Four Creme Egg hacks that will make your Easter

IT TURNS out it is possible to improve on perfection. Here’s how to make an Aussie favourite even better.

LEGEND tells us there was a time before the Creme Egg; a dark age when chocolate eggs were hollow and eaten without fear of a creamy centre spilling out over hands, shirts and carpets.

Luckily, we now live in oozier times.

The Creme Egg, for the unindoctrinated, is a milk chocolate shell filled with a mystical semi-liquid white and yellow fondant, cleverly devised to look like the inside of an egg.

Created in 1963 and available annually from January 1 until Easter, the Creme Egg is to many the pinnacle of our accomplishments as a species, eclipsing the combined achievements of evolution, the renaissance and those removable sticky wall hooks.

But for decades, one question has remained: is it possible to improve on perfection?

To find out, we took a few classic egg dishes and reinvented them for the magnificent Creme Egg.

SCOTCH CREME EGGS

YUM!!!! Picture: Tristan Lutze

Inspired by the English pub staple, where a soft-boiled egg is wrapped in sausage meat, crumbed and fried, this sweet variation sees a Creme Egg wrapped in a doughnut, fried, and rolled in cinnamon sugar.

Makes 4

Ingredients:

4 Cadbury Creme Eggs

240g plain flour

25g caster sugar

1 ½ tsp dried yeast

50g butter, melted and warm but not hot

125ml milk, luke warm

2 egg yolks, room temperature.

Oil for deep-frying (canola oil, rice bran oil, or similar)

½ cup extra caster sugar

2 tsp ground cinnamon

Method:

Mix flour, sugar and yeast in a bowl. Add milk, butter and egg yolk*, and mix until a sticky dough forms.

Transfer dough to a greased bowl, cover, and leave somewhere warm for 90 minutes, or until dough has doubled in size.

On a lightly floured bench, knead the dough for two minutes, then divide into four equal pieces.

Flatten each piece of dough into a disc and wrap around a Creme Egg. Repeat with remaining three eggs. Let dough-covered eggs sit for 15 minutes to rise a little (this will make your doughnuts light and airy).

Heat oil in a deep, heavy-sided saucepan until it reaches 180C. Fry each dough-covered egg for 90 seconds, turning once, or until dark brown all over. Remove from oil, drain for a minute, then turn through mix of caster sugar and cinnamon until well coated.

Serve immediately.

* Make sure your egg yolks, milk and butter are at room temperature or only lukewarm. Too cold and your yeast won’t activate, too hot and it will burn.

DEVILLED CREME EGGS

Chocolate versions of the picnic classic. Picture: Tristan Lutze

The Devilled Egg was a staple of mid-twentieth century picnics and dinner parties, alongside flared pants, Kris Kristofferson and keys in a bowl. In the original, a hard-boiled egg is cut in half and the yolk mixed with mayonnaise and mustard, then piped back into the egg white. Here, we’ve turned the Creme Egg’s magical fondant into a delicious Italian meringue.

Makes 10 egg halves

Ingredients:

5 Cadbury Creme Eggs

4 egg whites

200g caster sugar

200ml water

A pinch of cream of tartar

Crushed red sprinkles for decorations

Method:

Warm a sharp kitchen knife in a container of hot water and carefully half the room temperature Creme Eggs down the seam (if the chocolate’s too cold, it will crack). Refrigerate until chocolate hardens.

Carefully scoop out the fondant from the eggs and reserve. Pick out any bits of chocolate.

In a small saucepan, bring sugar and water to the boil, stirring until sugar is completely dissolved. Brush any sugar crystals off the side of the pot with a clean, wet pastry brush, then clip a candy thermometer to the inside of the pot. Increase heat.

Cook syrup until it reaches ‘soft ball’ stage (115C), and continue cooking it while you prepare the egg whites.

In an electric mixer, whip egg whites with a pinch of cream of tartar until soft peaks form.

When sugar syrup reaches 121C, remove from the heat. With mixer on medium speed, slowly pour sugar syrup into mix.

Increase mixer to high speed and beat for 10 minutes, then add Creme Egg fondant. Beat for five more minutes. Meringue should be thick, glossy and room temperature.

Transfer to a piping bag with a fluted nozzle and pipe carefully into each egg half. Finish with a small amount of crushed red sprinkles.

SCRAMBLED CREME EGGS ON TOAST

Here’s your Easter Sunday breakfast sorted. Picture: Tristan Lutze

A classic breakfast with a Creme Egg twist. Not indulgent enough? That’s why we added ‘whiskey butter’.

Makes two serves.

Ingredients:

4 Cadbury Creme Eggs

2 slices brioche

2 tablespoons butter

½ tablespoon whiskey

Method:

Melt butter and add the whiskey. Stir to combine. Brush each slice of the brioche on one side with the whiskey butter and place under griller until evenly browned.

Roughly crush Creme Eggs and distribute between the two slices of toast. Leave to sit for five minutes and the egg’s filling will melt over the toast.

CREME EGG HOLLANDAISE

This recipe is by far the most simple, and the one we want to try the most. Picture: Tristan Lutze

It may sound simple, but once you try this gooey combination of chocolate, caramel and ice cream, you’ll be hording Creme Eggs year-round.

Serves 2

Ingredients:

4 Cadbury Creme Eggs

1 tablespoon milk

Vanilla ice cream

Method:

Place a glass bowl over a simmering pot of water, ensuring the bottom of the bowl doesn’t touch the water. Add the Creme Eggs and stir occasionally.

When mostly melted (small lumps will remain), add the milk. This will help soften the mix and melt the remaining lumps.

Once the eggs and milk have become a smooth, thick liquid, drizzle over vanilla ice cream. It will harden slightly into a thick chocolate caramel as soon as it hits the ice cream.

All recipes and photos by Tristan Lutze. He hasn’t been paid by Cadbury and this is not a sponsored post. He just really likes Creme Eggs.

Find more of Tristan Lutze’s food stuff (and photos of his cats) on Instagram and Twitter: @tristangled