Sugar Easter Eggs are such a fun, nostalgic Easter tradition! Like little egg dioramas, these decorated hard sugar eggs are meant to be displayed.
It's an old-fashioned activity that your kids will love making. From molding the sugar to creating a cute scene inside with miniatures, this craft idea is totally a lost art!
Panoramic Sugar Eggs are one of my family's holiday traditions that I now get to share with my kids.
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Post was originally created years ago and has been updated with clearer steps and links to products.
Sugar Easter Eggs are a Fun Tradition!
These Panoramic Easter Eggs aren't the easiest things to make but they are super awesome.
This is not a craft that you can just let your kids do on their own. Mom will need to be hands-on and do the heavy lifting.
But once the sugar has been molded and scooped out, the kids can decorate their hearts out.
They will love peeking through the little window!
It's hard to find any real information on the history of these cute Easter decorations. They seem to have been first created in Eastern Europe. Like any good tradition, you'll need to infuse your own memories when sharing this with your kids.
What are Panoramic Sugar Eggs?
Panoramic sugar eggs are super cool.
They are hollow eggs made of molded sugar that have the center scooped out and have a diorama-like scene with miniatures inside.
Packing sugar and water into a sugar Easter egg mold creates a shell that hardens as it dries.
Sitting upright or on their side, sugar eggs can be decorated on the inside and out.
While these are made of edible ingredients, I think they are best used as an Easter decoration.
My mom and I had so much fun posting about the candy bar trains we used to make at Christmas that we thought we would share this super fun to remake our sugar eggs too.
They are a bit time-consuming and pretty fragile, but the end result looks totally elaborate, it makes the work worth it.
But thank goodness we only make these every few years…I'm far too lazy for this type of activity.
Note: Make sure you read through these directions before you decide to make them.
You really need to make them a day or two ahead of time to make sure the molded sugar sets up and hardens as much as possible.
Or you can pull a Sharon and read through the steps halfway and then try to make them and not give yourself enough time…
Long story short, there is a process for making sugar eggs for Easter that you should know before you start.
Watch A Sugar Panoramic Easter Eggs Video
It might be helpful to watch a quick video to see how the whole process looks.
The recipe in the video uses meringue powder mixed in with the white sugar which probably helps make the sugar harden better.
They also made theirs stand upright which allows for more room for a scene inside. Which, I also think, it makes them more susceptible to kids knocking them over.
From a girl who wouldn't use a stemmed wine glass until her youngest turned 8, I prefer to make them on their side. :)
How to Make a Sugar Egg for Easter
Panoramic Sugar Egg Supplies
You need a few special items to make these see-through Easter eggs so you will want to make sure you plan ahead.
- Small Sugar Easter Egg mold
- Large Sugar Easter Egg mold
- Piping Bags and Tips
- Spoon
- Butter knife
- Sugar decorations for the outside like sugar flowers and sugar bunnies
- Easter Miniatures plus dollhouse miniatures
- Chocolate Covered Sunflowers Seeds (they look like little Easter eggs!)
Ingredients for the eggs:
- 6 cups of sugar
- 3 TBSP water
- Food coloring (optional)
- Meringue Powder, and powdered sugar to make royal icing
I am super lucky that I have my mom's vintage miniatures to use. I've looked at my local craft stores and also online and they are really hard to come by.
I pick them up whenever I see any that might work for the candy bar trains or these sugar eggs.
My mom did not keep her sugar egg instructions so she searched around online to refresh her memory of how to mold sugar. She used this post as a guide.
We made the eggs pink so it would be easier to show the first steps. I like making my panoramic eggs white so the decorations really stand out but you can totally make them any color you want.
Steps to Make Sugar Eggs
- Put the sugar in a bowl.
- Add water, a little at a time and mix (by hand or with a spoon) with the sugar. You want the sugar to hold together when you squeeze it in your hand.
- Pack the sugar into the mold, making sure the mold is filled all the way to the top.
- Use a knife to level the top so it's smooth.
- Invert the mold and carefully remove the egg.
