Easter Egg Mini-Cakes II

Last year the Easter Egg Mini-Cakes were a hit. So this year I wanted to make some more. Especially because I was planig to have breakfast with some of my friends the saturday before easter. They make great gifts. Especially for kids, I have it on good authority that they like them just as much as the adults.
First I was planing to bake 30 eggs, but then I had a closer look at the recipe and realised that it would be more advantageou s to make 40. 
It's a good thing that this time I could use a small drill to make the holes or I would have spend a few hours on that alone. I had this idea that I could drill perfect little holes into the shells. Of course that didn't work out. For smaller holes it worked great, but as soon as I tried to make them bigger, the shell started to break. In the end I had the same result as if I had just used a finger to make the hole bigger, just with more work.

At the begining of the year I made my own extracts. And the eggs were a perfect opportunity to try them out. I made four varieties. Lemon, lime, mandarine and mint. I also used vanilla extract, but it's store bought (for one it's cheaper, for another it's the only extract you can actually buy in a supermarket here in germany). It was kind of funny, cause after the baking the eggs were all mixed up and you always had to guess which flavor it is you were just eating. 

Sometimes I can't eat the things I baked. Mostly because of the smell during the baking. The kitchen had this buttery smell the hole time I was cooking. I was kind of sick of it after the three of four hours I had to smell it non-stop. I ate one that same evening to see how they looked on the inside and that was it for the next four days. But when I came back after easter I ate the six eggs I left at home (they broke while I was cleaning them after baking). They were absolutely delicious. Way better then the one straight out of the oven. 
That's why I would recommend to make them two or three days before you plan on eating them. Just don't store them in the fridge, the cold dough won't be as fluffy. Just put them in an airtight container. 

And one last pointer. Don't peel the hole shell of when you want to eat it. Just make the hole at the bottom a little bigger and than spoon it out. Just as you would do with a soft-boild egg.

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Easter Egg Mini-Cakes 

Cake Batter

1 1/2 cups flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
3/8 tsp baking soda
1 pinch salt
1 1/2 cups sugar
150 g butter, soft
200 g sour cream
3 eggs

1. Sift the flour, the baking powder, the baking soda and salt together.
2. Blend the sugar and eggs with a hand mixer till the mass is pale and creamy.
3. Add the butter to the batter and blend it well.
4. Add the flour mixture and blend everything together.
5. Add the sour cream to the batter and blend it.
 

Cream Cheese Batter 

2 egg
360 g cream cheese
1/2 cup sugar
yellow food coloring
red food coloring
7 tsp extract of your choice

1. Blend the egg, the cream cheese and the sugar with a hand mixer together.
2. Add the food coloring until the batter resembles egg yolk.
3. Add flavour of your choice. Mix in well.
 

To Assemble

40 eggs, hollowed
40 strips kitchen foil, ca. 10 cm wide

1. Carefully drill a small hole into the bottom of the eggs. Preferably use some kind of sharp metal skewer. Widen the hole with a corkscrew bottle opener or something similar. In the end the hole should have a diameter of about 2 cm.
2. Scoop out the eggs. A wooden skewer is rather helpful with that. You should save five of the eggs separately. Three for the cake batter and two for the cream cheese batter. The rest of the eggs can be put together and used for something else.
3. Wash the egg shells out with warm water.
4. Keep the egg shells for 30 minutes in salt water.
5. Rinse the egg shells with cold water. Place the shells with the opening down on some kitchen paper and leave them for at least 10 minutes.
6. Dry the shells in the microwave. Do it 3-6 times, for 12 seconds at a time. Open the door between each time.
7. Tear 40 strips of kitchen foil. They should be roughly 10 cm wide.
8. Crumple up the foil and put one each in the hollow of the muffin pan. It should be formed in such a way that the eggs can stand on their heads without falling.
9. Place the egg shells in the muffin pan with the hole facing upwards.
10. Pre-heat the oven to 180°C/360°F.
11. Put the cake batter into a piping bag.
12. Fill each egg to 1/5 with the cake batter.
13. Fill each egg to 2/5 with the cream cheese batter. The batter will be to fluid for a piping bag, so just carefully pour it with a spoon.
14. Fill each egg to 3/5 with the cake batter.
15. Bake the eggs for 20-25 minutes. During the baking some of the batter will flow out of the eggs. When the batter has a gold brown coloring it should be ready.
16. Let the muffin pan on a cooling rack for about 5 minutes. Afterwards take the eggs out of the pan and let them cool down to almost room temperature.
17. With a small knife carefully scrape the overflowed batter from the eggs. Don't cut all the batter at the hole of. Delicately wipe down the shells with a wet paper towel.
18. Color the eggs with an easter egg coloring which doesn't require for the eggs to be dipped in water or something similar.
19. When the color is dry cut of the rest of the overflowed batter or which has some color on it.

Tip: You will save time if you work with two muffin pans. You can prepare one while the over is in the oven. That way the second can go in immediatley when the first comes out.

Bon appétit!!