Don’t buy Easter Eggs this season! Professional chocolatier Simon Knott shares his chocolate Easter Egg recipe and tips for hand-crafting high quality Easter Eggs – solid, hollow and filled.
Easter is a beautiful time for celebration for chocolate-lovers! What other time of year can we feast guilt-free and judgement-free, on as much chocolate as we can eat? While Easter is a fun time to succumb to our chocolate addiction, it feels like the price of chocolate Easter eggs just gets higher each year, leaving many of us feeling bitter about the whole shebang.
But, guess what? You don’t have to buy Easter Eggs. With a little time and patience, good quality couverture and an Easter egg mold, you can simply make your own at home. What better gift than a lovingly hand-crafted, colored and decorated Easter Egg?
In this practical guide, professional chocolatier Simon Knott shares his chocolate Easter Egg recipe, and tips for making professional-standard Easter Eggs at home. Let’s hop in.
How to Make a Chocolate Easter Egg
By Simon Knott, Professional Chocolatier
Making personalised chocolate Easter eggs for your loved ones only takes a little imagination and skill. They will be head and shoulders above the average, expensive versions in the store and twice as much fun. In this tutorial, I will share my chocolate Easter egg recipe for solid eggs and hollow eggs (filled and unfilled).
Ingredients & Equipment for Making Easter Eggs
Easter Egg Molds
To make professional quality Easter eggs, you need an Easter Egg mold. Fortunately, you can get them quite easily and affordably from local cookware stores or online.
If you haven’t made Easter eggs before, don’t be too ambitious. Just buy molds that are manageable. Silicone molds are much cheaper, and it’s often easier to remove eggs from them as they are flexible. Polycarbonate moulds are more expensive, but they can give a mirror finish to chocolate.
Chocolate
For any type of chocolate molding work, you should use good quality couverture chocolate. Dark, milk or white are all suitable. For help choosing suitable chocolate, check out our articles below:
Other Tools
Other essential tools:
- Disposable gloves – for handling chocolate eggs, to prevent fingerprints or smears
- Double boiler, thermometer and basic kitchen tools – for melting and tempering
- Disposable piping bag or small jug – for placing chocolate in molds
Optional decorative items:
- Icing and food dye
- Cellophane and ribbons for wrapping
- Toys or gifts to put inside hollow eggs
- Sprinkles, coconut, cacao nibs or other edible decorations
Types of Chocolate Easter Eggs You Can Make
Solid Eggs
You can make two types of Easter eggs at home using inexpensive equipment and ingredients. The solid Easter egg is made by completely filling a silicone or polycarbonate mold with liquid chocolate, which is then allowed to set, creating a half egg.
Hollow Eggs
The hollow Easter egg is often larger and, with more space inside, allows small gifts or sweets to be hidden inside as a surprise. The hollow Easter egg is also made with a silicone or polycarbonate mold but has a thin shell that can be easily cracked to reveal the goodies inside.
Homemade Chocolate Easter Egg Recipe
SOLID CHOCOLATE Homemade Easter Egg Recipe
1… Prepare your Easter Egg molds
Always clean your molds thoroughly before use. Wash them in warm, soapy water, dry them thoroughly and then use a cotton cloth to polish the inside surface. This will give a better gloss to the chocolate and make the eggs easier to extract from the mold.
2… Prepare the chocolate
Using a double boiler or microwave carefully melt the chocolate. Add the manufacturer’s recommended quantity of seeding chocolate and stir to temper. Eggs can be made with dark, milk or white chocolate but tempering is vital to create a strong egg with an enjoyable texture when eaten.
For detailed instructions on tempering, check out our article on How to Temper Chocolate.
3… Fill the Easter Egg molds
When the chocolate is tempered, fill the molds using a disposable piping bag, a spoon, or a pouring jug. When full, tap the mould against the tabletop a few times to encourage any air bubbles to escape. Allow the molds to set at room temperature.
4… Remove the eggs from the molds
Invert the molds and tap them gently on the table surface. If any remain stuck, the silicone mold can be peeled away from the chocolate. If you have problems with a polycarbonate mould, put it in the fridge for half an hour and tap it sharply again on the table.
5… Sandwich two halves together
Two solid egg halves can be sandwiched together but they may be difficult for younger kids to eat, so they may be better kept as halves. For older kids, sandwich two halves together by melting a little chocolate and using it as glue to sandwich two halves.
Another way to create neat, solid eggs is to prepare a tray of egg halves. Remove from the mold when set. Then, fill the same mold with another batch of half eggs, but this time, while the chocolate is still melted, place an egg half from the first batch onto the surface of each egg in the mold. Leave to set.
