocoa powder and icing sugar into a bowl and mix together until smoothly combined. Whip the double cream in a separate bowl, and gently fold the whipped cream into the cream cheese mixture.
Spoon the cheesecake filling into the Easter egg halves on top of the biscuit base. Add mini eggs, sprinkles or other treats to the top of the egg halves, and then place them in the fridge to chill until set for at least 2-3 hours, or ideally overnight. If you have any filling left over, pop it into glasses as an extra pudding!
Once set, serve up the Easter Egg Cheesecakes drizzled with chocolate or caramel sauce.
Why not create a show stopping centrepiece dessert on Easter Sunday by making 4 or 6 Easter egg cheesecakes and serve them up on your Marble Sharing Platter!
Easter Egg Chocolate Nest
I'm sure lots of you will remember making these as a child (usually as an Easter activity at school!) Get the kids involved making this easy recipe, and use up your Easter chocolate to create this nostalgic treat.
Ingredients:
Method:
Prepare a muffin or cupcake tray with paper cake cases.
Melt the chocolate Easter egg chunks, butter and golden syrup in a bain-marie, stirring continuously until combined.
Once melted, remove the chocolate mix from the heat, add the cornflakes and stir gently to coat the cereal in the chocolate mixture.
Spoon the mixture into the cake cases creating a little hollow in the centre of the nest with the back of a spoon. Pop 3-4 mini eggs in the centre of each nest and place the tray into the fridge for around 2 hours to set.
Once the nests are ready, pile them up on a Medium Marble Platter, serve and enjoy!
Easter Egg Garland
Once everyone is chocolate-ed out and the sugar rush has worn off, why not get everyone out of the house collecting up feathers, leaves and blossom petals to make some Easter themed decorations. The perfect Easter holiday activity on a spring day!
Supplies:
Method:
Pierce a small hole at each end of the eggs, and gently blow through the hole to remove the egg white and yolk. (Collect the egg yolks and whites in a bowl to make scrambled eggs, or use in cakes and other recipes!)
Once you have removed the white and yolk from all the eggs, fill the sink with warm soapy water and gently rinse the egg shells. Leave them to dry on a tea towel.
While the egg shells are drying, pop out to the garden and collect some natural decorations for them! Forage for feathers, leaves, seed pods and blossom petals. (Remember to only collect fallen leaves and petals).
Once the egg shells are dry, it's time to get decorating! Unleash your creativity and decorate the eggs however you like; simply paint the eggs in pretty pastel colours, glue leaves and petals onto them for a fresh spring look, or create cute little Easter chicks by drawing on eyes and a beak, and gluing feathers to the eggs for wings and a tail.
Once you've had fun decorating each egg, carefully thread some twine or pretty ribbon through the holes in the egg shells to create the garland!