Mini Egg Treasure Hunt

Forget running around the garden hiding eggs, just pop them in your cupcakes. These Easter cakes the yummy answer to the Easter egg treasure hunt.

Ingredients:
Serves 24

125g unsalted butter, softened

125g caster sugar

125g self-raising flour

Pinch of salt

2 medium eggs

2 tablespoons milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 packet Cadbury's Mini Eggs

For the Frosting:

50g unsalted butter, softened

100g chocolate, melted

300g icing sugar

3 tbsp Milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

Let's get making:

1. Preheat oven to 190°C or Gas Mark 5.
2. Beat the butter in a large bowl until it is softened. Add the sugar, flour, salt, eggs, milk and vanilla and whisk until the mixture is smooth.
3. Spoon the mixture into the cases, and then press one Mini Egg into the centre.
4. Place muffin tin in the oven and bake for 12-15 minutes, until cupcakes are a light golden colour.
5. Remove the tins from the oven. Leave the cupcakes to cool in the tins for a few minutes, then transfer them to a wire rack to cool.

To make the frosting:

1. In a large bowl beat the butter until it is fluffy. Beat in the melted chocolate. Gradually add half of the icing sugar, stirring first (to prevent it going all over the counter, and you) and then beat until well combined.
2. Slowly beat in the milk and the vanilla. Then add the remaining icing sugar. Beat in more milk, if needed.

Pipe the icing onto the cakes, when cooled and then top with a Mini Egg.

And there you have an Easter egg treasure hunt on a plate!

Egg-tremly Expensive

I love chocolate, who doesn't, but do I love it enough to spend £49.99 on an Easter egg? Probably not. Do I love anyone else enough to buy them a £49.99 Easter egg? Certainly not. (If anyone would have it, it would be me. However, I'm not sure I can justify spending that much on a few indulgent moments.)

But if you can, pop into Selfridges and pick up your Gianduja chocolate egg. This luxury egg from Baratti & Milano, is made from Gianduja chocolate and the inside is layered with over 200 whole hazelnuts. (I think I would also like to find a little gold nugget inside for that price.)

A more reasonably priced egg, if you want luxury, is the Marc de Champagne egg. For a less jaw-dropping, £18.99 you get an egg made from the finest milk chocolate and it is filled with marc de champagne truffles. Yes, it's still a little pricey for an Easter egg but it contains three of a girls favourite things: chocolate, champagne and truffles. And if you're going to eat lots of chocolate this coming weekend, you might as well as make it the best.

And as for Fortnum and Masion's £85.00 egg, they can't be serious. I can only imagine that anyone buying one of these would either have to be the biggest chocolate lover in the world, or have a brain like the inside of a Cadbury's Cream Egg.
Hmmmm...Cadbury's Cream Eggs-sometimes the simplest things are the best.

Itsy Bitsy Eggs

Hope and Greenwood is one of my favourite shops. Firstly, the shelves are stacked with sweet treats and secondly, there is a wonderful nostalgic feeling about it. Remember your favourite childhood sweet and you will find it in a jar on the shelves waiting to be weighed and taken home.
This Easter, Hope and Greenwood offer a variety of eggcellent treats including Vintage Bunnies, Farmer Greenwood's Eggs and Butterfly Truffle Boxes.

Although, my favourite chocolatey choice has got to be the Itsy Bitsy Eggs Funbag-tiny little chocolate eggs with a speckled candy shell. Surely being so small they must contain an itsy amount of calories? At least that's what I'm telling myself as I dig into my second bag.