Diyflavorshack contest - halloween fun- take a peek dont be scared

[carrielsal]

Witches' Fingers

INGREDIENTS:
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup confectioners' sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup whole almonds
1 (.75 ounce) tube red decorating gel
DIRECTIONS:
1. Combine the butter, sugar, egg, almond extract, and vanilla extract in a mixing bowl. Beat together with an electric mixer; gradually add the flour, baking powder, and salt, continually beating; refrigerate 20 to 30 minutes.
2. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Lightly grease baking sheets.
3. Remove dough from refrigerator in small amounts. Scoop 1 heaping teaspoon at a time onto a piece of waxed paper. Use the waxed paper to roll the dough into a thin finger-shaped cookie. Press one almond into one end of each cookie to give the appearance of a long fingernail. Squeeze cookie near the tip and again near the center of each to give the impression of knuckles. You can also cut into the dough with a sharp knife at the same points to help give a more finger-like appearance. Arrange the shaped cookies on the baking sheets.
4. Bake in the preheated oven until the cookies are slightly golden in color, 20 to 25 minutes.
5. Remove the almond from the end of each cookie; squeeze a small amount of red decorating gel into the cavity; replace the almond to cause the gel to ooze out around the tip of the cookie.

 

[Reddhott]

 

[carrielsal]

Marshmallow Witches

Directions
For the face of each witch, place a dab of frosting on the bottom of three chocolate chips; press two for eyes and one for nose onto each marshmallow.
For hair, combine green food coloring and a drop of water in a small resealable plastic bag; add coconut and shake well. Spread a small amount of frosting on sides of marshmallows; press coconut hair into frosting. Place 3 tablespoons of frosting in a small heavy-duty resealable plastic bag; tint orange with red and yellow food coloring. Set aside.
For hats, spread some of the remaining frosting in the center of chocolate wafers; press peanut butter cups upside down into frosting. Lightly spread bottoms of chocolate kisses with frosting; place on peanut butter cups. Cut a small hole in the corner of pastry or plastic bag; insert a small star tip. Fill the bag with frosting and pipe stars around the base of each peanut butter cup. Secure a hat to each witch with a dab of frosting. Yield: 1 dozen.


Read more: Marshmallow Witches Recipe | Taste of Home

 

[carrielsal]

Snake-Bite Calzone

what you need
1 can (13.8 oz.) refrigerated pizza dough
1/2 cup KRAFT Shredded Mozzarella Cheese
1/2 cup POLLY-O Original Ricotta Cheese
31 slices OSCAR MAYER Pepperoni, divided
1 egg white
1 drop each yellow and green food coloring, divided
2 manzanilla olives
1 cup pizza sauce
make it
HEAT oven to 350°F.

UNROLL dough on lightly floured work surface; roll or flatten to 17x10-inch rectangle. Combine cheeses.

CUT 1 pepperoni slice to resemble a snake's tongue; set aside. Arrange remaining pepperoni slices over dough rectangle, leaving 1-inch border around all sides; top with spoonfuls of the cheese mixture. Roll up dough, jelly-roll fashion, starting at one long side; pinch seams together to seal. Place, seam-side down, in "s" shape on baking sheet sprayed with cooking spray to resemble snake.

BEAT egg white and yellow food coloring lightly with fork; brush about half over dough. Add green food coloring to remaining egg white; brush randomly over dough to resemble a snake's splotched skin. Insert olives into one end of dough for the snake's eyes. Add pepperoni tongue.

BAKE 30 to 35 min. or until golden brown. Meanwhile, heat pizza sauce just until warmed.

SERVE calzone with the sauce.

kraft kitchens tipsSPECIAL EXTRAMix 1/2 tsp. Italian seasoning or dried oregano leaves to the cheese mixture before using as directed.FRENCHY SNAKE Omit ricotta cheese and pizza sauce. Substitute 1 can (11 oz.) refrigerated French bread dough (at room temperature) for the pizza dough, KRAFT Shredded Cheddar Cheese for the mozzarella and 14 slices OSCAR MAYER Deli Fresh Smoked Ham for the pepperoni. Roll out dough on lightly floured surface to 16x6-inch rectangle. Spread with 1 Tbsp. GREY POUPON Dijon Mustard to within 1 inch of sides. Arrange 7 ham slices down center of dough rectangle, overlapping slices as necessary; top with Cheddar and remaining ham. Roll up and continue as directed, adding the pimento strip from an additional olive for the tongue.

