Giant Chocolate Easter Bunny, Guinness World Record
It took Crafty Corner 3 days to help Duracell break the Guinness World Record for the World's largest solid chocolate Easter Bunny.
Weighing in at 3,014 tons and measuring 3,82 metres high, Crafty Corner broke the previous Guinness World record by far!
How it was done
Building the Worlds largest solid chocolate rabbit meant a number of challenges. Our first challenge was to find a supplier who could supply 3 tons of chocolate at very short notice. Through our network of contacts, Gold Reef Chocolates came to the rescue, and before we knew it, we were flooded under a giant mountain of chocolate, over 3000kg of the stuff!
The chocolate came in 400g slabs, and to make a giant chocolate bunny with these would have been virtually impossible. Our first task was to melt the small slabs into bigger slabs that we could work with. We brought in the the team at Gold Reef Chocolates to help us. They melted the slabs into solid bricks weighing in at 6,5kg each and individually packaged in strict accordance with our country’s health regulations, giving us something we could really work with.
While this was happening, Mark Fruhauf from Crafty Corner set about designing a giant chocolate bunny that would be solid, as well as meet the strict regulations in order for this to be recognized as an official world record. Chocolate is quite brittle, and this was quite a tricky process, as the rabbit needed to be a replica of the famous Duracell bunny everyone knows so well, as well as have the strength needed to stand on its own, after all, if this toppled over, it would bring a whole new meaning to the term "Death by chocolate!".
After a lot of sketching and redesigning, Mark finally had the technical drawings sorted for what would later become the Worlds biggest chocolate bunny and a recognized Guinness World Record.
The Worlds biggest chocolate Easter bunny was due to be revealed at the Centre Court in Sandton City, and as the shopping mall's doors were too small, we built the entire giant chocolate bunny in a plastic box behind a curtain in Sandton City over three days.
Starting to pack the 6.5 kg blocks of chocolate
To start, we needed pack the bricks of chocolate together. In order for the bunny to be solid, we had to individually melt the top and bottom surfaces of two chocolate blocks before merging them together.
Later on in the packing stage
With a solid design and a mountain of chocolate to work with, the Crafty Corner team set about creating a giant mound of chocolate. As the giant bunny had to be solid, we had to physically melt the blocks with a blowtorch and stick them together. Once we had completed a very rough robot looking bunny weighing about 2500kg, the Crafty Corner's sculptors then set about shaping the blocks.
As we sculpted, we collected the flying chips and added them to trays of melted chocolate to make up a chocolate "plaster paste" which was then used to form the detail of the giant chocolate bunny. This process allowed us to add the additional 500kg that was what we needed to make the 3014kg total in the end.
Constuction of the bunny face begins
Face with more detail after several hours of construction
The Giant Duracell Chocolate Easter Bunny nearing completion, no sleep and many hours later.
The entire process took from Monday morning, 15th April 2010, to Thursday, 18 March 2010 when Duracell gave the sign off at 16:00.
Almost lost in the entire story is how the entire bunny is resting on a tiny scale. This is so that passers-by could stop and see the weight for themselves, as well as providing the correct weight for our record keepers. The official weight came in at 3014kg, and the height at 3.82m.
We all had a blast and kept each other awake with bad jokes, loads or moral support and coffee. Now all that remains to be seen is... what shall we do next?
One week later...
A week after completion, the world record giant chocolate bunny needed to be broken up, bagged and donated to charity.
