Easter Bunnies

As it is the Chinese year of the Rabbit, and as it's almost Easter I have decided to write a suitably festive post! <3

Click 'read more' for some suggestions of fun things to make, such as carrot cupcakes, face scrub and a thread banger rabbit hat tutorial!

Carrot cupcakes: 

Cake recipe:
130 g Self raising flour. 
1 tsp Ground cinnamon. 
215 g Caster sugar. 
2 Eggs. 
175 ml Vegetable oil.
65 g Chopped walnuts, plus extra to decorate.
165 g Grated carrots. 

For the icing:
170 g Thick cream cheese.
70g Butter. 
125g Icing sugar. 
1/2 Lemon - finely grated zest. 
1 tbsp Soured cream.
1 tsp Vanilla extract.

To make the cupcakes:
Firstly preheat the oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4.
Then line a tray with paper cake cases.
Sift the flour and cinnamon together and put the bowl to one side.
In another bowl, whisk the sugar and eggs together - so they become thick/creamy. 
Whisk the mixture constantly, whilst slowly adding the oil in a thin stream.
Fold in the dry ingredients, once combined gently stir in the nuts and carrots.
Divide the batter evenly among the paper cake cases and bake for 20-25 minutes - you know they are ready when you insert a knife or skewer into the centre of one of the cakes and it comes out clean.
Place the cakes onto a wire rack to cool.

To make the icing:
In a large bowl mix the cream cheese, butter and icing sugar together until it makes a smooth, soft paste.
Stir in the lemon zest, soured cream and vanilla extract.
Using a piping bag, pipe the icing onto the cooled cupcakes. Alternatively, using a flat knife put the icing on top and smooth till you are happy with the result.
Decorate the tops of the cakes with the extra chopped walnut pieces.

Carrot face scrub:

You will need:

• Carrot juice.
• Honey.
• Sugar or Salt depending on skin type. (Sugar for normal /dry skin, Salt for Normal/oily skin.)
• Cotton pad.
• Bowl.

Bowl of my home made carrot juice.

Always on the look out for cheap, fresh skincare which will give me fabulous skin I was sold on the idea of carrot scrub. I got out my blender and carrots and attempted to make some of my own carrot juice, turns out two carrots makes a lot more juice than I was expecting. I then mixed the home made carrot juice with honey and sugar to make the paste and applied it to my face.

2 Carrots made a jar full of juice!

For the sake of your eyes I've decided to not include the photo of me in the face mask! (Not an attractive sight!)

It left my skin feeling really smooth and soft, even though it smells a bit funny - to me at least! I would recommend this for others to try but as I had to learn the hard way from trying many lush skincare products and homemade concoctions natural ingredients may sound good in theory but they will still have the chance to cause breakouts. I would not recommending trying this scrub -or any new skincare products if you have a big date or something the next day in case they cause break outs!

That warning stated I have very, very sensitive / picky skin and I guess that most people's skin would have better results!

So far the carrot scrub and I seem to be getting along but I have only tried it a couple of times.

Chocolate rabbits:

You will need:

• Rabbit shaped chocolate mold.
• Chocolate.
• Heat proof bowl.
• Saucepan of water.

Melt the chocolate in the bowl over the saucepan of boiling water. When smooth and melted pour the chocolate into the mold and tap to remove any air bubbles. Leave to set and the remover from the mold. Add a small amount of melted chocolate along the outside seam of one of the rabbit halves and put the other half on top and leave it to set. Ones it had cooled and both halves are 'glued' together decorate the rabbit with icing, contrasting coloured chocolate.

Once your rabbit is complete wrap in a cellophane and tie with a ribbon to make a cute Easter gift!

xxVickyxx