God bless the Easter bunny

I'd like to start this entry by apologising in advance to any religious friends who might be reading. I'm afraid I'm about to write an entire blog about Easter without mentioning God or Jesus, because for heathen like me, the best thing about Easter is the chocolate.

As some of you may have already gathered from other posts on this blog, I worship at the alter of the cocoa bean. Chocolate is, quite frankly, a pretty damn good reason for living, and a life without chocolate would be, quite frankly, pretty damn pointless. 

I love chocolate in all it's forms. I don't discriminate. There are some people who get a bit snobbish about chocolate, favouring only organic or 85% cocoa. But while I do most certainly appreciate the difference between good chocolate and cheap sugary chocolate, I'm pretty open to eating any and all of it. 

So I guess loving Easter is a no-brainer. We give each other big chocolate eggs - what's not to like? And there's something extra-special about Easter egg chocolate isn't there? Even if it's just plain old Cadbury's, the egg somehow tastes better than the humble bar. It must be something to do with the subtle curve and smooth surface of the egg chocolate - and the way it feels in your mouth. Plus Easter eggs are rarely of uniform thickness the whole way through, so finding those amazing thick bits where the chocolate has pooled is an extra (or should that be egg-stra?) treat.

Apparently we give eggs at Easter because they are a symbol of fertility and rebirth, and the practice of decorating eggs pre-dates Christianity. But who wants a painted chicken's egg when you can have a chocolate one?!

My "mainstream" egg from grandma

These days the supermarkets are crammed full of Easter eggs at this time of year, with many of the larger stores dedicating a whole aisle to Easter eggs and gifts. And most of them tend to stock mainly the big names in chocolate - Cadbury's, Nestle, Thorntons and the like. I've got one of these eggs courtesy of my grandma, and like I said above, I'm no snob so I'll definitely be eating it. Well, all accept the Snickers bar, anyway. Snickers, in my view, is the booby prize of chocolate. It's chocolate gone wrong. It's just not cricket.

However, as we're avoiding the supermarkets, I've gone for more artisan Easter eggs this year so the ones I've bought for people are a bit more interesting than my 'Mars and Friends' offering from Grandma.

The two eggs from Brown and Green

I did my egg shopping with my lovely friends at Brown and Green, in Derby, and picked up two gorgeous milk chocolate offerings. The first, decorated with sweeties and jelly beans, was made by The Bittersweet Chocolate company, which looks like an absolutely amazing little firm in Melbourne, South Derbyshire. These guys have a brilliant website and it looks like they also run chocolate making workshops, so perhaps I ought to pay them a visit at some point (all in the name of supermarket-free research of course!).

The second, slightly smaller egg, with little mini-eggs melted into the front of it, was made by Cottage Delight, a firm that makes "speciality foods" in nearby Staffordshire. 

But the real win on the Easter egg front was a gorgeous egg made by The Elegant Baking Company, in Sheffield. We found a huge selection of these eggs in a little co-operative craft store in the city, and the one I chose was milk with an iced egg design on the front. Even the box it came in looks gorgeous, and at just a fiver it was a real bargain when you compare it to the top-of-the-range Easter eggs in the supermarkets.

And whose egg is it? Mine of course! Happy Easter. 

Elegant Baking Company egg

Elegantly wrapped