Easter is right around the corner and I've been trying to think of some fun Easter foods to make. I came upon these Easter Bunny Buns over at Mommy's Kitchen and knew right away that I wanted to make them. These are so easy to make because you use a cake mix. I've never used a cake mix in my bread baking but was intrigued at the idea. I have to say that they rose beautifully. I made four Easter Bunny Buns and with the rest of the dough I shaped into crescents for dinner tonight. The original recipe calls for a powdered sugar glaze to brush over the bunnies but opted out and kept them simple with a butter and cinnamon sugar dusting. Okay, it was pure laziness but they were still awesome just the same. I think these would make a fun Easter morning treat for your family. I hope you enjoy!

Easter Bunny Buns
Recipe source Mommy's Kitchen

1 - (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast (I use rapid rise)
1 1/2 - cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)
3 1/4 - cups all-purpose or bread flour (I prefer bread flour)
1 - 9 oz package jiffy yellow cake mix or 1/2 of
regular 18.5 oz cake mix approx 1 1/4 cups
1/4 cup butter, softened to brush on baked rolls
Cinnamon Sugar
Colored Easter Sprinkles (optional)

Glaze

2 - cups powdered sugar
2 - tablespoons milk
1/2 - teaspoon vanilla extract
1 - teaspoon butter, softened

In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water. Let stand until creamy, about 10 minutes. Stir in the flour and cake mix. Beat until dough is smooth. Add some flour on the counter and knead any additional flour into the dough. Knead until it is no longer sticky. Lightly oil a large bowl, place the dough in the bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 40 minutes - 1 hour. Punch down the dough and turn it out onto a lightly floured surface.

Roll dough into a long rectangle 1/2-inch thick.

Cut dough into strips 1/2-inch wide and 14-inches long. (sorry I did not get a photo of that part). Reserve 1-2 of the strips to cut into pieces about 1/2-inch long and roll into small balls (use for bunny tails).

Then roll the dough to make rounded snake shapes.( I just cut them into strips without rolling). Place one long piece of dough on a greased baking sheet. Place one end of the strip over the other to make a loop; bring the end that is underneath up and cross it over the other end. Place a ball of dough on top of the bottom loop (to be the tail).


Brush the bunnies with melted butter and sprinkle on a mixture of cinnamon and sugar. You can also leave some of the bunnies plain. Cover the bunnies with plastic wrap that has been sprayed with baking spray. Allow the rolls to rise in a warm place for 45-60 minutes, until nearly double in size. Remove plastic wrap and bake at 375 degrees for 12-15 minutes. Brush on a simple icing and add holiday sprinkles to the plain rolls. Just add the simple icing to the cinnamon ones.

GLAZE INSTRUCTIONS

Stir the powdered add the butter and blend with a fork. Add the milk and the vanilla extract and mix until you have the consistency of a pourable glaze. Brush on the glaze while the bunnies are still warm. Add colored sprinkles.

Note: These bunny buns can be left plain and used as a dinner roll. Just shape, rise and bake the bunnies. When they are finished brush with melted butter before serving.








I linked this post up with Sweet as Sugar Cookies & Mom's Crazy Cooking & Good Cheap Eats (What's on your Plate?) & At Home With Haley

Easter is one of my favorite holiday's. I think it is because I love Spring and get so excited when the weather is warming and flower's are blooming. Easter is also a fun time for kids with eggs coloring, egg hunts, and bunnies bringing baskets full of goodies. Coloring eggs is a blast, messy sometimes but still fun. I saw this idea over at Our Best Bites and knew that I wanted to try it out. I've never seen eggs dyed this way but loved the way they looked. They turn out to look just like dinosaur eggs, way cool! Just a little something different to try other than just coloring the shells. Something else that was fun was turning those colorful eggs into a rainbow egg salad. My daughters love egg salad and making it rainbow colored just pushed it way over the edge for them. They were so excited. So to make this just take your hard boiled eggs and crack them on the counter gently to make little cracks all over the egg.


Then take liquid food coloring and color some water. I used Red, Blue, Yellow, and Green. Just a note, Yellow didn't show up very well for me. I like the brighter colors best.