You'll want to make sure the sugar isn't too dried out so you can get the center started for scooping.
- Cut the flat edge off that will be the front window to the panoramic Easter egg. As you can tell, this is the smaller model and the window is pretty small. The real magic happens on the inside though.
- Dig out a little section, which will help you get started scooping out the rest of the middle, later.
- Then wait. For about 2 hours.
- After two hours, the center will still be a bit soft but the outer shell will be harder.
- Using a spoon, scoop out the middle, leaving enough around the outside so that it doesn't collapse.
- Do small sections at a time being extra careful near the front section, which you previously cut flat.
- It will be harder closer to the center and you may need to use a little pick or toothpick to help get through it. (A spoon might be a little too much force.)
The egg on the right is scooped out and the other side is not. If you wait too long, you won't be able to scoop it out and then you will have a solid sugar egg which I think would still look pretty cool, especially if you didn't cut off the flat edge on the front.
Once it is all scooped out, let the eggs sit to harden for a day or more.
As you can tell from the photo, the small molds are pretty small. This size might be better suited for sitting upright. In that case, you would use the flat part of the side of the egg for it to sit up.
Then you would scrape out the center from the side that was flat from the mold.
Once the sugar eggs are hard, you can start getting really creative with them.
You will need miniatures, royal icing in various colors and bright candies to decorate with. Chocolate covered sunflower seeds are super cute and look like little decorated Easter eggs!
My mom used to do a lot of cake decorating so she has a ton of decorative icing tips that I get to use for these fun food crafts.
Here we made grass using green royal icing. The royal icing works, not only to hold the two sides of the egg together but also as the glue to hold the scene, with the miniatures and bunnies, inside the eggs.
If I was doing this myself, since I have no baking or decorating skills, I would color some coconut and use it for grass instead.
Make sure the flat side of the egg is sitting on the table as you decorate. You want the full, round egg part on top.
Oh hey there drunk bunny. I found this miniature wine bottle and glasses at the craft store and knew I had to pick it up.
I think it worked out pretty perfectly with this little bunny. Nothing says Jesus is risen like a bunny drinking wine. Amiright?
Once your scene is complete, you can then start to put your eggs together and decorate the outside.
Use royal icing to “glue” the two halves together.
Try to match it up as close as possible. Don't worry if it doesn't match exactly. You'll be able to hide the seam with piped icing.
You can use a nail file to file down the sugar and make the edges match up a little better. Just be careful! It's fragile! And again, you can hide flaws with the icing.
And then the fun begins of decorating the outside. I don't have any experience with cake decorating so I got really sweaty when my mom suggested that I do this part.
Just practice some simple flowers a few times on a paper towel first and get the technique down. It's super simple with the flower tip. The icing hides the messy parts and makes everything look cuter.
Wilton has an easy tutorial for How to Pipe a Flower here.
And then you finish decorating however you would like to. I piped icing all around the front and then added some pizzaz to the top in the way of sugar candies.
When my kids got home from school and saw adorable sugar Easter eggs they totally freaked out. Well, they immediately asked if they could eat them and then they told me how cool they thought these were.
Can you Eat Sugar Eggs?
Your kids will definitely ask if they can eat sugar eggs. And the answer is yes. Technically they are made from edible ingredients. But I wouldn't let them.
The sugar is super hard so they won't be able to bite through it without maybe breaking their teeth. Also, your hands have been all over these and well, that's gross.
The most they could eat would be the sugar decorations off the outside. And those never taste good.
And if you package these up carefully and air-tight, you may be able to use them again for the next few years!
Where to Buy Panoramic Sugar Eggs
If all of this sounds like too much work, you can also just buy one! Check out some ready-made sugar egg decorations.
If your family
- Waffle Bar and Easter Craft Ideas for Kids
- A Cool Easter Setting
- Easter Menu Ideas
- Italian Easter Cake Idea
- Super Cute Easter Cakes to Make for Your Celebration
These sugar eggs would be perfect for your Easter table or even as a spring centerpiece. Have you ever made these before? A BIG thank you to my mom for indulging me in this post and helping me to make the eggs!
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