Some wonderful Easter treats have just come to our attention.

Look at these beautiful Eggs Naturel, filled chocolate eggs covered in Valrhona white chocolate, from Chocolat Moderne (a NIBBLE Top Pick Of The Week).

The White Egg, “Peanut Pizzazz,” has a center of salted roasted peanut paste blended with dark milk chocolate and flecks of caramelized sugar.

The Brown Egg, “Hazelnut Hystérie,” has a center of roasted hazelnut paste blended with dark milk chocolate and flecks of caramelized sugar.

The Blue Egg, “Parlez Pistache,” is filled with our favorite pistachio paste blended with white chocolate and rice crisps.

Be a good bunny and send these gourmet chocolate Easter eggs to someone you love. Six eggs in large coral gift box, $39.00. To order, telephone Chocolat Moderne, Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Eastern Time, at 212.229.4797. Or visit the website.

Creative and beautiful chocolate Easter eggs.
Photo courtesy ChocolatModerne.com.

The chocolatiers also make “Fauvergé Eggs” with different flavor combinations and Fabergé-like designs, as well as Greek Easter Eggs, infused with anise seed and laced with ouzo.

It’s easy to color coconut to make desserts
more fun. Photo courtesy McCormick.com.

It’s easy to tint coconut for Easter cakes/cupcakes or any other holiday.

1. Place shredded or flaked coconut in a large resealable plastic bag.

2. Squeeze food color into the coconut: 5 to 6 drops per 1 cup of coconut.

3. Shake until color is evenly distributed. If not using immediately, spread in a shallow pan to dry and store in an airtight container.

You can use the coconut in other dishes as well.

For a spring or Easter salad, toss fresh fruit (apples, bananas, mangos, pineapple) or dried fruit (blueberries, cherries, raisins, sultanas) with your greens. Halved pecans are a nice touch as well.

Garnish by sprinkling with flaked or shaved coconut—colored or white.

These chocolate bunnies are just two of the
delicious prizes in this week’s Gourmet
Giveaway. Photo courtesy Martine’s
Chocolates.

If the Easter bunny fails to bring you a basket full of Easter joy, there are still chances to win super-premium chocolate goodies in this week’s Gourmet Giveaway. Three lucky winners will receive adorable (and luscious) artisan chocolate bunnies from Martine’s Chocolates, in their choice of dark, milk or white chocolate.

And Martine’s is offering a freebie for all NIBBLE readers:

PRIZE #2: Naturally Nora Baking Mixes

Need some brownies or a frosted cake in a hurry? Naturally Nora provides boxed cake and frosting mixes made with all-natural ingredients and no artificial colors, flavors or preservatives.

One lucky NIBBLE reader will be able to make three easy frosted cakes and two pans of brownies, with a prize that includes:

Learn more about Naturally Nora at NaturallyNora.com

We’ve gotten to the point where that adorable chocolate Easter bunny just isn’t the temptation he used to be. Old School music rocks, but Old School chocolate is a “been there, ate that.”

We’re going New School with this Bunny Collection edition of the always-welcome Edible Chocolate Box from Charles Chocolates. The chocolate box is filled with Fleur de Sel caramels. How tasty is that?

The lid is of the box (white chocolate) is adorned with a cool Easter bunny and Bunny Jr. Inside the box (made of dark chocolate) are chocolate-covered caramels featuring the bunnies and their neighbors, the Easter chicks.

After you eat the caramels, you eat the box; so you’re guaranteed to get your solid chocolate fix.

The 17 ounces of chocolate make a spectacular gift. But spectacles don’t come cheap: This one is $60.00; 20 pieces of bunny and chick caramels in a blue gift box are $34.00.

Buy it online at CharlesChocolates.com.

Please hop down our bunny trail!
Photo courtesy CharlesChocolates.com.

Bake or buy cupcakes to make these Easter
flower cupcakes. Photo courtesy McCormick.

Easter Sunday is a week away. If you haven’t finalized your Easter menu yet, we have two new recipes:

If you’re not cooking Easter dinner, how about Easter brunch?

Find more Easter ideas by selecting “Easter” from the navigation menu in the right column.

Marshmallow Peeps are an Easter tradition in many homes. In our childhood we were delighted by them; some people find them iconic.

But over the years they’ve tasted worse and worse to us—artificial flavor, and more texture than flavor at that! Perhaps it’s the carnauba wax.

Sorry, Peeps, we’ve replaced you with all-natural, pillowy soft and incredibly flavorful gourmet marshmallows. If your palate demands the best, buy a marshmallow that tastes out of this world.

Check out our review of gourmet marshmallows and you’ll never look at a marshmallow the same way again.

Blackberry marshmallows from Gateau et Ganache.

What wines are you serving with Easter dinner?

Forget the same old, same old. Pour something special to talk about over Easter dinner.

Think of Lachryma Christi (“Tears of Christ”). Or Saint Joseph “Offerus” from Jean Louis Chave: It comes from France’s great Rhone appellation named after Joseph of Arimathea, who donated his own prepared tomb for the burial of Jesus after the crucifixion.

Both wines are delicious and can precipitate a dinner table discussion about the meaning of Easter. Read more about them.

Find more information about wine in our Wine Section.

Serve a real Easter wine this year. Photo
courtesy Australian Lamb Council.

Please hop our way this Easter. Photo
courtesy Vosges Haut Chocolate.

At Vosges Haut Chocolat, the Easter bunnies are of a more flavorful species.

Four exotic, solid chocolate bunnies are ready to hop your way:

Instead of a traditional sorbet presentation,
shape balls of sorbet into oval egg shapes
and serve in a “nest.” Photo courtesy Wine
Cellar Sorbets, a NIBBLE Top Pick Of The
Week.

For a quick and delicious dessert, scoop sorbet in three Easter colors (orange or mango, raspberry or strawberry and lime or kiwi, for example) into oblong-shaped “Easter eggs.”

To shape the sorbet into egg shapes:

1. Use plastic gloves or put your hands into thin plastic bags from the produce section.

2. Let the “eggs” freeze hard on a tray covered with plastic wrap, until serving time.

3. Put one “egg” of each color on a plate and sprinkle with jelly beans. You can also use a meringue “nest” or create a nest of lettuce cups.

4. Serve with tiny cookies, such as Byrd’s Key Lime Coolers and Razzberry Tarts.

5. You can do the same with ice cream or frozen yogurt, but it’s harder to find three bright colors.

Find more dessert ideas in our Ice Cream & Sorbet and Desserts Sections.

How cute are these Easter cupcakes?

A simple cupcake becomes an Easter treat with three simple changes:

1. Use colored cupcake wrappers (shown here, Reynolds Baking Cups).
2. Make pastel-colored frosting in the shape of a “nest.”
3. Place 3 jelly beans in the nest.

Don’t wait until Easter Sunday: Your friends
and family want these cupcakes now.
Photo courtesy Reynolds Kitchens.