6… Trim and decorate
Remove each egg from the mold and quickly trim any excess chocolate from the seam with a knife to create a precise finish. Wear disposable gloves and work quickly to stop your hands from melting the chocolate and leaving fingerprints. The exterior of the eggs can be decorated with Easter novelties, chocolate, sprinkles, paints, etc.
HOLLOW Homemade Chocolate Easter Egg Recipe
1… Prepare the chocolate and Easter Egg molds
As with the solid chocolate Easter eggs recipe, start by washing, drying and polishing your molds. Then, temper a batch of your chosen chocolate as normal.
2… Fill the Easter Eggs molds
Next, you will fill the easter egg molds with the tempered chocolate.
Using a spoon, add a small quantity of tempered chocolate into the bottom of the mold. Gently tap the mold on the table a few times to dislodge any air bubbles, which will rise to the surface.
When you can’t see any more air bubbles, rotate the mold in your hand so the chocolate flows around the interior of the mold, coating it with a thin layer. Keep rotating the mold until the chocolate reaches up to the rim.
When the inside is entirely coated use a palette knife to scrape across the surface of the mold to remove any excess chocolate. Place the mold cavity side down on parchment paper to set. Repeat the process with a second layer of chocolate and even a third layer, if you want a thicker Easter egg.
3… Leave the Chocolate Easter Eggs to set
Leave your homemade chocolate Easter eggs to set at room temperature or in the refrigerator.
Depending on the ambient temperature, leave the eggs to set at room temperature or put them in the refrigerator briefly. Don’t leave them for too long in the refrigerator, or any moisture in the air will condense on the chocolate creating blemishes.
4… Join two half eggs together
If you don’t want to put anything inside your Easter egg, it’s easy to join two halves together:
- Heat a shallow baking tray in the oven at 175° F (80° C) for a short time.
- Place the tray on your work surface.
- Take a half egg in each hand and place the rims on the baking tray.
- Move each one slightly in a circle to melt the chocolate.
- Pick each half up and gently push them together until they are joined.
If necessary, the seam can be tidied up using a sharp knife.
How to Make a Filled Chocolate Easter Egg
If you are going to be putting fillings inside your chocolate eggs, first decide whether you want them to be edible items or gifts. The range of choice is only limited by your imagination, and naturally, ensure they will fit inside the egg.
Edible fillings can continue the theme of Easter, for example, with foil-wrapped mini Easter eggs, marzipan rabbits, and any number of commercial candies. Similarly, nonedible gifts can be toys, jokes, jewellery, and any other gift you feel fits the personality of the person receiving the egg.
To fill an egg, place the gift inside a small sealable plastic bag and place this inside one of the chocolate halves. Ensure there is plenty of room when you attach the other half, and keep the gift away from the edges that are about to be sealed.
How to Color an Easter Egg & Decorate
How to Color an Easter Egg
There are different ways to decorate the outside of an egg in colour:
Coloured chocolate compound
Paint different coloured designs on the inside of the mold surface with a paintbrush using melted coloured chocolate compound. Allow the compound to set, then fill the mold with tempered chocolate as normal.
Coloured melted chocolate
Colour melted chocolate with an oil-based colour and then apply this to the exterior of the egg using a brush or piping bag. Make sure the colour is designed for chocolate use.
Icing
For decorating the exterior of the egg, use either royal icing (made with egg white) or icing just made with water. Making your own icing enables you to experiment more with different colours.
Numerous commercial icings are available in many different colours. They are more convenient and often come in a dispensing tube for easier application.
Packaging Your Homemade Chocolate Easter Eggs
If you’re going to display your chocolate Easter eggs, it’s a good idea to protect them. People will be naturally attracted and want to handle them, which can leave marks on the chocolate.
Either display the eggs in a simple basket on tissue paper or wrap them in clear cellophane finished off with a ribbon.
Final Tips For Homemade Chocolate Easter Egg Recipe
We hope you’ve enjoyed this article from Simon Knott and his homemade chocolate Easter Egg recipe. Here are some final tips and key takeaway points from this instructional, to summarize.
Homemade Chocolate Easter Egg Recipe – Key Points:
- Prepare your molds correctly. Wash, dry and polish your molds only. Do not use oil – it will ruin the feel of your chocolates.
- Temper your chocolate properly for a professional gloss and ‘crack’ when you open the egg.
- Start with simple molds and don’t try to be over-ambitious. Silicon molds are fine.
- When putting toys or gifts inside a hollow egg, wrap them in plastic first.
Homemade Chocolate Easter Egg Recipe – Further Reading:
For further reading and tips on crafting professional quality eggs at home, to supplement Simon’s chocolate Easter Eggs recipe, check out:
How to Temper Chocolate by Chef Prish
How to Mold Chocolate by Chef Prish
What is the Best Chocolate for Molds? by Simon Knott
Happy Easter!