 

[Reddhott]

Witches Brew

+1/2 gallon vodka
+12 beers
+5 cans frozen lemonade from concentrate
+Food-grade dry ice
+A few drops green food coloring

Directions: Combine vodka, beers and lemonade into a punch bowl and stir. Add a few drops of food coloring. When guests arrive, add a few chunks of dry ice to make the drink start to bubble and smoke. Continue to add bits of dry ice as it melts to maintain the smoke.

Important! Take caution when handling dry ice and be sure to follow the directions that come with the ice to prevent injury. Be sure not to serve any chunks of the dry ice to any of your guest in their drinks.

 

[Reddhott]

Ingredients
1 (3½ ounce) package instant pistachio pudding mix
1 (12 ounce) containers Cool Whip
1 (20 ounce) can crushed pineapple
1 cup chopped pistachios or walnuts
1 bag mini marshmallows
Instructions
Mix pudding package with cool whip and pineapple
Fold in marshmallows, combine well
Refrigerate for at least 2 hours
Add chopped pistachios right before serving

 

[carrielsal]

Skeleton and Brain Dip

what you need
1/2 leaf lettuce leaf
1 cup KRAFT Lite Ranch Dressing
4 cups assorted cut-up fresh vegetables (red and yellow bell pepper strips, cucumber slices, snow peas, mushroom slices, celery sticks, carrot sticks, cherry tomatoes, broccoli florets, cauliflower florets)
make it

LINE half of small bowl with lettuce for the skeleton's hair; fill with dressing. Place at one end of large tray or baking sheet for the skeleton's head.

ARRANGE vegetables on tray to resemble skeleton's body.

 

[Reddhott]

Satan’s Whiskers (from Bitters: A Spirited History of a Classic Cure-All)

½ oz. Old Tom Gin
½ oz. dry vermouth
½ oz. sweet vermouth
½ oz. fresh orange juice
¼ oz. orange cordial (brandy-based or curacao)
3 dashes of orange bitters
Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake vigorously and double-strain into a chilled coupe. Garnish with an orange twist (or, you know, the skin of an orange snake coiled lazily around two melted eyeballs, if you can stomach it).

 

[Reddhott]

How To Make Awful Edible Fleshworms

To make Roasted Awful Edible Fleshworms you'll need a few things. I have two methods of making them - one involves ham and slightly easier cooking, the other requires bacon and more work to prepare. They give similar results but I think the bacon one has a slight edge in looks and flavor.

Both methods require the same basic preparation and handling. A strip of pork tenderloin is wrapped in Prosciutto Ham (just the stuff from the deli counter at the supermarket - no need to get all food-snobbish here) and baked, or a strip of tenderloin is wrapped in strip-style Bacon, then frozen (more on why later), then roasted.

Both are finished off with some high-heat broiling to give the desired amount of "charred/crusty" look to the worm. Then the mouth is cut out and the teeth are inserted. Then the worm is given any final presentation touches that may be necessary.



Method 1 - Using Prosciutto Ham

You will need:

Strip of Pork Tenderloin (This is a boneless strip of meat whose worm-like shape will be useful.)

About 75g - 100g of sliced Prosciutto, depending on the size of your worm. Normal sandwich-slice thickness will be fine - about 1.5mm - 2mm thick.

1 stick of uncooked spaghetti.

Small, sharp knife.




The Prosciutto is on the left, the Pork Tenderloin on the right. The Prosciutto will be the "skin" and the tenderloin will be the "body" of the worm-to-be.



Step 1 - Wrap the Tenderloin with the Prosciutto

Start at the "head" end of what will be the worm, and wrap the strips of ham at a slight angle so they overlap as they wind their way down the tenderloin. Make sure they overlap, and as you get to the end of one strip add another one before you get to the end, so the end of one strip overlaps the beginning of the next by at least a good inch. Handling the worm will shift the ham a little, and the ham is a little fragile. Also, in cooking the ham will shrink somewhat - the last thing you want is for the "skin" not to cover all the tenderloin, so if in doubt wrap and overlap more, rather than less.

Be sure to wrap a little over and past the ends.






