Easter Activities for Children

Now the Easter Holidays are here and the weather is looking less than inviting I thought I would do some activities to entertain your children or Grandchildren indoors.


Most children love ‘helping’ bake so I have found two simple recpies with an Easter theme, Easter Rocky Road and Easter Chick Cupcakes. Both recipe’s are from the Good Food Channel and both are easy enough for children to get involved with.

Easter Rocky Road

Prep time: 15 min, plus setting time

Cook time: 5 min

Serves: Makes 12 pieces

Ingredients
• 300 g milk chocolate, (min 30% cocoa solids)

• 100 g butter, softened

• 100 g digestive biscuits

• 100 g rich tea biscuits

• 100 g mini marshmallows

• 200 g chocolate mini eggs



Method

1. Break the chocolate into pieces, place in a bowl and melt gently - you can do this either in a microwave or on the hob in a heatproof bowl over simmering water.



2. Add the butter and stir until it is melted and fully mixed with the chocolate.



3. Place all the biscuits in a food bag and bash with a rolling pin, but stop before they all turn to dust.



4. Add the biscuits and the mini marshmallows to the warm buttery chocolate and stir well.



5. Pour the mixture onto a buttered baking tray and top liberally with the mini eggs.



6. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour and then cut into pieces. Store in a cool place and eat within 3 days.



Easter Chick Cupcakes

Prep time: 20 min

Cook time: 18 min

Serves: Makes 12

Ingredients
For the cupcakes

• 125 g unsalted butter, softened

• 125 g caster sugar

• 2 eggs, room temperature

• 125 g self-raising flour

To decorate

• 125 g unsalted butter, softened

• 250 g icing sugar

• 2 tbsp milk

• 100 g moist shredded coconut

• yellow food colouring

• 24 chocolate chips

• 12 orange jelly diamond sugar decorations



Method

1. For the cupcakes: heat the oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. In a mixer, combine the butter and sugar. Once this is pale and fluffy, add 2 eggs one at a time.



2. Add the flour and once this has become a nice fluffy cake batter spoon into cupcake cases in a muffin tray and bake for 18 minutes. Once they are firm but springy to the touch, remove from the oven and allow to cool.



3. To decorate: Put the shredded coconut in a bag and drop in some yellow food colouring. Give it a good shake until the white strands have turned a cheerful yellow colour. Turn it out onto a large plate.



4. In a bowl, combine the butter with the icing sugar. If your buttercream frosting is a bit stiff, add the milk to soften it.



5. Once this has mixed well and become fluffy, dollop 1 heaped teaspoon on each cupcake and spread to form an even layer with a palette knife.



6. Scatter the top of each iced cake with the yellow coconut flakes to give an even coating. Finish each cake with 2 chocolate chip eyes and a jelly beak.



Easter Crafts

There are so many Easter crafts that you can do with children including:

Making Easter cards – coloured card, cotton wool, tissue paper, poster paints, brushes, felt tips, Pritstick

Easter bonnets – plain straw hat ( a card hat can be made instead using a large sheet of card, double sided sticky tape and staples), PVA glue, coloured card, glitter, little Easter chicks (available from most card shops and supermarkets), tissue paper, silk flowers, feathers, ribbons and buttons.

Painted/coloured hard boiled eggs – Hard boiled eggs (eggs boiled for 12 minutes then cooled), felt tip pens, Poster paints, brushes, tissue paper, glitter, wool strands for hair, googly eyes, pritstick.

Mulled Wine

Christmas is very nearly here, and one of our favourite things to drink this time of year is Mulled Wine, Jamie Oliver has a lovely simple recipe
you will need:
• 2 clementines


• peel of 1 lemon

• peel of 1 lime

• 250g caster sugar

• 6 whole cloves

• 1 cinnamon stick

• 3 fresh bay leaves

• 1 whole nutmeg

• 1 whole vanilla pod, halved

• 2 star anise

• 2 bottles of Chianti, or other Italian red wine

...and for a none alcoholic version use red grape juice

This is dead easy to make and tastes like Christmas in a glass. It’s a lovely celebration of those traditional festive spices like cloves, cinnamon and nutmeg. If you’ve got your own favourite spices, then feel free to add those to the pot too. Let everything cook away and warm up gently so the flavours have time to mingle with the wine. I like to leave my mulled wine ticking over on a really low heat and just ladle some into glasses as and when guests pop in.



Peel large sections of peel from your clementines, lemon and lime using a speed peeler. Put the sugar in a large saucepan over a medium heat, add the pieces of peel and squeeze in the clementine juice. Add the cloves, cinnamon stick, bay leaves and about 10 to 12 gratings of nutmeg. Throw in your halved vanilla pod and stir in just enough red wine to cover the sugar. Let this simmer until the sugar has completely dissolved into the red wine and then bring to the boil. Keep on a rolling boil for about 4 to 5 minutes, or until you’ve got a beautiful thick syrup. The reason I’m doing this first is to create a wonderful flavour base by really getting the sugar and spices to infuse and blend well with the wine. It’s important to do make a syrup base first because it needs to be quite hot, and if you do this with both bottles of wine in there you’ll burn off the alcohol.


