I love an excuse to bake and Easter is the perfect one.
Also, I can now eat chocolate again as I gave it up on the 8th of Jan until Good Friday! Horray.
So, here are two Easter bakes that I have made this Easter weekend.
They are super easy, relatively quick and even child friendly.
Let’s take a look!
Chocolate Easter Nests
Chocolate Easter Nests
I surely don’t even need to include a recipe for this Easter classic!?!
This Easter season special is great to do with kids and one of my favourite ‘cakes’ whenever I seem them on sale.
I had to use shredded wheat this time as we already had it in the cupboard but my preference is cornflakes, and of course I used Cadbury chocolate and mini eggs.
Cadbury Creme Egg Brownies
Cadbury Creme Egg BrowniesGooey goodness!
These brownies came out super gooey and were so delicious, especially warm!
I had this ‘Brownie in a jar’ mix from Christmas, that I hadn’t used yet and all you needed to do was add 125g of butter and 2 eggs (whisked together first). Super easy!
I then cut the creme eggs in half and pushed them into the batter, fondant side up.
A brownie recipe that I use alot is a BBC Good Good one, I’ll leave a link here .
As I said a few days ago, I have one more recipe for you! And it’s perfect for a special Christmas day occasion.
It’s a delicious, and relatively easy and quick, Salted caramel (do I need to say any more?) and chocolate tart.
It doesn’t require a lot of ingredients which is great! And apart from time for it to set it doesn’t take too long either. It only took me an hour or so one evening so its great as a fancy, last minute showstopper.
Don’t let the making caramel stage scare you… it’s not as horrendous as you’d think and, if you have a food thermometer this will really come in handy.
I will link both of the recipes that I used below.
I used pre made shortcrust. Remember to bake it blind for 15 mins before removing the baking parchment and beans (or whatever you have, I used dried pasta) pop it back in until it starts to turn golden.
I had some nice flakey salt that I added during the caramel recipe process (as stated but I doubled it) and I sprinkled more salt on, generously, once I had poured the caramel into my cooled tart.
Leave the caramel to set and then add your silky smooth ganache on top. Good quality Dark chocolate is the best.
As someone who likes baking, I enjoyed this recipe because it uses lots of different techniques that perhaps I wouldn’t bother to try usually.
And it looks impressive too!
This is going to be our Christmas day dessert, served with some thick double cream, YUM!
I LOVE festive food (& food in general) and Christmas is one of those times of year where we indulge a little more, enjoy a few of our favourite snacks and have a nice time.
… I like having some of these, particularly, at Christmas as they make me feel super festive, but obviously alot of them can be had at other times of the year!
Here are some of my favourites…
A absolute festive staple.
This is one of my favourite chocolates. I would of course eat this at other times of the year but, I often just get the grab bags or bars, saving the actual chocolate orange for christmas time.
It always feels so festive, perhaps it’s the Christmas/clementine similarity.
And thanks to old Saint Nick, I always get one in my stocking.
Now I do only eat these ones at Christmas! Mince pies.
These are a treat that I have started to like only over the last five years or so, and I love them throughout November and December.
Me and my work friend did a mince pie taste testing this year so look out for that in a Blogmas post to come.
Shortbread is my favourite type of biscuit and I LOVE them at Christmas. I especially love the M&S Christmas, musical tins. These little packs of Chritmas trees are delish too.
Tesco’s Christmas shortbread selection tins are my favourite in terms of taste, super delicious and with lots of sugar on top.
PRINGLES! The ultimate crisps.
I try not to eat tooooo many because they really are addictive!! So I always get these for Christmas as they are a buffet essential ππ»
Sour Cream and Chive are my absolute fave.
Hot Chocolate is a Christmas must have!
Perfect for the cold weather and these are a couple of my favourites.
I recently discovered the Cadbury hot chocolate and how good it is. I’m sure I’ve tried it before but not made it well, because I can’t get enough of it now!! I was definatly making it wrong Haha.
Mint hot chocolate is my favourite flavour and there is something about the minty taste that makes me feel super festive.
Hot chocolates are so cosy π₯°
Crackers & cheese are a Christmas must have. Great as a little snack or part of an epic buffet.
& finally…
Our tipple of choice!
It’s got to be a nice, ice cold fruit cidar. I don’t really drink casually, but I do love to have a few of these in the fridge, ready for the festive period π
It’s one of the times of year that I do actually fancy a casual one here and there.
