Homemade Fondant-Filled Chocolate Eggs and Bunnies

 

 

When I was a teenager Easter eggs were all about choosing whether I preferred Toffee Crisp or Mars or Galaxy, and getting a hollow chocolate egg in a big box with two bars of whichever chocolate I had chosen in the box with it. Now I like to think I have more refined tastes – but it’s probably just that I have more expensive tastes. Nothing will ever compare to the first Easter egg my boyfriend bought me from Godiva – I couldn’t believe how much it cost. But there are plenty of other shops and Easter treats which don’t have to break the bank – including home made ones!

 

There’s always something nice about home made treats which show you have put in the time and effort, and I like being able to make something just the way I want it. I’ve toyed with the idea of making Easter eggs for a few years but never quite seem to buy the mould from Lakeland that I’ve got my eye on in time, and this year was no exception. However, I popped into Poundland one day when I was passing and picked up this cute silicon mould for making small eggs and bunnies.

 

 

You can also buy it on Amazon but it three times as much – though that’s still not particularly expensive if you want to have a go and can’t get to a Poundland.

 

It’s really easy to use and since the mould is silicon you don’t even need to be particularly careful about removing the chocolates when they are set; just peel back the mould and they will pop out.

 

I used milk chocolate and needed 200g to fill all the shapes in this mould. I put a fondant filling inside, but you could also use caramel (either homemade or from a tin e.g. Carnation) or make them solid chocolate.

 

First melt 100g of the chocolate in the microwave or a bain-marie and using a teaspoon, spoon a little of the melted chocolate into each mould. Use the back of the teaspoon to spread it around, making sure you have covered the bottom and the sides of the mould with a thin layer. Place in the fridge to set – this should only take about half an hour.

 

 

I bought some fondant filling from Almond Art as I was purchasing some other things from their website and it only cost £2 for a large block. You can also buy boxes of fondant icing sugar and make it up yourself, but I have never done this so can’t share any advice on how to get it to the right consistency!

 

 

 

The block of ready made fondant was quite firm – though softer than sugarpaste. I popped a chunk of it in a dish in the microwave for a few seconds to soften it further and mixed in a couple of drops of Dr. Oetker food colouring to make the fondant yellow. I put it back in the fridge to go back to its original consistency and when it was thicker, spooned a little into each chocolate coated mould. If you are using caramel, just add the filling in the same way.

 

 

Melt the remaining 100g of chocolate and allow to cool a little, then carefully spoon into each mould so the filling is covered and the chocolate covers the top. Return to the fridge to set.

 

 

Again this only takes about half an hour, and then you can pop out the chocolates and if you want, decorate them further with royal icing or writing icing tubes, edible glitter, or whatever you like.

 

 

 You can see the fondant inside when you bite into the chocolates:

 

 

These would make cute Easter gifts if you can bear to give them away!

 

I’m sharing these with We Should Cocoa, hosted by Choclette at Tin and Thyme, as the theme this month is no-bake chocolate treats.

 

 

I am also sending this to Tea Time Treats, hosted by Karen at Lavender and Lovage and on alternate months Janie at The Hedgecombers, as their theme is chocolate.

 

 

The theme for this month's Biscuit Barrel challenge is candy. The challenge is guest-hosted by Alexandra, the Lass in the Apron, and was created by  Laura at I'd Much Rather Bake Than.

Finally I am sending this to the Food Year Linkup on My Recipe Book which showcases recipes for different times of the year, in this case Easter.

 

Halloween Candy Corn Rocky Road

Candy Corn is popular in the US at Halloween, but most of the British people I asked had never heard of it. I think I've only come across it because I've been to the States in September a couple of times and the shops are full of candy corn in the run up to Halloween. Candy Corn looks like mini ears of corn and is orange and yellow coloured, made from corn syrup.

My boyfriend's mum went to America in September and brought me back a huge haul of candy and chocolates, including these candy corn M&Ms and a giant packet of candy corn marshmallows. I wanted to use them in baking and one good way to use marshmallows that sprang to mind is rocky road. Normally rocky road uses broken biscuits but I decided the hard candy casing of the M&Ms would give a similar crunch. I used milk chocolate for this as that was all I had, but it was very sweet so I would recommend using plain chocolate instead.