When your syrup is ready turn the heat down to low and add your star anise and both bottles of wine. Gently heat the wine and after around 5 minutes, when it’s warm and delicious, ladle it into glasses and serve.

The Nations Favourite Christmas Carols

To carry on with our 12 Blogs of Christmas (blogs for the 12 days before and after christmas)
We wondered what the nations favourite Christmas carols were...good old google.
according to The Nation's Favourite Christmas Carol on ClassicFM
Top 30 Christmas Carols


1. O Holy Night

2. Silent Night

3. In the Bleak Mid-Winter - Gustav Holst version

4. In the Bleak Mid-Winter - Harold Darke version

5. Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

6. O Come All Ye Faithful

7. O Come, O Come Emmanuel

8. Coventry Carol

9. O Little Town of Bethlehem

10. It Came Upon a Midnight Clear

11. Once in Royal David's City

12. In Dulci Jubilo

13. Joy to the World

14. God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen

15. Away in a Manger

16. Sussex Carol

17. Shepherd's Pipe Carol

18. The Three Kings

19. Gabriel's Message

20. Jesus Christ the Apple Tree

21. Gaudete

22. The Holly and the Ivy

23. Carol of the Bells

24. See Amid the Winter's Snow

25. Ding Dong! Merrily on High

26. Candlelight Carol

27. Good King Wenceslas

28. Angels from the Realms of Glory

29. The First Nowell

30. What Sweeter Music

we in the office love the Candlelight Carol (number 26)

really gets you in the Chrsitmas mood!

Christmas Preparations

10). Review Christmas budget, by doing this a long way in advance it allows you to set limits for presents, food and drinks. Make a list now of everything that needs doing and keep the list somewhere you know where it is… this saves the hunt the list later! Being able to cross things off the list once you have done them makes you feel you are accomplishing something even if you are adding more things than you are subtracting.


(9). Finish making homemade gifts – all home made gifts that don’t perish should be made as far in advance as you can. Food gifts like jams and chutneys will keep for 6 months at least. For gifts such as sweets and biscuits these are best made 2 days before Christmas and kept in a cold place.

(8). Update Christmas card list – dig out your Christmas card list and add any news names for this year to it. Make sure you have all the addresses you need and check last dates for postage to the UK and other countries if necessary.

(7). Make Christmas family and children’s cards – if you have children get them involved in this part of your preparations. Make sure you stick to any posting deadlines. If you hate writing lots of card in one go, keep your address book and cards in a bag by the side of the sofa so you can get a few written at a time over the next few weeks.

(6). Finish gift tags and wrapping paper – if you’re making your own tags and papers do this now, again it is something children can be involved with. If you’re not making them make sure you buy enough in now with spares for surprise last minute gifts.

(5). Christmas present list and shopping – make a list of everyone you buy for and add what gifts you intend to buy them to the list then you can ensure you stay within the budget you set yourself. Make a list also of what food you are going to buy, don’t forget to include nibbles and drinks if you are expecting people to call by. Make a list of who is coming for the day or staying over during the holidays, including details like vegetarian meals you might need to make. Also decide what you’re going to cook. Work from your Christmas dinner outwards because other meals can be lighter. If there is anything from your meal planner that can be made in advance, put a date by this of when you’re going to make and freeze it.


(4). Christmas Decorations – Get out all your Christmas decorations and lights and check they are working. Let the kids decorate your Christmas tree as they’ll be the ones nagging you for it! They can also help make some new decorations if you want from salt dough or from shaped biscuits.

If you order your meat, do this now. For an online food shop, get your order in now. You can update it over the next few weeks, but delivery slots will get booked up early

(3) Buy holiday drinks alcoholic and soft. Start posting your cards now. Start making some freezer meals now for easy meals and lunches for days when you don’t have the time to prepare anything. Make sure you label them clearly and date them.

(2) Buy treats and the Christmas meal items that won’t go off. Wrap presents, you could maybe plan it for a time when everyone will be out. Wrapping takes longer than you think and you don’t want to leave it until Christmas Eve.

(1). Do laundry so it’s not a chore over Christmas. Two days before, make soups and sauces that will keep in the fridge. Don’t leave your big food shop until Christmas Eve or your meal might be ruined by a key ingredient being out of stock. Give yourself time to find it elsewhere.

Christmas Eve – Pick up any last minute forgotten items. Deliver any close by presents you have left. Prepare all vegetables for tomorrow’s lunch and keep them in cold water to keep them fresh. Make any cold desserts. Set the table. Make sure you have a guide for when everything needs to be cooked tomorrow and stick this to somewhere easily seen.

Don’t forget to put out a carrot and water for Rudolf and a Mince pie and sherry for Santa!

Remember to give yourself breaks along the road to Christmas. If you get everything done early, you could, for instance, book a family night in with duvets and a good film. Who knows, it might calm down the children too!