Marianna's Cooking Adventures: Happy Halloween!!

I know its been awhile! We have been keeping busy between helping my parents move into their lake house, working, and planning for our Halloween Party time flies! Speaking of which we had such a great time with our friends. Here are a few things we made.

Monster Toes

Recipe Ingredients:

Cocktail wieners
6-inch tortillas
Ketchup or mustard
Toothpicks
Directions
1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Cut a wedge into the end of each cocktail wiener to make a toenail.
2. Cut the tortillas into strips about 4 inches long and 3/4 inch wide. Discard the ends.
3. Soften the strips in the microwave between damp paper towels for 10 to 30 seconds.
4. Roll each wiener in a tortilla strip and secure with a toothpick.
5. Bake for 7 to 8 minutes. Remove them from the oven, then fill the toenail with ketchup or mustard.
**adapted from Family Fun magazine

Finger Food

( Pardon the pun I know it sounds cheesy...sorry couldn't help it!)

These were so much fun to make!

Ingredients

Mozzarella string cheese
Green bell pepper
Cream cheese
Instructions

*Wearing plastic gloves or sandwich bags over your hands to keep the cheese as smudge-free as possible, use a paring knife to cut each string in half and then carve a shallow area for a fingernail just below the rounded end of each half.
*Mark the joint right below the nail as well as the knuckle joint by carving out tiny horizontal wedges of cheeses.
*For the fingernails, slice a green bell pepper into 3/8-inch-wide strips. Set the strips skin side down on your work surface and trim the pulp so that it's about half as thick. Then cut the strips into ragged-topped nail shapes and stick them in place at the ends of the fingers with dabs of cream cheese.
**adapted from Family fun magazine

Edible Eyeballs

These were a hit! Who doesn't love pudding pops? I found a new use for plastic Easter eggs they made perfect molds for this recipe.

Ingredients

3.4-ounce box vanilla pudding mix
Jelly beans
LifeSavers Gummies
Plastic eggs
2 empty egg cartons

Instructions

*Prepare the pudding according to the package directions. For each eye, fit a jelly bean into the center of LifeSavers Gummies candy and place it in a plastic egg half.
*Fill the egg cup with the pudding, then place the egg halves in an egg carton in the freezer until they're firm (about 3 hours).
*Remove the egg halves from the freezer and let them sit at room temperature for about 3 to 5 minutes.
*With the back of a fork, gently press down on the edge of the pudding, rolling the frozen ball out of the egg cup. If you're not serving them right away, place the eyes in a freezer-safe dish in the freezer until you're ready.
**adapted from Family Fun magazine

Gina's Cheesy Witch Hat

I have been asking my friend Gina to share her cheese ball recipe for years. For every occassion we ask her to make this recipe there are never any left overs. This year she out did herself. Isn't she creative? It WAS to cute to eat but of course we are never shy so we had to eat it!

Ingredients:
2 (8 oz.) packages of cream cheese soften

1/2 cup butter soften
1 (.7 ounce) package of italian salad dreesing mix
10 ounces (2 1/2 cups) Cheddar Cheese shredded

Combine all ingredients and refridgerate. Once it has chilled, divide into two balls. One smaller than the other. Flatten the smaller ball out to make the brim of the hat, and shape the other ball into the hat.
I covered the cheese in fineyl chopped pecans, but the recipe calls for poppy seeds if you like them. Decorate to fit you own ghoulish taste. Have fun with it.

Gina's Spooktacular Mix

Gina makes this for every holiday and you just can't stop eating it. Its so addicting.
1 jar of party peanuts
1 bag of candy corn
1 bag of M&M's
Mix all ingredients together and serve. These bag great gifts for friends and co-workers. I made some for my husband and I to take to work.