Easter Baking - Chocolate Heaven

The weather is slowly bringing a little sunshine through the clouds along with extra daylight hours. We all feel more enthusiastic towards getting hands on around the home, spring cleaning, home crafts and home baking.

The Easter half term is when children will be bouncing around looking for mischief, so baking is the perfect messy fun to keep their hands and minds occupied with a delicious sticky reward at the end of their hard work.

So dust off your aprons and grab a large mixing bowl ready for making some delicious bakes. Traditionally many people bake hot cross buns for a popular afternoon tea to share with the family, perfectly toasted and served with butter that melts on top.

Another popular choice when baking at easter are Easter biscuits. These are a shortcake style biscuit with dried fruit and dusted with sugar. These are great for any age to enjoy and ideal for serving to guests. Easter biscuits are perfect for wrapping up in a homemade parcel and giving to loved ones this Easter.

For us Easter is about one thing - Chocolate… There is nothing better or more fun than making a variety of chocolate treats at Easter for sharing with friends and family. Chocolate baking treats are a great way of getting kids into baking and getting involved in the kitchen. The messier the better and of course who gets the spoon before it goes in the dishwasher?

If you want to make a variety of baking recipes, not only for Easter, but for other great baking, there are a few basic essentials to help you out.

• A non-stick baking tray is great for baking cookies, biscuits and pastries without the ingredients sticking.

• If you like cupcakes and muffins a bun tray with a variety of holes that can be used with paper cases is just the job.

• A brownie pan that has higher sides than a baking tray, which can also be used for traybakes and slices like flapjacks.

• There are a variety of different cake tins, including loose base, springform and standard sandwich tins. All types will make a perfect sponge cake.

• A mixing bowl is essential when mixing ingredients, make sure the bowl is big enough for mixing all of your ingredients together with ease and without spilling over.

• Scales and measuring cups assists in accurately measuring out your ingredients, essential for a successful bake.

• Utensils complete the essentials for baking, these include wooden spoons, spatulas and whisks.

If you need some ultra chocolatey heaven, then these recipes are ideal, fun to make together with children on rainy days or school holidays.

Here are a couple of great recipes that are easy to make and share this Easter.

Brownies are a must have for any chocolate lover. They are easy to make but the great thing is that the recipes makes a decent quantity of brownies and you can of course cut them up into as few or as many as you like.

180C/fan 160C/gas 4
20cm x 30cm baking tray approx

Ingredients

300g dark chocolate (70%)
225g unsalted butter
190g soft brown sugar
190g caster sugar
½ tsp vanilla extract
6 large eggs
130g plain flour
½ tsp fine sea salt
3 tbsp cocoa powder
A bag of mini eggs

Method
• Put the chocolate in a large heatproof bowl with the butter and place the bowl on a pan containing a few centimetres of simmering water, over a gentle heat. Make sure the bottom of the bowl doesn’t touch the water. Stir continuously until the chocolate starts to melt. Remove the bowl from the pan and the residual heat will continue the melting process. Alternatively, melt in the microwave in 20-second bursts. Whisk in both sugars and the vanilla. Crack in the eggs, one at a time, and keep whisking.
• Place the flour, salt and cocoa powder into a separate bowl, then fold into the chocolate mixture in 3 batches. Mix thoroughly until all of your ingredients are incorporated.
• Fold in half of the mini eggs and pour the mixture into the tin. Decorate the top with the remaining mini eggs.
• Bake for 35-40 minutes. Remove from the oven when there is still a little movement. The heat of the tin will continue to cook the brownie while it cools. Leave to cool in the tin, then cut it up into approx 15 pieces.

• Finish by sifting a little cocoa powder or icing sugar over the top.

Creme eggs start to appear in shops as we get closer to Easter and are a great treat for people of all ages. The following recipe combines a delicious creme egg with a simple chocolate cake into a delicious chocolate scotch egg. This is a fantastic treat to serve at Easter. You could even wrap one up with a pretty bow as an Easter treat.

Makes approx 4 scotch eggs

Ingredients

4 x creme eggs
4 x double chocolate muffins
2-3 tsp of salted caramel chocolate spread
100g melted dark chocolate
70g chocolate sprinkles

Method
• Crumble the chocolate muffins into a food processor and quickly blitz for 20 seconds.
• Add the salted caramel chocolate spread to the muffins and blitz again until just combined, or stir by hand.
• Carefully mould a small amount of muffin mixture around each creme egg until completely covered and round.
• Melt the chocolate in the microwave or your preferred method and using a pastry brush gently coat the covered eggs in a thin layer of chocolate. Make sure the chocolate isn’t too hot before doing this.
• Finally, place the chocolate sprinkles in a separate large bowl and roll each egg around the bowl one at a time until completely covered. Enjoy!