Step 2 - Cooking

Place the worm into a roasting pan and stick it into the oven - which has been pre-heated to 350 degrees. (If you forgot to pre-heat the oven, do that now while the worm waits in the fridge).
I cooked my worm for about 25 minutes, after which the tenderloin is well done, and the whole worm had pleasantly "roasted" look to the outside.




However, to give it one final finishing touch, I cranked on the top broiler of the oven at full power and watched carefully as the exterior of the worm got crisped-up a little more.

I did this until it looked right to me - it should not be more than a few minutes at most. Watch constantly when you broil in this way because the difference between "done" and "burned" can be only a few seconds.



Step 3 - Adding the Mouth and Teeth

To make the mouth, use a sharp knife with a small blade. You need to cut out a semi-circle from the "head" of the worm - use the bigger end of the tenderloin as the head-end. You may wish to get a little experimental and creative with the shape of the mouth as well but this gave just the right look I wanted.

Now is a good time to pick up the piece you just cut out and pop it into your mouth. It should be tasty!




Now, take the stick of uncooked spaghetti and break off small pieces (make them longer than the little scrap in the picture - they need to be long enough to stick in and stay!) Stick the small pieces into the mouth as teeth. Do the upper and lower jaws. I found that evenly-spaced teeth of even lengths gave the effect I was looking for.




Only about 1/3 of each tooth is visible; the other 2/3 is pushed into the meat of the jaw to hold it in.




OK! That's shaped up pretty nicely! We have something that looks like a vicious little roasted-up Fleshworm! Now the remaining step is to do any final preparation work for whatever your presentation is going to be.



Step 4 - Final Preparations

Before we can serve the Fleshworm, we need to remove the guts.

Slice open the abdomen and allow the innards to squeeze out. This will serve as a sauce. You may wish to turn on a fan if you're new to this, as I understand that the smell is really quite astonishing.




It's all about the presentation. For example, those "entrails" in the last picture are actually just a little bit of leftover chili. Some spaghetti sauce could work too. Of course, it doesn't look like chili -- it just looks repulsive.

That's the kind of thing you're looking to do in the presentation. Here is an idea for a simple, single-dish presentation. Get creative! Those little hors-d'oevre skewers or vicious-looking little fondue forks can really come in handy.




Now that's starting to look like something you'd find on the dinner table when visiting a house of horrors.

 

[carrielsal]

The Great White Pumpkin Cheese Ball

Ingredients
2 (10-oz.) blocks extra-sharp white Cheddar cheese, shredded*
1 8-oz.) package cream cheese, softened
2 (4-oz.) goat cheese logs, softened
1/2 teaspoon pepper
Braided pretzel, muscadine vine and leaf
Crackers and assorted vegetables
Preparation
1. Stir together first 4 ingredients. Shape mixture into a ball to resemble a pumpkin. Smooth pumpkin's entire surface with metal spatula or table knife. Make vertical grooves in ball, if desired, using fingertips. Press pretzel into top of cheese ball to resemble a pumpkin stem; place muscadine vine and leaf beside pretzel. Serve with crackers and assorted vegetables.

*Extra-sharp Cheddar cheese may be substituted.

Note: We tested with Cracker Barrel Extra-Sharp Cheddar Cheese. To make ahead, wrap cheese ball in plastic wrap, without stem, vine, or leaf, and store in refrigerator up to two days. Attach stem, vine, and leaf before serving.

 

[liblue1]

CANDY CORN POPSICLES

Plain yogurt mixed with honey or agave on the bottom of the mold,
100% orange juice with a tad of food coloring in the middle,
100% pineapple juice with a tad of food coloring as the final layer.
Let each layer freeze up for about 4-5 minutes before adding the next layer

 

[carrielsal]

Monster Eyes

Ingredients
3 cups all-purpose baking mix
1 pound ground hot pork sausage
1 8-ounce block Muenster cheese, shredded
1 7-ounce jar pimiento cheese-stuffed Spanish olives
Preparation
1. Combine 3 cups all-purpose baking mix; 1 lb. ground hot pork sausage; and 1 (8-oz.) block Muenster cheese, shredded, in a large bowl until blended. Shape sausage mixture into 1 1/4-inch balls, and place on lightly greased baking sheets. Press 1 pimiento-stuffed Spanish olive (you'll need 1 7-oz. jar) deeply into center of each ball. Bake at 400° for 15 to 18 minutes or until lightly browned.

