A 10-minute Easter treat -- good for Easter baskets or just a surprise for loved ones

Milk Chocolate Egg Nests

Including taking photos, these took me 10 minutes to make, start to finish. Many years ago, I made all of the treats for my kids' Easter baskets. I made molded chocolate bunnies, marshmallow Peeps, egg-shaped decorated sugar cookies, mini animal graham crackers, mini chocolate rabbits, fudge eggs, and these egg nests.

Russell Stover's sells a single coconut nest for about 33 to 39 cents. I don't think they even have the "eggs" in them any longer, just the coconut and chocolate. I made these for about 14 cents each.

The melting chocolate I bought on markdown, last spring, for $1.89/lb. You could also use chocolate chips (with about a teaspoon of shortening or coconut oil added to the melting), or a regular Hershey bar (again with a small amount of shortening for it to melt better), or you can use white "chocolate." With the white chocolate and milk chocolate bar, like Hershey's, you will want to melt slowly (a double-boiler, or if in the microwave, in short bursts of time -- 20 seconds -- with vigorous stirring in between. The high sugar content of both of those can scorch). Anyway, my price may be met using chocolate chips, if unlike me you do not happen to have coating chocolate in the pantry ;) My coconut was simply a bag of WinCo coconut that I purchased a year ago, and the jelly beans I bought for Easter egg hunts. But in calculating my cost per item, I included the cost of chocolate, coconut, and jelly beans.

Here is how easy they are:

I used about 4 ounces of chocolate, melted in the microwave according to package directions, stirring often between bursts of microwaving.

After melted, I stirred in 1/2 cup of coconut flakes.

I scooped the chocolate/coconut mixture into mounds on a sheet of waxed paper.

Using the back of the spoon that I stirred with, I formed the nest shape, making an indentation for the eggs.

I placed 3 jelly beans into each nest, pressing in slightly. Then I just let them sit and firm up on the counter. If I was in a hurry I might have put them in the fridge at this point.

So, this batch with 4 oz of chocolate and half-cup of coconut made 5  1/2 nests.If I had not been in such a hurry, I could have taken more time to divide the chocolate evenly, and made exactly 5. But this way, I get a little treat later today! You know, "quality control" sampling is allowed, and has zero calories.

I shared this idea because of all of the Easter treats that I have made over the years, these are one of the very easiest.

A long receipt for Senior Discount Day

I think this may have been my largest grocery shopping trip at Fred Meyer. I've bought more than this at Cash & Carry, but the carts are different there (flatbed style), so it never seems as much. The four indications that this was a big shopping trip:

1. I filled the cart above the top edges, and was hanging on to a few items so they wouldn't topple out.
2. My purchases completely filled the car's trunk, and I had to put several bags into the back seat.
3. I think this may be the longest receipt I have ever received, over a yard long -- 38 inches.
4. I completely filled both the garage fridge and the kitchen fridge.

I only deviated from my shopping list for a couple of items: some oyster crackers to use in soups (less expensive than the saltines that I buy, and at least part of the time that we eat crackers it's to crumble into soup); 2 extra loaves of bread, as they were marked down; asparagus because it was on sale for $1.49/lb; and 2 half gallons of chocolate milk, because they were marked down. I spent $111.48 on food. The other day I spent $91.97 at Cash & Carry. oh boy, this is not good -- $203.45 and it's only early March. The good news is that we won't need to shop for several weeks. Between the 2 stores, I think I bought just about everything we could need for the month of March. Maybe some of this will last into next month, but I don't like to count on something so unknown. I may be increasing our monthly grocery allotment.