Sweet Easter chocolate treats
This Easter make your own marshmallow and creme eggs, writes Anna King Shahab.
Cadbury’s decision to remake its marshmallow chocolate egg as an Easter treat of one half – not two – was met with outrage when it was announced in January. ‘‘I loved pulling apart the marshmallow eggs!! What is wrong with you Cadbury?!’’ wrote one Stuff commenter.
‘‘Cadbury needs to leave things as they are. They are eggs not just a hump,’’ said another.
The individual egg ‘‘humps’’ are now sold wrapped in plastic and are the shape of half an egg. Cadbury said the change was necessary as the equipment at its Australian factory, which took over production of the marshmallow eggs when the Dunedin factory closed, cannot replicate the full-egg shape.
For a nation perhaps still grieving the loss of the locally made creme egg – a far superior specimen to the examples which have been imported into our market since the Dunedin factory stopped producing them in 2009 – this was a cruel blow.
There are all sorts of cooking hacks around if you’re keen to try to recreate the egg of two halves, but I maintain the actual chocolate used in some bigbrand Easter products has gone downhill over the years and this is where the focus should be if you want your egg to come close to replicating the marshmallow eggs of your childhood.
The marshmallow and creme eggs in these recipes may not look as picture-perfect as something mass-made, but home cooks don’t generally have access to fancy equipment, and nor should they – in my view – care too much for achieving a perfect finish.
The whole point of making your own Easter treats is for them to look a little rough around the edges so that the first thing everyone asks is ‘‘Ooooh did you make these?’’ Yes, you did.
I have to admit that I don’t have a very sweet tooth, but when I taste-tested one of these from the first batch I made, it was pretty hard not to immediately devour a second. They are that good. They are the love child of a marshmallow egg and a Pinky Bar. (Kudos to Cadbury for keeping Pinky Bars alive, and they still seem to taste the same as they did in the 1980s – high five!)
Making marshmallow is a bit of a faff, mostly because it requires an extended period of beating. If you have a stand mixer, use it. It’s also sticky, so wash equipment sooner rather than later. You can add food colouring to the marshmallow if you like but you need only a few drops.
Makes: around 24 whole eggs, depending on size (recipe can be halved)
❚ 3kg plain flour (see tips)
❚ 1 large egg
❚ 230ml water
❚ 20g gelatin powder
❚ 280g caster sugar
❚ 1⁄2 teaspoon vanilla bean powder (I used Heilala) or paste
❚ 2 teaspoons Fresh-as freeze-dried passionfruit powder (or other flavour of your choice, optional)
❚ 1⁄2 cup dulce de leche (I used Barker’s of Geraldine)
❚ 300g dark chocolate (see tips)
In large roasting tins, pour flour and tap tins to settle it evenly. Use the egg to gently press half-egg shapes into the flour. You need to have deep-enough flour in each tin to press an egg shape in without revealing the base of tin. You also need to leave enough space between each shape so as to not collapse the neighbouring shapes when pressing in – but, if you do, just gently use the egg to fix up the shape.
You’ll be making up to 50 half shapes, so depending on how many suitable tins or dishes you have, you may need to do this in batches (I did).
Place 60ml water into a bowl and scatter over gelatine. Set aside.
In a large pot, place caster sugar and remaining water. Heat to a boil and cook just on the boil for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Take off the heat, add the gelatine mixture and whisk in for two minutes. Leave mixture to cool for around 45 minutes.
If using a stand mixer, transfer the mixture to it at this stage, or if not then into a large mixing bowl. Beat for seven minutes. Stop to scrape down the sides of the bowl, add the vanilla bean powder and fruit powder if using, then beat for another minute until fluffy and bright white.
Spoon marshmallow mixture into each egg depression, taking care not to add too much of it or it will spill over the sides (though if it does, you can trim any imperfections once set). Let it set for an hour or more.
To remove marshmallow eggs, gently flip the shapes over to coat the upwards-facing sticky side in flour, then carefully brush off excess flour using a pastry brush and place egg halves on a large tray. Having a slight flour coating means they won’t stick so stacking carefully is OK.
Use 1 teaspoon of dulce de leche on one side of a half, gently press another half on top to make a whole egg shape, place filled egg back on tray and continue with remaining halves.
Using your (gloved) hand or a slotted spoon, dip each egg in melted chocolate, let excess drip off, and place carefully on baking paper-lined trays. If you find you have bare patches after dipping, just drizzle a little extra melted chocolate over to coat gaps. Remember we’re not about being perfect here. Transfer tray of dipped eggs into fridge to set.
Eggs will store in an airtight container for a week or so. Foil wrapping will keep them fresh for longer, or store in airtight container in fridge for longer.
Tips:
I used plain flour to make moulds, but if you’re avoiding gluten, you could use cornflour. Very little of the flour remains attached to the marshmallow, you can’t detect it in the end product. Because the marshmallow comes away from the flour cleanly, you can tip your flour back into a container to be used again.
