Make Your Own Easter Basket Treats!

It's very easy to pick up traditional Easter candies at your local store, but it's so much more fun to make them from scratch! Any of these projects can be an enjoyable and educational experience for kids, and homemade treats are a perfectly personal gift. And they're tasty, too.

1. Peeps

Yes, you can make your own marshmallow Peeps. It's just a matter of decorating your homemade marshmallows. Kathleen at Twig & Thistle takes it from there. Add your color before the marshmallow sets. Cut them out with cookie cutters, dampen slightly, and roll in colored sugar. Don't forget little candies for the eyes! An alternate method from Serious Eats uses a whipped marshmallow mixture that you can squeeze into the classic Peep chick shape. It takes a steady hand and a little practice.

2. Cadbury Creme Eggs

Cadbury eggs seem complicated, with a yolk and white that looks like a chicken egg but tastes like heaven. However, this recipe from Instructables breaks it down into steps that you can accomplish. The yellow and white filling are the same thick fondant you can mold with your hands. The chocolate covering is the delicate part, and even if the result is less-than-picturesque, it will taste delicious.

3. Giant Cadbury Creme Egg

Once you've conquered the Cadbury Creme Egg, you may as well make the leap to the giant Cadbury egg. The process requires more ingredients and a bigger mold, but the rewards will be greater as well. The guys who made this 8-inch tall egg also made their own foil wrapper!

4. Chocolate Bunny

Making a chocolate rabbit is just a matter of following instructions for melting chocolate and using a bunny mold. You can make your bunny solid, or let the chocolate cool enough to be a little stiff, then paint the inside of the mold with a even layer to make a hollow bunny, like the chefs in the video. Chocolate Easter eggs are made the same way.

5. Whoppers

Many chocolate Easter eggs are made of malted milk balls, or what we know by the name brand of Whoppers. The simple part of making them at home is mixing chocolate with malted milk powder and rolling into balls. Dipping them in chocolate afterward is kind of tricky, but it's a skill worth practicing. The reviews of the recipe say these are better than Whoppers.

6. Tootsie Rolls

Traditional Tootsie Rolls are relatively inexpensive and plentiful, so you won't save any money by making your own. But the homemade versions are tasty and softer than the store-bought kind. Allrecipes has an extremely easy version, (pictured) with a list of ingredients and simple instructions: "Mix all ingredients together. Knead like you would for bread. Roll into rope shapes and cut into desired lengths." Right, no cooking at all! A slightly more complex recipe that does involve a bit of cooking yields rolls very close in texture to the original.

7. Pop Rocks

I really wanted to find a recipe for homemade jelly beans to complete the traditional Easter basket, but found nothing that really approximated the jelly beans we know and love. However, we can substitute Pop Rocks, because we have a recipe! These directions at Instructables yield a candy that relies on citric acid and baking soda to create the fizzy sensation on your tongue. And don't forget your hammer!