A Better Easter Creme Egg

I don't know about you, but to me and my family growing up, Easter has always been about bunnies, little yellow chicks and chocolate.  We would all get together, have a big Easter egg hunt for the kids in the family and then cram about 40 people around a table that stuck out into the hallway and eat, elbow to elbow, laughing and talking over each other all night long.  And then we'd eat chocolate.  A lot of chocolate. Like a gross amount. No joke. Ahhh...Easter.  I love this holiday.

One thing I was never crazy about was those creme eggs.  You know the ones-wrapped in purple and EVERYWHERE at this time of year.  I love sweet stuff, chocolate is one of my downfalls, but these made my teeth hurt.  I never "got" them. Now, my husband on the other hand...these are his Easter treat.

So, as I do with most of our special treats, I try to make a healthy version and (as my husband says) "ruin" them.

So here we go.  A "ruined" version of the famous Easter creme egg.  Let me be clear: This tastes NOTHING like a creme egg, but it's pretty damn good.  My husband even raved about it.  And my kids SCARFED them down.

My original plan of the day was to make these with my kids as a fun Easter craft but first I made these "Chicks" with them and...well, BIG FAT FAIL, so I decided to go about the creme eggs on my own.  Don't stare too hard at the coconut chick...your eyes will hurt...not what I had planned!

So first thing I had to figure out was how to make the chocolate egg.  I wanted to make a whole chocolate egg and fill it but when I realized how difficult that was going to be, I figured hey-an open egg is cool too!

I couldn't find any molds ANYWHERE so I wrapped up my plastic eggs in cling wrap and dipped them in chocolate.  Easy peasy!

Melt 6 oz. dark chocolate over a simmering pot of water. I have no idea how to "temper" chocolate...so when it was melted, I dipped the eggs and put them aside. There is probably a proper way to do this...

While I waited for those to set, I made the "whites" of the egg..  Cheesecake is delicious and I figured a cheesecake filling would be SOOOOO good in these.  So I blended up these ingredients:

1/2 cup room temperature cream cheese
1/2 cup 0% plain greek yogurt
2-3 tbsp real maple syrup
1 tsp vanilla

That's IT. It's so good it almost didn't make it to the eggs.  Put that aside and here is the "hard" part.

Lemon curd.

Now, lemon curd is usually made with a lot of egg yolks and sounds harder to make than it is.  The key is to NEVER LEAVE IT ALONE.  You have to stand there, kind of like a jerk, and whisk this stuff until it thickens.  I mean it-no answering the phone, door or changing a diaper.  Your kids are on their own. They HAVE to wait if you want curd and not scrambled eggs. But the good part is it only takes about 5-10 minutes MAX.

Lemon Curd Ingredients:
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1/8 cup raw honey
zest and juice from one lemon
2 tbsp coconut oil

Whisk together the egg, yolk, honey and lemon zest.

I used the same simmering pot of water from the chocolate and whisked this for a while over a gentle heat.

I added the coconut oil and whisked again until it was all melted.

Add the lemon juice.

Whisk.  More.  Don't answer the phone I said.
Keep whisking.

And.....not yet.

Ok now, looks good!  It's thick and delicious.  Put it in the fridge!

Bring those eggs back out!   By now they should have hardened.  I peeled the plastic eggs out of the chocolate.  Some broke.  Did I mention make more than you need?  You get to eat the broken ones. BONUS!

I filled up the eggs with the cheesecake filling and then made a little scoop and filled that in with the lemon curd. You could just top it with the lemon curd too. Eat right away or stick in the fridge until after dinner. Yah right, you can't wait. I certainly couldn't.  Not going to lie-I was scraping the cheesecake filling out of the bowl with the broken chocolate...over the sink...so the kids wouldn't see.  You'll do it too, don't pretend.

Come ON!  These look like a perfect Easter treat, do they not?  YUM!

They're decadent, PORTIONED and so so good. 

You can't tell me that doesn't look like a smushed creme egg.  It totally does.

Enjoy! I hope you all have an awesome Easter weekend!  It doesn't have to be all about gross cheap chocolate, it can be something sweet yet better for you.  You deserve it.