If you have a high-speed blender, you can mill the sugar first, which will result in a finer finish.
If you have the patience for tempering chocolate the traditional way, you can do so, but I don’t bother. My preferred method for melting chocolate is to roughly chop the chocolate, place in a greaseproof bowl set over a saucepan with a small amount of boiling water in the bottom. Stir regularly until chocolate is three-quarters melted then carefully take the bowl off the heat onto benchtop and continue stirring briskly until all the chocolate is melted and you have a shiny finish. If the chocolate cools and thickens while you are midway through whatever you’re coating it with or making with it, simply pop it back over boiling water for a minute and stir again, then continue your work.
I recommend Whittaker’s Dark Ghana when dark chocolate is called for – it melts nicely, gives a glossy finish and lends the most beautiful flavour. To make the chocolate coating – I find it melts nicely, and gives a much nicer flavour and texture than types with less cocoa mass content.
Setting chocolate creations in a single layer in the fridge requires space: clear space first (if you’re like me and have copious amount of condiments and so on, you can always keep them in a chilly bin for a few hours).
Cream-filled eggs
Makes around 8
I won’t lie, making hollow egg halves requires a good amount of patience. But when you think of the smug sense of satisfaction you’ll feel gifting homemade Easter eggs, you’ll agree it’s worth it.
For this recipe you need half-egg-shaped moulds. My egg moulds were 5cm long, I bought mine from Spotlight and I use the stiff plastic sort, but you might prefer silicon. This method results in leftover melted chocolate; you can re-melt it and use it to make nests (see following page) or to coat the aforementioned marshmallow eggs.
300g chocolate (dark, milk or white chocolate)
Fondant filling
40g sugar
40g water
300g plain white fondant in block form Few drops yellow food colouring
Melt chocolate (see tips in previous recipe) and fill moulds to top.
Chocolate will set from the outside in – leave at room temperature until the outer half-centimetre or so is set (depending on temperature this might take up to 45 minutes), then carefully scoop out the still-pliable centre and place it back in the bowl.
The moulds should now have a hollow, quite thick layer of chocolate.
Make sure the tops aren’t too thin or it’ll be tricky to stick them together later. Place them in the fridge to set hard for 20 minutes.
Now make two elements for the fondant filling; the whites and the yolks. First place sugar and water in a saucepan and bring to a boil then simmer for 10 minutes to create a simple sugar syrup. Remove from the heat.
Separate the fondant into 200g and 100g portions, or thereabouts and grate each portion into mixing bowls. Combine around two-thirds of the sugar syrup with the larger fondant portion using a wooden spoon (start with a little sugar syrup and work till you have a suitable consistency).
Do the same for the other portion with remaining syrup, this time adding yellow food colouring, until you have a smooth creamy consistency.
Three-quarter fill each egg half with white fondant, then add a dab of yellow fondant. Using a small teaspoon or tip of finger, place dabs of melted chocolate on rim of filled half and gently press halves together.
Lay on lined tray and leave to set in fridge for a 20 minutes. You can store wrapped in foil or in an airtight container for a few days.
Chocolate nests
These make cute Easter table centrepieces or gifts, if placed in a box or basket so as to not break. Makes several nests in various sizes.
❚ 400g chocolate – use dark, milk and white if you like, to get a varied finish
Wrap the exterior of bowls in preferred sizes (you want to use bowls that don’t have a big flat bottom – glass or stainless steel cooking bowls work well for that), in a double layer of tin foil, shiny side out.
Coat tinfoil lightly with cooking spray (this is necessary to avert disappointment later on.)
Cover bench or table in baking paper and place bowls on it, bottom up.
Melt chocolate (see tips in recipe on the previous page). If using different types of chocolate, melt them separately.
Spoon melted chocolate into a piping bag fitted with a nozzle with a plain circular opening. The diameter of the opening is up to you but don’t go too thin or the resulting lines of chocolate will be too delicate. If you don’t have a piping bag, just snip the very tip of a corner off a ziplock plastic bag.
Gently push melted chocolate out the tip to fashion a nest-like chocolate drawing on tinfoil. Starting from the base, work your way up the sides of the upturned bowls, going however far up you like for a shallower or deeper shape. I find a looping pattern works well (you want the lines of chocolate to intersect so the nest will pop out in one piece later.)
After you’ve piped one layer of swirls, put the bowls carefully in fridge to set. Leave for 5-10 minutes. Re-melt the chocolate, take chilled bowls out and repeat the piping process for a second layer.
Put back in fridge and chill for 20 minutes then carefully remove the tinfoil and nest from the bowls, then the foil from the chocolate – roll back the foil very slowly to avoid snapping the set chocolate. Fill nests with homemade or bought Easter treats.
Yes, they’re delicate – good excuse to gobble them up quickly.