Spooky Foods for Little Goblins:

Last year, I shared some recipes for “Finger Foods” (aka, food that you can both eat with your fingers and that looks like fingers) from the “Ghoulish Goodies” cookbook. This year, I took my search for Halloween recipes a little farther abroad, to the Internet. Google did not fail me, and I discovered several ideas for spooky treats that I thought would be a hit with Joss, and that he could probably help make as well.

Toothy Monster Grins

This is hardly worthy of being called a recipe, but it’s still a fun, semi-healthy treat that’s also quite amusing. All you need is an apple, peanut butter (or your favorite nut butter) and marshmallows. Just cut the apple into slices, spread a little peanut butter on each slice, line up a row of marshmallows on an apple slice and top it with another, creating a “mouth.” Repeat with remaining apple slices. Don’t forget to take pictures!

Crescent Roll Mummies

Another simple one. All you need is a can of crescent rolls, some sliced cheddar cheese, hot dogs and mustard. Cut the crescent rolls into thin strips, and cut the cheese into hotdog-width slices. Hold cheese to the back of a hot dog and wrap with crescent roll strips, which will both hold the cheese in place and give the hot dog its mummy-like appearance. (Ideally, your child will be eager to help with this part! Joss was more into just squishing the crescent roll dough.) Bake at 375 degrees F for 13-17 minutes. Once removed from oven, use mustard to create “eyes.” (Note: Try to use mustard with a narrow squeeze tip…mine was too big and made it difficult to make proper eyes.)

Staring-At-You Subs

Ingredients:

• Your favorite meatballs, prepared (I made the mistake of buying Italian-style meatballs at Reasors, in an effort to save time. They were way too sausagy. I should have gone with trying this recipe, as originally planned.)
• 2 green peppers, thinly sliced
• 1 yellow onion, thinly sliced
• 1 Tbsp. butter, approximately
• Pimiento-stuffed olives
• Submarine sandwich rolls
• Mustard, optional

Cook meatballs. In a medium skillet, cook green peppers and onions in butter. While you’re waiting, slice olives, creating round circles that look like irises.

Once everything is done cooking, assemble sandwiches. Put some of the peppers/onions on a sandwich roll, and top with meatballs. Affix the olive “eyes” to the meatballs (I used toothpicks, but make sure you warn your guests/kids if you go this route!) If you want to spread mustard or other condiments on the top of the bun, go for it.

Spiders in My Pizza

I used this recipe as inspiration.

Ingredients:

• Your favorite pizza crust recipe, or prepared pizza crust
• Black olives, whole (the recipe linked to above also uses green olives, but I decided that I’d rather not have green olives on my pizza.)
• Pepperoni
• Pizza sauce
• 2 c. mozaarella cheese
• 1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.
• 2. Cut several olives in half. Slice several others into small strips that will be used to make spider “legs.”
• 3. Slice several pepperonis into thin slices; these will also be used for spider “legs.”
• 4. Once pizza crust is ready, spread it out onto a baking sheet or pizza stone. Spread sauce on top. Top with mozzarrella. Arrange olives and pepperonis on top so that they look like spiders. (Joss also made a nice black-olive caterpillar).
• 5. Bake 15-20 minutes.

I hope you enjoyed these fun Halloween recipes! If you have some favorite Halloween recipes of your own, feel free to share a link in the comments!