Halloween

It's that spooky, ghoulish time of year again...Halloween! I know that for some people this is actually a pretty big deal, but for someone who hasn't been surrounded by it on a yearly basis then it isn't. Therefore, my costume effort today for work was a pretty lame one. Instead the Halloween spirit I did have was channeled into a baking request from a co-worker at the end of last week. She was having a Halloween fancy dress party on the weekend and enlisted my services to provide sweet treats for the event. It was decided that I would make some cake pops, which have previously been made here as well as the cupcakes I had also made here. I gave both of these items a Halloween twist by making the cake pops orange and topping them each with half a green Mike and Ike candy, thus turning them into pumpkins. The cupcakes had black and orange sprinkles baked into them for a confetti effect whilst being topped with chocolate shaggy-style frosting and oversized jack o lanterns. 

That was only half of the project with the final delicious items being sugar cookies using the recipe found here. It had been a while since I had made rolled out cookies so I was fortunate to have the opportunity to make some a week earlier as homework for my weekly decorating class, more about that in a future blog. The sugar cookies became black cats and white ghosts, which turned out really well although it was a bit of a task to create the black royal icing. I used the recipe here for both the white and black royal icing, applying it with a small spatula and using Wilton tip #1 for the eyes and mouth. Once the cats and ghosts were complete it turned out I had extra cookie dough. So drawing inspiration from a co-worker, I cut the dough and molded it into fingers using a knife to define knuckles and almond slivers for the nails. I baked them for a few extra minutes then the recipe suggested, as they were a bit thicker. I suggested to the party hostess that she dip them in a pot of raspberry jam to look like severed fingers, which was an idea my housemate gave me. 

All in all, she was pleased with her Halloween bounty and reported to me today that every last one of the treats were eaten. So as you can see I got into the Halloween spirit in my own way and am looking forward to the next challenge. Happy Halloween!