I based my recipe on Nigella's Rocky Road.

You need:
125g butter, softened
300g plain chocolate
3 tbsp. golden syrup
200g candy corn M&Ms, or similar, or broken up biscuits
100g marshmallows

Melt the butter and chocolate in a small pan then stir in the golden syrup and heat gently. Remove about half a cup of the mixture and set aside.

Stir in the M&Ms or biscuits and the marshmallows - chopped with scissors if large.

Line a 9 inch square tin with baking paper and pour in the chocolate mixture. Pour the reserved chocolate mixture over the top and spread roughly.

Chill in the fridge until set which will take at least two hours. When set, slice into squares.

My boyfriend was a very big fan of this but as mentioned I used milk chocolate and found it too sweet to eat more than a tiny bit at a time, which was probably a good thing!

                                                                                             
 I am sending this to Cook Blog Share, hosted by Lucy at SuperGoldenBakes, to share this recipe with other bloggers.

I am also sharing this with Let's Cook for Halloween, hosted by Simply Food.

These rocky road squares cookies are also perfect for the Treat Petite challenge, hosted by Kat at Baking Explorer and Stuart at Cakeyboi, as the theme is trick or treat.

I think these also fit the theme of comfort food, so I'm sending these to the Biscuit Barrel challenge, hosted by Laura at I'd Much Rather Bake Than.

Halloween is the theme for We Should Cocoa, so I am sending this to Hannah at Honey and Dough, who is hosting the challenge on behalf of Choclette at Chocolate Log Blog.

Pumpkin Spice M&M Halloween Cookies

 

 

Halloween candy is much more prevalent in the US and I received quite a haul of it when my boyfriend’s mum visited the States last month. I didn’t want to just eat the chocolates and sweets and prefer instead to bake with it (though we did already demolish a bag of caramel Hershey’s Kisses!). That has left me needing to do a lot of baking in the run-up to Halloween however!

 

After the success of my Reese’s Pieces cookies I decided to make something similar using these pumpkin spice flavour M&Ms.

 

 

 

They are not strongly flavoured and without reading the packet I wouldn’t have been able to tell the taste was pumpkin – so I decided to boost the flavour of the cookies with some extra canned pumpkin. I found this in the American foods aisle of my local (small) Tesco; you can use it as a pumpkin pie filling or for all sorts of other things.

 

 

 

The cookies are very simple to make, and since I used my American measuring cups I didn’t even need to find a recipe.

 

Makes 10-12 cookies

You need:

1 cup butter, softened

1 cup soft brown sugar

1 egg

1 cup plain flour

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

3 tbsp canned pumpkin puree

½ cup pumpkin spice flavour M&Ms

 

Preheat oven to 175C.

 

Mix the butter, sugar and egg in a bowl then fold in the flour and nutmeg. Mix in the canned pumpkin then stir in the M&Ms.

 

 

  

Line two baking sheets with greaseproof paper and place a heaped tablespoon of the mixture on the sheet per cookie. Press down a little to flatten the cookie. In retrospect I would flatten these quite a lot as mine didn't look all that much like cookies!

 

 

 

Bake in the preheated oven for 10 minutes then allow to cool.

 

 

These cookies were delicious – quite soft with a melt in the mouth texture. The M&Ms are like little hidden surprises, though the overall flavour of the pumpkin in the cookie wasn’t strong at all. Which might be a good thing as I’m not sure how I feel about cookies that taste too much of pumpkin!

 

 

I am sending this to Cook Blog Share, hosted by Lucy at SuperGoldenBakes, to share this recipe with other bloggers.

 

 

I am also sharing this with Let's Cook for Halloween, hosted by Simply Food.

 

 

These cookies are also perfect for the Treat Petite challenge, hosted by Kat at Baking Explorer and Stuart at Cakeyboi, as the theme is trick or treat.

To me, biscuits and cookies are comfort food, so I'm sending these to the Biscuit Barrel challenge, hosted by Laura at I'd Much Rather Bake Than.

The theme for this month's Tea Time Treats is cooking or baking with vegetables, and since there is pumpkin in these cookies I'm sharing this with Karen at Lavender and Lovage and Jane at The Hedgecombers.