Note: For testing purposes only, we used Bisquick for all-purpose baking mix and Jimmy Dean Hot Ground Pork Sausage.

 

[whodat2112]

Jello "shots" in real shots... 30ml syringes purchased from a vet supply website. Just pull the jello shot mixture up into the syringe and chill. Great with red or green jello, vodka or rum. Pull the plungers out and run through the dishwasher to reuse.

 

[whodat2112]

Ingredients
1 ounce bourbon
1/2 ounce lime juice
1/4 ounce grenadine
splash of Mountain Dew
dry ice chips, for presentation (optional)
Note: Always observe dry ice safety measures: Never touch dry ice with bare skin and do not swallow.
Instructions
1. Pour bourbon, lime juice and grenadine into a shaker over ice.
2. Shake well and strain into shot glass.
3. Drop dry ice chips into shot glass and top with Mountain Dew.

Note: Dry ice chips will sink to the bottom of the shot glass. Do not swallow them, wait till dry ice has evaporated to consume the drink.

 

[whodat2112]

Black Devil Martini

Ingredients:

2 oz. dark rum
1/2 oz. dry vermouth
black olive
orange sugar

Preparation:

Stir and strain into chilled martini glass that has been rimmed with orange sugar, then garnish with black olives.

 

[whodat2112]

Black Magic Halloween Cocktail

Ingredients
1/4 cup ice
1/2 cup orange juice
1 1/2 ounces black vodka
1/2 ounce triple sec
orange wedge, for garnish
Instructions
1. In a cocktail shaker, add orange juice and triple sec over ice. Shake well, and strain into a glass.
2. Using the back of a spoon, pour black vodka slowly into a glass so that the vodka sits atop the orange juice and triple sec mix.
3. Carefully dip one edge of the orange wedge into the vodka for a spooky presentation, and sit the wedge on the rim of the glass.

 

[whodat2112]

Black Widow Halloween Shot

Ingredients
1 1/2 ounces black vodka, chilled
1/2 ounces cranberry juice, chilled
1 cherry, for garnish
red sugar crystals, for rim
Instructions
1. Fill a small cocktail glass with ice.
2. Rim glass with red sugar crystals.
3. Pour cranberry juice over ice, and gently layer black vodka over juice.
4. Garnish with a cherry.

 

[whodat2112]

Liquefied Ghost Cocktail

Ingredients:

2 oz. vodka
1 oz. vanilla simple syrup
1 oz. cream
2 oz. soda

Preparation:

Mix vanilla simple syrup, cream, vodka and soda together in a cocktail shaker, then serve in a chilled martini glass.

 

[whodat2112]

Bloody Brain Shooter

Ingredients:

1 1/4 oz. strawberry vodka such as Stoli
1/8 oz. Rose's lime juice
3/4 oz. Bailey's Irish Cream
splash of grenadine

Preparation:

Chill vodka for better smoothness. Add vodka and lime juice to a shaker; shake, then strain into a shot glass. Using a straw, dip some Bailey's Irish Cream into the shot. Once you submerge the straw into the Bailey's, put your finger on top of the straw to hold the Bailey's in the straw. Dip the straw tip into the vodka and slowly release your top finger. The Bailey's will curdle a little bit due to the lime juice and you should be able to make strands of Bailey's.

Repeat the straw/Bailey's process to build a "brain" in the shot glass. Add a splash of grenadine to the concoction to add the "blood" to the mix. Down the hatch as a shot.

 

[carrielsal]

Pumpkin Patch Cheese Balls

Ingredients
2 tablespoons pine nuts
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
4 drops yellow liquid food coloring
2 drops red liquid food coloring
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon ground red pepper
1 (6-ounce) garlic cheese roll
1 (7-ounce) jar pimiento-stuffed olives, drained
Preparation
Bake pine nuts in a shallow pan at 350°, stirring occasionally, 5 minutes or until toasted; cool.

Stir together butter and food colorings in a large bowl. Add flour and red pepper; cut in cheese with a pastry blender until mixture is blended. Shape into a large ball using hands.

Press 1 tablespoon mixture around each olive. Using dull side of a paring knife, score cheese balls with vertical lines to resemble pumpkins. Chill 1 hour.

Bake on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet at 400° for 10 to 12 minutes or until golden. Place 1 pine nut into each cheese ball to resemble stem. Serve immediately or at room temperature, or freeze up to 1 month.