Sandra Lee An Easter Treat- An Easter Treat

An Easter Treat

Easter is a time of renewal—in spirit and on the calendar. Flowers pop up, baby birds hatch, bunnies hip and hop, and the whole world wears its Sunday best. Bring that outside beauty in, starting with whimsical Victorian-style birdhouses clustered into an Easter village proudly displayed on your buffet table. A pastel plaid tablecloth (or simply a piece of unhemmed fabric) picks up the hues in the cotton candy-tone roofs and are revisited in the napkins. The fluted plates and gold-trimmed teacups with triangular saucers boast four colors and modern designs. Bright-colored eggs are hidden on the table in tea cups turned egg cups, in greenery-wrapped birds’ nests, and in mossy twig baskets. The food is as lovely as the table. An Upside-Down Apple Skillet Pie glows with a golden apple glaze. Serve Butter-Rum Coffee—a blend of butterscotch, vanilla, and whipped cream—for a sweet celebration of new beginnings.

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Accent Pieces

Redefine the eggcup with these scalloped china teacups in spring colors. Use plastic or papier-mâché eggs if you are using them as decoration. Check craft, party, and home stores to find similar styles and patterns. Line birds’ nests (available at craft stores) with moss, tuck in greenery, and nest them with small egg-shaped candies.

Flower-Covered Eggs: To make these eggs, start with Styrofoam® in any size of egg shapes. Working with a hot-glue gun, a section at a time, coat the eggs with glue and attach tiny silk flowers (available at craft stores). Hot-glue or pin a complementary-color tassel to the bottom of the egg and a loop of pastel ribbon to the top.

Centerpiece

This charming tabletop vignette pairs a grapevine basket and birds’ nests into a stand-alone centerpiece that can be doubled to become endpieces to the buffet. Just line the bottom of a twig basket with dried moss and build height with faux pink, blue, and white hydrangeas and pastel-color plastic eggs. Keep the arrangement informal, as if you plucked fistfuls of flowers to carry into the house. Tuck tufts of moss and sprigs of faux ivy and other greenery here and there, twirl greenery up and around the handle, and finish with pink and blue satin ribbons tied into a bow with trailing tails. Embellish the birds’ nests with similar wisps of greenery and mini faux Robin eggs.

Favors

An Easter basket you make is so much more personal than a store-bought one. Buy small pastel-color baskets at a craft store or spray paint in a pastel shade. Buy pastel-colored Easter candy and cookies; bundle in clear or colored cellophane. Tie each bundle with ribbon, leaving a 2- or 3-inch cellophane tail peeking out. Line the basket with cellophane and arrange the bundles in it. Fill in with stuffed animals and lollipop bouquets.

Music: Judy Garland. Fred Astaire. Irving Berlin: The movie soundtrack from Easter Parade is a triple treat. And the mellow mood matches the table—light, festive, and utterly delicious.

Food and Drinks

Decorating Easter cookies with the kids is a fun family project, especially if you keep it simple. Cream Cheese Sugar Cutouts start with refrigerated slice-and-bake dough so you can spend more time on the fun stuff that makes your cookies special. Mix up a box of royal icing and thin it with water so it’ll dry into a stiff, glossy glaze on your cookies. Divide the icing into bowls, tint it with a drop or two of food coloring to get the right pastel shades, then pour each shade into a plastic squirt bottle. This “squeeze” method allows you to do all kinds of fun effects and swirls—even write names—while keeping things neat. When it comes to toppings, the more the merrier, so set up a “sundae” bar of candies, sprinkles, and colored sugars—it’s very orderly and the whole family can get involved. Remember to use toothpicks for creating decorative designs such as tie dye.