Easter Bunny Brunch + Pink Pancakes!

I love that every new holiday brings with it a chance for fun parties and decorations! Easter seems to be the perfect holiday for a cute brunch, so we teamed up with ALDI to show you some quick and easy decorations you can put together for a memorable (and delicious) bunny brunch. Plus—who doesn’t love a good alliteration?!

If you have children in your life, they’re sure to be excited (egg-cited?) about all of the fun table decorations, but I think they all work well for an adult gathering as well. Just change up the color scheme to suit your style and home. (Yes, I had bags of blue, green, and yellow eggs that were rejected from my brunch and sent to live with friends!)

I used linen napkins as placemats of sorts to anchor each place setting and used gift basket filler down the middle of the table as a table runner that worked nicely with the color of my tablecloth, adding contrast in texture rather than color. I tucked small plastic eggs into the basket filler around stationary serving dishes.

Every Easter I love watching the reaction of my kids as they wake up and find their filled baskets on the dining room table. It also gives them something to do while the pancakes are being made. (It can be difficult to be patient when the smell of pancakes is lingering in the air!) ALDI has these cute buckets (also in blue) that we used for baskets and filled with items for the kids like bubble wands, plastic eggs and basket filler, organic fruit snacks, candy, and stuffed animals that we also found at ALDI while getting our normal grocery items too! Shopping at ALDI makes it so easy to get both fun items for a brunch like this along with everyday staples!

EASTER EGG GARLAND

I’m practically swimming in plastic eggs at my house, so making an Easter egg garland was a quick and easy project that made a huge impact on the decor of our bunny brunch. Inexpensive and quick is always a winning combination!

Supplies:
-plastic easter eggs
-twine or ribbon

All you need to do to make your own garland is open the eggs and tuck the twine into the plastic connector piece (that keeps the two halves of the egg together), then close the egg securing the twine in place. If you don’t have the connector pieces on your plastic eggs, you can simply close the egg over top of the twine, as long as the twine or ribbon you are using is thin enough.

Once you have enough length, hang the garland around a window or mantel, or drape it around a cabinet or credenza.

EGG BUNNY PLACE CARDS

Place cards are a simple way to make each of your brunch guests feel special, even if you’re not fancy people. This place card craft is quick to make, adds a sweet touch to your table, and is easy for kids to do too. Most likely you already have everything you need to make these little guys.

Supplies:

-white chicken eggs (hard or soft boiled if you plan to eat them)
-white card stock
-scissors
-tacky glue
-egg cups
-paint + fine brush

Cut out pairs of rabbit ears from the card stock. I didn’t use a template for this, you can just make them in the style and size that you want. Bend the flat ends of the ears and use tacky glue to attach them to the tops of the eggs. The tacky glue will keep the ears from sliding off the egg as the glue cures. Finish them off by hand painting or stamping guests’ names onto each egg and placing in the egg cups at each place setting.

PINK BUNNY PANCAKES WITH STRAWBERRY GLAZE

These adorable pancakes were the hit of our bunny brunch! Definitely worth the extra effort. Of course, you can use your favorite pancake recipe or mix to make this Easter-themed treat, but I have my go-to pancakes recipe I’ve used without fail through the years. These only take about 15 minutes total to make! I simply added two drops of pink gel food coloring at the end to achieve the color I wanted.

If you think you’d like to make these bunny-shaped pancakes, I would highly recommend making them in advance of your brunch and reheating them before serving (or keeping them in a warm oven shortly before brunch is served). If you’ve never tried to make specifically-sized/shaped pancakes before, the process can take a bit of practice. Especially if you want your pancakes a light pink color, without much browning. It’s also a bit tricky to form bunny ear and paw shapes that are uniform in size and non-mutant looking. But I quickly got the hang of it (using a non-greased, nonstick skillet), and next time it will be even easier!

EASY CLASSIC PANCAKES

Ingredients:
-1 1/2 cups Baker’s Corner flour
-1 1/2 tablespoons Baker’s Corner granulated sugar
-3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
-1/2 teaspoon salt
-1 1/4 cups milk
-1 teaspoon Stonemill vanilla extract
-1 egg at room temperature
-3 tablespoons Countryside Creamery melted butter
-Southern Grove Sliced almonds (for bunny feet)
-2 drops of pink or red food coloring (optional)

Strawberry Glaze Ingredients:
-Baker’s Corner powdered sugar
-Season’s Choice frozen strawberries

Directions:

Sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a medium-sized bowl. Melt butter and add to warmed (not hot) milk and the beaten egg. Add the food coloring to the wet ingredients if you want colored pancakes. Then stir together the wet and dry ingredients until just combined, leaving some small lumps. Over-mixing detracts from their soft, fluffy texture.

Pour batter onto a medium-heated skillet and carefully flip once the underside is just beginning to turn golden.

For the Glaze:

Simply blend together equal parts powdered sugar and thawed strawberries. You can use fresh, but I find that this is the perfect application for frozen strawberries from ALDI, which I found at a great price! Once the mixture is pureed, add it to a serving pitcher to use as an alternative to standard pancake syrup.

This strawberry glaze is an alarmingly delicious treat that is also wonderful poured over bundt cakes and quick breads!

I sense the beginnings of an Easter tradition for our family! Maybe we’ll mix it up with new place settings next year, but I love how simple it was to use plastic eggs and basket filler for the main decorations for our holiday table. But if there’s an opportunity to organize a cute brunch—including pancakes—you can count me in! –Mandi

Credits //Author and Photography: Mandi Johnson. Photos edited with the NEW A Beautiful Mess actions.