Easter Chick Houses

I didn’t get around to making our yearly gingerbread house last Christmas. I missed the personal challenge of balancing the walls and roof to prevent a culinary tragedy. I even missed scraping the cement-like icing off my kitchen bench! If you’ve ever made a gingerbread house, you’ll know exactly what I mean.  

So now that it’s nearly Easter, I found a way to re-live the experience! The Easter Chicky Birdhouse! 

Ingredients

• 1 packet Lattice Biscuits (makes 3 small houses)
• Mini chocolate Easter eggs. (I used M & Ms but you can use any brand)
• 2 egg whites
• 3 cups pure icing sugar, sifted
• Materials to decorate: shredded paper, fluffy chicks, Easter egg foil, chocolate crackle mixture (for a nest).

Method

1. Beat egg whites until soft peaks form. You can use a hand beater. I used a Thermomix, with butterfly whisk, speed 3.5 for 90 secends. Gradually add sifted icing sugar until combined (approximately 3-4 minutes on speed 3.5).

2. Spoon the icing into a zip lock bag and snip one corner.

3. Cement one biscuit on a serving plate for the “floor”. Just use a blog of icing at the base.

4. Use the icing to glue 3 more biscuits for the sides and the back walls, leaving the front open. At this point I put the house in the fridge to set. About 20 minutes should do it.  Small ramekins were helpful to hold the wall into place while setting.

5. Then glue on the roof, this was a little tricky and took some patience. Again, you will need to find something to secure the roof while it hardens in the fridge.

6. Now for the fun part! Decorate the houses however you like! This could be with gluing M & M eggs over the top of the roof, throwing a little chick and a heap of foil eggs inside. I used green shredded paper and thought it looked cute for the bottom of the house and put in little chocolate eggs and a fluffy chick. Another all-edible idea is to make chocolate crackle mixture and use that as a nest at the base.

Ideas:

• These would be a fun activity to do with the kids leading up to Easter
• Make a fun surprise – pre-prepare the house part allow the kids to decorate how they like

More

Easter Craft Ideas