Easter Fun: Easy DIY Butterscotch Nest-Basket

Know how every Easter you buy new baskets and that plastic grass to hold candy for your kiddies? Always thinking you will put them up and keep them for next year, and maybe you do, but then they get broken or lost or the new Easter rolls around and you can’t remember if they got broken or lost ~ or tossed in the throes of some I’m-gonna-get-this-house-organized-once-and-for-all! episode that you’d rather not remember just now . . . .

Well, here’s an idea we came up with recently that’s fun and easy and inexpensive, and which will do away with all that ~ and it will save you weeks of finding strands of plastic grass in the furniture, your kids’ clothes, your kids’ hair, your hair . . . .

Basic list of items you’ll need follows the video, along with a step-by-step how-to. Happy nest making!

to  make 1 large or 4-6 small nests

1 11oz pkg of Nestle butterscotch morsels
1 12oz pkg of dry chow mein noodles (I like China Boy brand from Target)
Easter candy to put in the nests! (used in the video: Reece’s peanut butter cups; Butterfinger golden eggs, Whopper malted milk eggs, Peeps, Lindt chocolate foil wrapped bugs, including 2 ladybugs! (hi mama!), and Twizzlers pull and peel candy)

1. put water in the bottom of a double boiler or a 4-6 quart saucepan and bring to boil.
2. shut the heat off under the water, then put entire package of morsels in the top pan of the double boiler or a slightly smaller metal or glass pan or bowl in the saucepan (be careful not to get water in the pan with the morsels or they will “seize” ~ if that does happen, a friend of mine says you can loosen them back up by adding a little milk)
3. morsels will begin to melt, while you open the chowmein noodles and put them in a big bowl
4. stir morsels (I use a butterknife for this) until completely melted (only takes a couple of minutes)
5. pour melted morsels into chow mein noodles and mix, coating noodles completely (3-5 minutes)
6. line the bowl(s) you’ll be making your nest(s) in with plastic wrap or similar food wrapping material
7. shape butterscotch noodles in the bowl into a nest (you’ll want to do this quickly while candy is still soft/warm)

• Hint: we first tried shaping the nest outside the bowl for the small nest but later discovered that shaping inside the bowl worked better for the nest forming and staying together.
• Hint: along those same lines, if the candy has cooled/hardened too  much to stick together well, you can sit the bowl over the still hot water to let the candy melt together a bit more, or if your bowl is glass or ceramic, you can place it in a 200 degree oven for 5 minutes or so ~
• Hint: additionally  (as you’ll see with the bigger nest in the video), you can melt a bit more butterscotch and paint the inside of the nest with the warm butterscotch on a rubber spatula to help strengthen the bond. (Incidentally, after we had successfully removed the large nest by lifting it at 4 points, I broke it by picking it up with my hands on either side (they don’t call me the SpaceLady for nothin’!), so my husband suggested I put it in the oven back in the bowl [which is ceramic] lined with parchment paper (DON’T use plastic wrap ~ I got room in my space cadet club, but you don’t want to join THAT way! ;-)). I did that (the oven bit, not the plastic wrap bit!)~ 200 degree oven, 10-15 minutes ~ worked like a charm!

8. let nest(s) sit for at least an hour or two (longer won’t hurt)
9. fill with and decorate with candies
10. be modest and humble when the children (small and tall) sing your praises . . .;-)

And drop us an email, if you get a chance and let us know how you “butterscotch-nested” with your own special flair this Easter! at ThoseGirls@Shirley-and-the-SpaceLady.com

Hope you had as much fun with this as we did ~ See you next time!

Cherie & ‘becca (aka: Shirley & the SpaceLady)