Then you set them in your fridge to color over night. Remove the eggs and rinse them off with water. Now you will be able to crack some of the shells off to reveal the dinosaur eggs.

I like the way the shells look on the inside.

I was trying to think of something St. Patrick's like to make with my girls today and saw this cute idea on a blog called Munchkin Munchies (cute name). I didn't use her recipe just borrowed her concept. I used my own sugar cookie and icing recipe, CLICK HERE to find it. These were fun and easy to make, your kids will have a blast helping out.

First roll 3 balls of dough and place them together like this:


Then take your thumb and press in the center of each ball so they look like this:

The weather here in Arizona has been simply gorgeous the past few days, most especially yesterday. All I want to do is be outside in the sunshine. That is basically what I did yesterday. Our little town has what is called a Winter Fest every February. The whole uptown in shut down and vendors come from everywhere to set up their tents and sell their goods. It is fun to go and walk up and down the street and check out what there is. This is what we decided to do with our kids yesterday. Our two kids are starting to get out of the stroller stage so we braved it let them walk on their own. They actually did really well staying close by. Sniff, sniff, I do have a tear in my eye because they are growing up so fast. I miss my little babies.

On the way home I told my husband that I didn't have anything planned for dinner and that maybe we could just pick & peck, which is basically just leftover night. I could just see the sad and disappointed look on his face so I started to think about something that I could make. Now, I've been on this Valentine kick lately with all the hear shaped goodies and I'm still on that wave length. Pizza popped into my head and then I had visions of heart shaped pizza. How fun would that be I thought to myself, so I went to work on it. This is a great way to celebrate Valentine's Day with your kids. Somehow eating homemade pizza that is in the shape of a heart makes it even more special.

I just used my pizza recipe that you can find here. Once the dough was rolled into a circle I used my large heart cookie cutter and cut out heart shapes. I placed them on a pizza pan that had been sprayed with cooking spray.

You can see Ellie's little helping hand in the corner.

All ready to go in the oven

Tonight I kept them simple with just mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses. I made eight heart shapes and still had a good chunk of dough left. The wheels in my head were churning on what I could do with what was left. I decided to make pizza rolls. I rolled the dough out into a square, covered it in the sauce, sprinkled on mozzarella cheese and Parmesan cheese, rolled it up jelly roll style, and then cut it into 3/4 inch or so slices. Then I baked them right along with the pizza. They turned out great. You could probably add chopped up pepperoni or sausage but I kept then simple.

Oh my, what a breakfast this was! I love my heart shaped waffle maker. It  makes the most perfect cute little hearts that are perfect for little hands. I thought that I would make a Valentine breakfast for my kids today and found a recipe for chocolate waffles over at Our Best Bites that I've been wanting to try for a long time. You will love each and every bit of these waffles with their smidge of ooey melting chocolate in every bite. Make these for your family and they will be thanking you all day.

Double Chocolate Waffles

2/3 cup flour (I used whole wheat white)
1/3 cup corn starch
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
3/4 tsp. baking powder
3/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. cinnamon
6 Tbsp. granulated sugar
1 cup milk
1/3 cup oil
1 egg
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
1/2 cup mini chocolate chips

Preheat a waffle iron.

Combine flour, cornstarch, cocoa powder, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon. Use a whisk to combine.

In a separate bowl whisk together sugar, milk, oil, egg, and vanilla. Whisk for a minute so it gets a little frothy.

Slowly add the wet ingredients into the dry a little at a time, whisking to combine. Just stir until they're combined and don't over mix. Stir in the chocolate chips. This is a pretty thin batter, so don't be expecting something that looks like a pancake batter. It's supposed to be thin.



Place batter in and cook according to your iron. Be careful to not overfill. This batter has plenty of leavening so it will expand.
Top with sweetened whipped cream and dust with cocoa powder if desired. Ellie asked for syrup on her waffles so I drizzled some on. Also, in honor of Valentine's Day I added some red strawberries.

Here are Ellie & Emma's Waffles

Here is a link to my Sugar Glaze recipe-Sugar Glaze