Kids' cracking Easter recipes

Keep the kids sweet this Easter with these cracking recipes – there’s something for everyone from no-bake to Simnel cake out there, so whether you have master chefs in the making or short attention span cooks you’ll have it cracked with one of these !

Bunny Biscuits

These bunny biscuits are based on a classic oatmeal raisin cookie recipe but with a citrus hint. The shortbread is studded with juicy raisins and it’s an easy bake with kids over the Easter holidays. 

 Ingredients

• 110g butter
• 110g caster sugar, plus extra for sprinkling
• 1 orange, zested
• 1 egg
• 210g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
• 80g oats
• 80g raisins, roughly chopped

Method

1. Using a hand mixer or wooden spoon, cream together the butter, sugar and orange zest until very light and fluffy. Add the egg and beat to combine. Add the flour, oats and raisins; stir until evenly incorporated and coming together to form a dough.
2. Press the dough into a disc, wrap in clingfilm and chill for 30 mins to firm up.
3. Preheat the oven to gas 6, 200˚C, fan 180˚C. Line 2 baking trays with baking paper. Lightly flour the surface and roll the dough to 1cm thick. Using a bunny biscuit cutter, stamp out biscuits. If you do not have a cutter, draw a template to cut around.
4. Place the biscuits on the baking trays and sprinkle each with the caster sugar. Bake for 10-12 mins until just turning golden at the edges – you may need to do this in batches. Remove from the oven and place the biscuits on a wire rack to cool.

Mary’s Easter Biscuits

Make Easter biscuits the Mary Berry way: use half of the dough to make traditional Easter fruit biscuit, and half to make iced Easter biscuits in seasonal shapes. The recipe will make about 30 biscuits.

Dough Ingredients

 200g softened butter plus extra for greasing

• 150g caster sugar
• 2 large free-range egg yolks
• 400g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
• 1 level tsp ground mixed spice
• 1 level tsp ground cinnamon
• 2–4 tbsp milk

For the traditional currant biscuits

• 100g currants
• caster sugar, for sprinkling

For the iced biscuits

• 1–2 tsp lemon juice
• 250g/9oz icing sugar
• different food colourings

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/160C Fan/Gas 4. Lightly grease two baking trays lined with baking paper.
2. Measure the butter and sugar into a bowl and beat together until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg yolk. Sieve in the flour and spices and add enough milk to make a fairly soft dough. Bring together, using your hands, to make a soft dough.
3. Halve the mixture and set half to one side.
4. For the traditional currant biscuits, add the currants to half of the mixture and knead lightly on a lightly floured work surface. Roll out to a thickness of about 5mm/¼in. Cut into rounds using a circular cutter. Place on the prepared baking trays. Sprinkle with caster sugar.
5. Bake in the preheated oven for 15 minutes, or until pale golden brown. Keep a careful eye on the biscuits – it doesn’t matter if you open the oven door to check. Sprinkle with more caster sugar and lift onto a wire rack to cool. Store in an airtight container.
6. For the iced biscuits, knead the remaining half of the biscuit dough lightly on a lightly floured work surface. Roll out to a thickness of 5mm/¼in. Cut out Easter biscuits using an assortment of shaped cutters, such as bunnies, Easter eggs, chicks or spring flowers.
7. Lightly grease two baking trays lined with baking paper.
8. Place the biscuit shapes on the prepared baking trays and bake in the preheated oven for 10–15 minutes. Remove from the oven and lift onto a wire rack to cool.
9. To make the icing, pass one teaspoon of lemon juice through a fine sieve, to remove any pips or bits. Mix the icing sugar with the lemon juice and then add about two tablespoons of cold water, adding it little by little until you have a relatively stiff but smooth icing. Add a splash more sieved lemon juice if necessary.
10. Divide the icing into separate bowls and mix in food colourings of your choice into the separate bowls of icing, until you achieve the desired shade.
11. Spoon a little icing into a piping bag and pipe your decorations onto the biscuits. For a smooth finish, you can pipe the outline of your design in the firmer icing, then slacken it down a bit by mixing in a little more water, giving the icing more of a runny consistency, and use this to fill in the designs.

Easter lamb biscuits

The easiest of Easter biscuits and great fun to make these Lamb Cookies  would be the perfect addition to the Easter afternoon tea table – the children will enjoy perfecting their decorating techniques too.

Ingredients

• 200g pack chunky chocolate cookies
• 75g vanilla favour frosting
• 100g ready-to-roll black or brown icing
• 50g mini marshmallows

Method

1. Lay the biscuits upside down on a tray and spread with the frosting. Use the icing to make faces and ears for each one, then press onto the biscuits using the frosting as a glue. 
2. Finely chop a mini marshmallow and use 2 pieces per biscuit for the eyes, then use a little more icing for the pupils. Surround the face and ears with mini marshmallows as the body.

Easter nests

Ring the changes with theses Easter nests. The traditional Cornflake, Shredded Wheat or Rice Krispie cakes  you remember making as a child are still so popular with kids today. Just melt dark, white, or milk chocolate and stir the cereal of choice into the mix, into cup cases and then into the fridge ready to be decorated with mini eggs or sprinkles or both. These sweet white chocolate and coconut nests are a new twist on the traditional and are also decorated with pretty pastel chocolate eggs.

Ingredients

• 400g white chocolate cake covering
• 75g desiccated coconut
• 5 shredded wheats
• 4 heaped tbsp milk chocolate micro eggs
• ½ tsp cocoa powder
• icing flowers, to decorate

• Place the white chocolate cake covering into a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water and melt, stirring occasionally. While still on the heat, add the desiccated coconut and stir well – the chocolate may feel as though it is thickening, but as long as it stays warm it will melt again. Break up the shredded wheats and add them to the bowl and gently fold together to mix and coat well in the chocolate.
• Spoon into 4 x 10cm diameter Yorkshire pudding moulds and form nest shapes using a metal spoon. Use the spoon to smooth out a centre cavity for the eggs. Chill for 1 hr until firm.
• Remove from the tin and place onto a board. Fill each nest with the eggs. Put the cocoa powder into a small sieve and scatter a light dusting of cocoa over the top of each. Finish with an iced flower decoration and serve.

Easter Fudge Cake

The ultimate Easter cake if you want an alternative to Simnel Cale – so good but so calorific – try and reduce the slices – impossible

Ingredients

• 150ml sunflower oil,plus extra for the tin
• 165g golden caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 150ml milk
• 165g self-raising flour
• 3 tbsp cocoa powder
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

Chocolate fudge icing

• 100g milk or dark chocolate,chopped (either a chocolate bar or Easter egg, broken up)
• 100g butter,softened
• 100g icing sugar
• 100g Easter treats (chocolate eggs, sweets, chocolate bar pieces)

Method

• Heat the oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Oil and line a traybake tin, about 20 x 30cm, and 5cm deep. Put the oil, sugar, eggs and milk in a bowl and whiskuntil well combined. Sieve over the flour, cocoa and bicarb, and stir briefly until combined. Pour the mixture into the tin and bake for 20-25 mins until the cake is well risen and springs back when pressed. Transfer to a wire rack and leave to cool completely.
• Melt the chocolate in a bowl set over a pan of simmering water, ensuring the bowl doesn't touch the water, or in short blasts in the microwave until melted. Leave to cool for a few minutes.
• Beat the butter and icing sugar together until pale and fluffy, then drizzle in the chocolate and beat again until smooth and uniform in colour. Swirl the icing over the top of the cake, with a few peaks and swirls to decorate. Scatter with the Easter treats to serve.

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