by Sharon | Jul 20, 2014
Did you ever imagine adorable gingerbread men being turned into vampires? Well it can be done with just a bit of frosting gel to his precious smile. It seems whatever recipe you have, you can turn it into something special for Halloween. I’ve never been a great fan of gingerbread cookies, but I have acquired a taste for them through the years. I guess next will be the quaint gingerbread houses turned into haunted houses. Hummm, decorating these could be quite fun.
This image is compliments of http://www.flickr.com
Can you imagine having a tray of these greeting your guests at the food table? They are frightfully delicious! I think they would be great fun to put in a box and hear the screams of fright when the box is opened.
Well, you’ve seen the image, now to get down to the traditional gingerbread men recipe.
Ingredients:
1 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 cup softened butter or margarine
1/2 cup molasses
1 egg
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ground ginger
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
frostings of your choice for decorating
You may want to use M & M’s or Skittles for the buttons down the front of the body
You may also like to have a Gingerbread Man cookie cutter.
Now, to get this dough mixed up and popped in the oven:
1. Get out your mixer and large mixing bowl. You’ll need it to beat the brown sugar, butter, molasses and egg on medium speed until well blended.
2. Turn the mixer down to low speed as you beat in the flour, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, salt and cloves.
3. You’re now ready to remove the dough from the bowl onto a lightly floured surface. Just make the dough into a ball and press into a flat disk. Wrap it up in plastic wrap and pop it in the refrigerator for an hour or until firm.
4. Back to work on your cooled, firm dough.
5. Heat oven to 350°F.
6. Get out the cookie sheets and give them a light glaze of cooking spray.
7. Lightly flour your working surface. Now, you’re ready to roll out the dough to a 1/4-inch thickness. I lightly flour my rolling pin to keep it from sticking and pulling out pieces of the dough.
8. Now for the fun part, cutting out the gingerbread men. Using a gingerbread man cookie cutter which needs to be lightly floured, too. That’s some sticky dough!
9. Place your gingerbread men 2 inches apart on prepared cookie sheet.
10. Reroll dough scraps together, roll them out to 1/4-inch and cut out additional cookies. Do this step as many times as necessary.
11. Bake 10 to 12 minutes in the oven.
12. Immediately remove from cookie sheets to cooling racks. Thorough cooling takes about 30 minutes.
13. Now, you’re ready to decorate!
This is a fun recipe that allows you to get creative.
by Sharon | Jul 13, 2014
Look what we have here! This is a definite taste sensation! My only question is How do you eat it? From the marshmallow head, skeleton body to the brownie base, I’m thinking some dismantling may be in order to get a really good bite out of this. Or, you may want to eat it piece by piece from the bottom to the top. It would be interesting to present these at a party and watch how others go at it and devour it. I know some who will save the brownie for last and others will eat it first, then try to trade you their skeleton for your brownie.
This image is compliments of http://www.wantsandwishesdesign.com
As mentioned above, this happy skeleton is sitting on a brownie. He’s made from mini pretzels dipped in white chocolate with a marshmallow head decorated with black frosting gel.
I don’t think you really need a recipe, but I’ll do my best to satisfy your sweet tooth — and you know this is going to be sweet. It will also satisfy those who love, love, love chocolate.
Here’s a Brownie Recipe inspired from http://www.allrecipes.com that isn’t too thick nor too thin which I think would be perfect for this project. You can frost them or not.
Ingredients for making 16 Brownies
1/2 cup butter
1 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
Frosting:
3 tablespoons softened butter
3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup confectioners’ sugar
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
- Grease and flour an 8-inch square pan.
- In a large saucepan, melt 1/2 cup butter.
- Remove from heat, and stir in sugar, eggs, and 1 teaspoon vanilla.
- Beat in 1/3 cup cocoa, 1/2 cup flour, salt, and baking powder.
- Spread batter into prepared pan.
- Bake in preheated oven for 25 to 30 minutes. Do not overcook.
To Make Frosting:
- Combine 3 tablespoons softened butter, 3 tablespoons cocoa, honey, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, and 1 cup confectioners’ sugar.
- Stir until smooth.
- Frost brownies while they are still warm.
Now we have the base for the skeleton.
For the skeleton you’ll need:
- A bag or two of White Chocolate Melts
- A bag of Mini Pretzels
- A bag of Marshmallows
- A tube of Black Frosting Gel
Directions are basically an assembly line process:
- Melt the white chocolate melts in the microwave (I don’t melt the whole bag at once. I prefer to use what I make and then melt a fresh batch.)
- Dip a mini pretzel into the melted white chocolate, place on wax paper
- Dip another mini pretzel and place it on top of the previously dipped pretzel
- Do this until you have a stack of 6 pretzels — you can have more or less, depending how you want your skeleton to look.
- You may want to add the marshmallow “head” — dip it in the white chocolate just to get the bottom to stick to the top pretzel
- You can either decorate the marshmallow faces before or after you set them on your stack of white chocolate pretzels
- Repeat this process until you have 16 skeletons to put on top of your brownie squares
- You can either stick the skeletons on your brownie squares with white chocolate or the brownie frosting.
There you have your Delicious Skeleton On A Brownie Halloween Treats.
You can put these in sandwich size zip lock bags or on a plate, however you prefer to serve them. If you bag them, you’ll need to print out something clever to staple to the bag, but I’m sure you’ll think of something or we’ll have something here you can use. To tell you the truth, I think homemade labels give more of a personal touch than something printed out, but I’ll see what I can find suitable for this project.
Here’s a Free Printable compliments of http://www.sherbetblossom.com
Or you may like a variety of labels for your various Halloween projects compliments of http://www.mygrafico.com/freebies/free-printable-halloween-party-kit/prod_5511.html
by Sharon | Jul 11, 2014
She got a cupcake with green frosting dropped on her, of course.
Image and concept compliments of http://www.foodnetwork.com
I know, it’s not what happened in the Wizard of Oz, but that’s definitely what can happen on your plate when you make cupcakes, decorate them with green frosting and plunk one on orange fondant legs (2 3″ long rolls). You make the shoes with black fondant and use black decorating gel to finish off the witch’s stockings. It’s an upside-down decorated cupcake!
Kids will love them and your adult guests will, too.
They’re fun and make me laugh.
