Thursday, March 24, 2016

Speckled Easter Eggs

easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

Just finished this year's Easter projects. And delivered them all. And it's still not Easter! Hooray. Ahead of the game for today at least.

easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

Decided to try and up the game with a bit nicer presentation and the blue and brown were just the look I was after. 


easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch


The cardboard bakery boxes, not so much. What a difference the right package can make! I still needed to transport 6 dozen of the minis so the bakery boxes came in handy for an office that usually devours the goodies without noticing any fancy boxes.
easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

Last year I made these rustic speckled Easter egg cake pop sort of thingys. They didn't have the traditional addition of frosting to cake crumbs but instead were made from cake and chocolate. Surprisingly moist. And delicious. I wasn't thrilled with the presentation but the taste more than made up for it.
easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

Along with the larger eggs for regular sized cupcakes, I made some mini eggs to fit on . . . you guessed it . . . mini cupcakes. Love the way the dark brown set off the blue in this freebee box from CookieCon.

easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

Here's a close up. The crumbs were a mixture of colored sugar cookies and dyed graham crackers. I wasn't loving the taste of the grahams so I baked up a batch of extra vanilla-y sugar cookies and colored the dough in shades of greens and brown and pulverized them to bits once they cooled. Avocado and Electric Green seemed to work well together but next time I'd leave out the Leaf Green. It just didn't want to blend in very well with the rest of the green team.
start replacing here
easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

I added a tag so the recipients would know what they were eating. Or about to not eat if they are allergic to peanut butter or chocolate.

easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

The egg shells were made from blue Candy Melts and a little shaved chocolate mixed with chocolate jimmies. I loved them so much that I decided to leave that process alone. To switch it up a little bit, I filled the egg shells with a peanut butter chocolate truffle mixture instead of cake. They ended up as cupcake toppers on square chocolate cupcakes. In keeping with the theme, they were slathered with a light peanut butter frosting and sprinkled with cookie crumb moss. I may or may not have added chocolate syrup during the assembly. Twice. Wanted to make sure they were as moist and tasty as last year.

easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

The square shapes were easier to transport and fit together than regular round ones. 

easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

The cupcakes were then set inside birch boxes. Well. Not boxes really. And not birch. Just card stock strips printed with a white washed wood design. They really helped stabilize the treats which were a bit top heavy after the eggs were added. 

easter-egg-cupcakes-peanut-butter-edible-moss-candy-melts-deborah-stauch

Even a pot can become an Easter basket in a pinch! My wonderful neighbors brought over a yummy pot of soup a couple of days ago so I filled their pan with sweet treats before returning it. The Reese's eggs hidden underneath the brown grass will give them a tiny Easter egg hunt of their own before heading out for Spring Break.

Hope you all have a wonderful Easter with family and friends!!!