These came out so well, are super chocolatey (I always add extra chocolate π€¦πΌββοΈ) & look how cute they are!!
I’m not as great at the finer detail when it comes to decorating things like this but, even I could do this haha! and I love how they turned out.
These would be great for a Christmas buffet table (and yes I am still having one even though there won’t be many of us, because come on 2020 or not… it’s Christmas & who doesnt love a buffet!!)
I hope you had a nice weekend, it probably wasn’t the weekend we all planned or thought it would be.
So, we actually have a few traditions that we usually do at Easter but obviously this years a bit different (for now)
But, lets not dwell on what would have/should have been… So, what did we do to make the Easter weekend fun and what traditions did we manage to uphold in lockdown?!
Board games are a must!
We opted for LOTR Monopoly as we haven’t played it for a while and Monopoly is the Queen of board games, so it’s the perfect choice.
Plus, this one is great as you move the one ring along so you can either play a manageable length game or go the long haul.
We also got together on Good Friday night (on Skype) as we have been since this began, to do our weekly quiz night so that was good to get together that way.
Easter treats!
We also made the good old Easter tradition that is chocolate crispy cakes.
We made individual ones using shredded wheat, chocolate and Terry’s choc oranges mini eggs.
The large one was cornflakes, chocolate, cut up Creme eggs & lots of sprinkles.
Delicious!
Easter Sunday Breakfast π½
As a family, on Easter Sunday we usually get together, exchange Easter eggs, do craft with the kids and have a chinese takeaway for dinner (I know, traditional Easter food π but that’s just what we do, my Nana started it!)
Our Asda Chinese ‘Takeaway’
It was nice to play games together, just me and Tim, watch some TV and have a few treats. (Well, quite a few treats but it’s one weekend aye!)
Plus, I had a nice video/call from my niece and nephews so that was lovely as I am missing them alot and I love to spoil them on special occasions like this. But, most of all I just love to give them a big hug and have some fun with them!
Let’s hope we’ll all be together again soon!
How did you get through the isolation Easter weekend?
So I haven’t done a recipe post for a while and what better way to start off a new year of baking than with these delights…
….chocolate orange cupcakes.I’ve used a BBC Good Food recipe because they always work out well for me.I slightly modified the recipe to make then orange as the recipe was for just plain chocolate cupcakes.Let’s take a look at the recipe. I’ll leave a link here and then you can see on the recipe below how I modified it.
β’100g Plain Flour
β’20g Cocoa Powder
β’140g Caster Sugar
β’1 1/2 tsp Baking Powder
β’40g Inslated Butter
β’120ml milk
β’1 egg
β’Orange Extract
To decorate:
β’Chocolate buttercream flavoured with melted chocolate orange or the orange extract.
β’Chocolate orange segments
β’Sprinkles
I hope you enjoyed this little recipe. Chocolate orange seems to be everywhere atm (I’m not complaining) so theres plenty of chocolate orange adornments to choose from.
I added sprinkles too because why not!!
I would usually use a piping bag but mine broke last time so I glhas to just spatula it on, so not quite a professional finish but so yummy.
Last night we had a festive film night at my twin sisters house, perfect for getting you into the festive spirit. Plus, as you may have seen from my previous Blogmas post that I did a couple of days ago, I’ve made a list of the christmas films I want to get in before the end of the holiday season.
‘The film centres on Buddy, a human who was adopted and raised by Santa’s elves. He learns about this ans heads to New York City to meet his biological father while also spreading Christmas cheer in a world of cynics.’
Then we watched Home Alone…
‘The story follows eight year old Kevin McCallister who is mistakenly left behind when his family flies to Paris for their Christmas vacation. Kevin initially relishes being home alone, but soon he has two burglars to contend with.’
I’ve never actually watched this film properly, and all the way through so people were very insistent that I did this year. I did enjoy, it was an easy to watch film and Kevin is very sweet.
I wouldn’t say it’s one of my absolute faves but I would definatly watch it each year.
And of course, when you are watching christmas films, you need snacks!
I brought along I chocs from my Christmas stash…
After the films we played a game of Articulate. It’s a great game for the family and it’s a laugh too!
You’ll suprise yourself with some of the ridiculous things you say under pressure.
When I got home I finished all of my wrapping so I can fully enjoy the next few pre Christmas days!
Roseanne Byford 