Old fashioned hollow sugar eggs for decorating

Wow. That's a long heading.

I promised I'd tell you how to make these, but I have to tell you that I'm not a huge fan of these eggs.  I'd much rather have a good chocolate egg anyday.

Firstly, you'll need clean, dry moulds.  You would usually use large egg shaped moulds.  You get some with flat bottoms, which are ideal if you want to use only one side of a sugar egg and fill it with 'treats'.

As a 'modern' chickie, you may decide to use your noggin and be a bit more creative than this.  May I suggest you line an unusually shaped tea cup with cling wrap and use this as a mould?  Or a shallow bowl with an odd shape?

This is the recipe we used:

2 cups of castor sugar
3 teaspoons of water - add the water drop by drop, see explanation below
colouring of your choice - try bright purple, lime green etc
Simple, huh?

Mix the water in slowly, you don't want your mixture to be too wet or it will not hold its shape.  Too dry and you will not have a 'paste' to work with. It's not a train smash if you do wet it too much initially, you can simply add more sugar.

Spoon the mixture into your mould.  Pack it in tightly with the back of a soup spoon. You don't want the walls of your egg to be too thin or there won't be place for 'treats'.  Make the walls too thin and they're very easily broken.

Use the back of your soup spoon to 'smooth' off the walls.  They shouldn't be more than 3mm thick.  Max.

Your egg doesn't need to be one colour.  Get creative.

We used to leave our eggs to dry overnight.  If you're using an unusual shape lined with cling wrap, be sure to remove the egg gently and evenly.

What are you going to stand your egg on? We want this to be pretty. You can make a base out of modelling paste.  Colour your paste, roll out a small piece, don't make it too thin, we want it to be strong.  Use a cookie cutter to get the shape you want. Place the shape on a piece of cellophane to dry.  When your egg shape is perfectly dry and you're happy it's not going to shatter, glue it to the base with some egg white.  Egg white is a wonderful 'glue' to use when you're working with icing. Use sparingly though and don't 'streak' the bits you'll see.

If you've made both sides of your egg, you can put them together with royal icing after you've added some 'treats'.  Make up a mixture in a contrasting colour and pipe along the join.  Allow to dry. 

Let your creative mind run riot when it comes to decorating the top.  You can use paper flowers, pipe some icing flowers, make a chick out of modelling paste, use pretty ribbon...

Again, I'd wrap the egg in cellophane or place it on a nest of paper straw in a pretty box.

About.com:Candy have very good instructions on how to make a Panoramic Sugar Easter Egg. Their recipe and instructions are quite different to the one we used. 

Have fun! Love to see your photos...

April Blackbird