Frugal Easter Food Ideas from our Readers

Food

Bunny Cake
Make any kind of cake in 2 round 8 or 9 inch cake pans.  Use one for the Bunny's head.  Take the other and cut 2 long bunny ears off of either side.  What you have left should look like a bow-tie.   Assemble on a large cookie sheet putting ears on top and bow-tie under the chin.  Frost in any color you'd like your bunny to be and if you like coconut, sprinkle on top of frosting for a FUZZY bunny look.  Get creative with your decorating.  Put pink inside the ears either with colored frosting or coconut.  Use jelly beans, gum drops, chocolate chips etc to make the face and decorate the bow-tie.  Then use the pull-n-peel licorice for whiskers.  You can also make cute miniature Easter baskets by using cupcakes, top frosting with green colored coconut for 'grass', use jelly beans for eggs and make a handle out of licorice or a pipe cleaner.   -- Rhonda from MN

These easy "birds nests" are a treasured childhood memory from my Easter basket. My children grew up with them, and now my grandchildren enjoy them.  Ingredients:  1 pkg. semisweet chocolate chips, 1 pkg. coconut, and the smallest candy eggs you can find.  Instructions:  Melt chocolate chips in double boiler (or microwave carefully) and stir the coconut in until you have a thick mixture.  Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls onto a sheet of waxed paper and use back of spoon to make an indentation in each "nest".  Fill with tiny eggs.  Let cool completely, wrap in plastic wrap and tie with curly ribbon.  Yummy and so representative of springtime and rebirth! -- Lindy from AK

When we were kids we used to make Easter Parade cakes. Just bake your favorite cake in mini bread pans. Make a base out of cardboard covered with aluminum foil and place the cake toward one end. Hollow out the top of the cooled cake a little bit. Ice it making sure not to fill the hollow up with icing. While the icing is still wet sprinkle coconut, tinted green, into the hollow on top to make a nest of "grass" and push chocolate stripped cookies onto the sides by the corners to make wheels. Use however many hollow chocolate bunnies you want as horses attaching them to the base with icing and some of the coconut around them so they look like they are walking on grass. We usually put 4 in pairs of the six inch high ones. Use red thin licorice as reins attached with a little bit of icing and fill the nest with robins eggs candies or jelly beans. Line up your creations and you have a parade! -- Michelle from TN

The M&M website had a cute idea for a bunny and chicken using candy, plastic wrap, and cellophane.  It is a fun activity to have your kids help with.  To make the chicken.  Take one cup candy m&m's or skittles and wrap in plastic wrap. Next in a second piece of plastic wrap add 1/2 cup candy.  Wrap plastic around candy to make a type of ball.  Tape of ends.  Next wrap cellophane around the smaller ball and tie off using a ribbon.  On the larger ball wrap the cellophane and seal off. Using double stick tape, tape the smaller ball to the larger one making a head and body. Let kids make a beak and put eyes and feathers on. -- Amie from UT

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