The big Easter roundup: recipes, eggs and more

I’m so looking forward to this weekend! After a busy few weeks, it’s time to kick back and enjoy a lovely few days with the family. It’s Charlie’s birthday so we’re planning to head out on Sunday for brunch and I’m fully intending on spending Saturday baking hot cross buns and scoffing chocolate – let’s hope it stays nice and sunny!  If you’re entertaining this weekend, I’ve got loads of recipes for you, including big roast dinners, delicious desserts, baking and – of course – hot cross buns!  For this big Easter roundup, I’ve also picked a few of my favourite sweet treats, just in case you haven’t chosen your chocolate stash yet.  Enjoy!

If you’re feeding the family, try my slow cooked barbecue pulled chicken – you can double up the recipe and it’s an easy, shove in the oven and forget kind of recipe. Delicious stuffed into crusty rolls or tortillas with some crunchy salad:

Slow cooked barbecue pulled chicken

I’ve got quite a few slow roast lamb recipes (feel free to use the search box), but my favourite is this slow roasted lamb in sloe gin (feel free to use port, fruit juice, stock or even just use water instead):

Simply hygge: slow roasted lamb in sloe gin

Ooh, and if you’re looking for a lovely wine to accompany that lamb – I’d highly recommend this lovely Rosemount Estate Shiraz, currently just £7.00 in Tesco (there’s also 25% off at the moment if you buy 6 bottles).  If you follow me on Vivino, you’ll see that I gave it a strong four stars – it’s spicy, bold, fruity, a little bit earth and has a lovely jamminess too. Delicious.

Or maybe you’d prefer slow cooked chilli beef…

Slow cooked barbecue chilli beef

If you’re entertaining hoards of kids, look no further than my yummy salmon fish fingers, served with sweet potato wedges and a minted pea and yoghurt dip:

And this cherry pie is the easiest dessert ever – you literally just press the pastry into the tin with your fingers – add a tin of pie filling or some grated apple and you’re good to go!

Cherry pie with an easy biscuit pie crust

For a proper showstopper that’s not too complicated, try my strawberry and Cointreau layer cake with coconut cream (use any fruit in season, or even frozen or tinned):

Strawberry and Cointreau layer cake with coconut cream

And of course, you can’t have big Easter roundup without a few of these babies: my spiced cherry hot cross buns are so easy to make, and of course if you don’t fancy cherries, you can use raisins, sultanas or cranberries:

Butter those hot cross buns generously!

For chocolate treats, we loved loads of the new Divine Chocolate eggs (not that I got to do much of the tasting, if I’m honest).   I really admire the brand, especially their Fairtrade ethos and the fact that they’re co-owned by cocoa farmers. All the eggs are made with great ingredients like Fairtrade sugar, and of course the Fairtrade cocoa beans grown by a co-operative of over 85,000 cocoa farmers in Ghana who own 44% of the Divine company and share in the profits they help to create.

The boys loved the new Luxury 70% Dark Egg with Divine Chocolate Tasting Set (RRP £14), which contained a delicious dark chocolate easter egg plus a sweet little tasting set of 12 x 16g chocolate bars with flavours like white chocolate and strawberry, and milk chocolate with toffee. Great for sharing.

This year also saw the production of the world’s first Fairtrade popcorn easter Egg in partnership with Joe & Seph’s popcorn (RRP £11).  Look out for this one – it’s utterly moreish, with yummy salted caramel popcorn actually embedded into a smooth milk chocolate egg, plus extra packs of salted caramel popcorn.  SO GOOD!

The cute little mini eggs (RRP £4.50) are great for Easter egg hunts, and we loved the little Shaun the Sheep lollies (RRP £1.50) too. So cute!

As we’re on the subject of chocolate, I can’t leave out the amazing new Dairy Milk Big Taste peanut caramel crisp. I hid this but the boys sniffed it out – it really is incredibly good – lovely chunky chocolate full of peanuts and caramel. If you love peanut butter this one’s for you. YUM.

Lastly, if chocolate’s maybe not your thing, you might have seen me tweeting about the new bags from Rowntrees, as we were picked as taste testers for the launch of these new packs.  Both the 30% Reduced Sugar Fruit Pastilles and 30% Reduced Sugar Randoms are available at Tesco, currently priced £1.24.

Phew! And that’s it.  There’s enough edible stuff there to keep you occupied over the Easter weekend.  If you need any help or advice on any of the recipes, I’m always around on social media. Have a wonderful Easter with your loved ones x