 

Halloween is the theme for We Should Cocoa, but the recipe also needs to involve chocolate. Luckily these pumpkin spice M&Ms are chocolate! So I am sending this to Hannah at Honey and Dough, who is hosting the challenge on behalf of Choclette at Chocolate Log Blog.

 

 

 

Reese's Pieces Peanut Butter Cookies

 

This month's Food 'n' Flix challenge is hosted by Evelyne at Cheap Ethnic Eatz and she has chosen the Tom Hanks movie The Terminal. The film is ten years old now but the story is still relevant now - it's about a man who is trapped in JFK airport as a revolution takes place in his home country meaning he is denied entry to the US, as they no longer recognise his nation, but he also cannot return to his home country. It is partly inspired by a true story. The man, Viktor, is forced to live in the airport and befriends various employees including an air hostesss played by Catherine Zeta Jones, and manages to get on the wrong side of a customs official played by Stanley Tucci. The way the story plays out is at times heart breaking but the ending - which I won't give away - is incredibly uplifting, and probably not what you would expect.

The idea behind Food 'n' Flix is to make something inspired by the movie. Given the airport setting I toyed with the idea of making airline food, but don't have particularly good memories of anything I've eaten on a plane! I've reviewed a couple of restaurants where I've eaten in airports and have had pretty decent meals and thought about recreating one of those, but wanted my entry to be more closely tied in to the film.

Viktor is closely attached to a Planter's peanut can in the film, which he carries around with him as if it is very valuable - for reasons that are explained later in the film. Planter's is a famous American brand of peanuts, now owned by Kraft, and even though we can't get it in the UK (as far as I am aware - I've never seen it anyway) I have heard of the Mr. Peanut character. Admittedly that's largely due to an episode in season one of Friends where Chandler and Joey discuss whether they would rather be Mr. Peanut or Mr. Salty!

Anyway, I decided to make something using that other famous American peanut brand - or rather, peanut butter brand. My boyfriend's mum recently went to America and brought me back a literal bagful of goodies (including some Grumpy Cat merchandise!), among them several bags of American candy as she knows I love to bake with it. She gave me two bags of Reese's Pieces candy - peanut butter pieces in a hard candy shell which look a bit like M&Ms.

I wasn't sure how to best use them in baking so had a look at the Reese's website, and they have loads of great recipes. I chose a fairly easy one using ingredients I already had in the store cupboard, and made these peanut butter cookies.

These make about 12 large cookies (the recipe says it makes about 30 cookies but I obviously made mine very large!)

You need:
1/2 cup margarine or softened butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1/2 cup smooth peanut butter
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup self-raising flour
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup Reese's Pieces candies


Preheat oven to 175C and line two baking sheets with greaseproof paper.

In a bowl, cream the butter and sugars then mix in the peanut butter, egg and vanilla extract. Fold in the flour and the salt, then stir in the Reese's Pieces candies.

Drop a heaped tablespoon full of the cookie dough onto the baking sheet and spacing each one well apart, place five or six balls of cookie dough on each baking sheet and press down gently.

Bake in the oven for about 12 minutes then allow to cool on a wire rack. You want to remove the cookies from the oven while they are still a little soft, as they will harden as they cool, and they are best when they are still a bit soft and chewy in the middle.

These tasted lovely and even my boyfriend, who doesn't normally like peanut butter, wanted to try them and said they were fantastic. Since I've still got a lot of the Reese's Pieces candies left, I might have to make them again!

I'm sending this to Food 'n' Flix, hosted by Evelyne at Cheap Ethnic Eatz. I think Viktor might even relinquish his hold on his Planter's peanut can for one of these cookies!

I am also sending this to Cook, Blog, Share hosted by Lucy at SuperGoldenBakes.

The theme for October's Treat Petite is 'trick or treat'. While more kids do go trick or treating in the UK now than when I was a child (we never did), it's still very much an American thing and since Reese's Pieces are a very American candy, and I think kids would be quite happy to receive these as 'treats', I am entering these cookies in the challenge. It's hosted by Kat at Baking Explorer and on alternate months Stuart at Cakeyboi.

'Comfort food' is the theme chosen for this month's Biscuit Barrel challenge by Laura at I'd Much Rather Bake Than. There's something about a chewy cookie with the salty sweet tang of peanut butter which means these definitely fall under that category for me!