Halloween Treats!

A lot of people know that Halloween is my favorite holiday of the year. I love everything about it from pumpkins to costumes to candy and more, this holiday is so much fun. I went to a few costume parties this weekend, but I'm planning on spending my Halloween watching scary movies and giving trick or treaters candy with some of my friends.

My unicorn pumpkin and my boyfriends driving skeleton pumpkin.

To spice the movie night up, I made a few really spooky treats, because what better way is there to celebrate Halloween than with Halloween themed snacks?

Starting out with these simple take on cheese and crackers with these string cheese witches broom sticks.

I simply took sticks of string cheese and cut each one into 3 equal pieces. Then I cut each piece vertically to look like strands on a broom. Lastly I cut into those pieces twice horizontally to make the piece of cheese look frayed and more like an actual broom. I added a pretzel stick on top for the handle and voila, a broomstick!


The next snack on my party list are these super cute jalapeño popper mummies!

Find this recipe at the bottom of this post.

They're made with roasted jalapeños, cream cheese, cheddar cheese, and olives for the eyes.


Finally I made these adorable and extremely delicious spider cookies! They're basically snickerdoodle kiss cookies, but with a mini Reese's cup instead of a Hershey's kiss. 

Recipe at the bottom of this post.

However you are celebrating today and even if you're not, these snacks can be altered for any occasion. Cook away!





Mummy Jalapeño Poppers

Ingredients:

• Crescent rolls or puff pastry
• 10 jalapeño peppers halved lengthwise and seeded
• 8 ounces cream cheese
• 8 ounces grated pepper jack cheese
• 1 green onion, finely chopped
• Black olive slices for eyes

Directions:

1. Halve and seed the jalapeño peppers.
2. Combine the two cheeses and green onions and mix well.
3. Fill the mixture into the jalapeño pepper halves.
4. Use a pizza cutter to slice strands of the dough. Wrap the strands of dough around the jalapeños to resemble a mummy. Leave space for the olive eyes.
5. Bake at 400 degrees for 8-10 minutes until golden brown.
6. Remove from oven and immediately press olive slice eyes in the spaces for the eyes.

Spider Snickerdoodle Cookies

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup shortening
• 1/2 cup peanut butter
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tbsp milk (I used almond milk)
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 3/4 cup flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 cup sugar (for rolling)
• Mini Reese's cups, frozen
• Candy eyes
• Melting chocolate or frosting in a tube

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. In a large bowl, beat together shortening, peanut butter, egg, sugar, brown sugar, vanilla, and milk.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt.
4. Gradually add dry mixture to wet mixture and beat until blended.
5. Form into 1 inch balls.
6. Roll in sugar and place a couple of inches apart on ungreased cookie sheet.
7. Bake 10-12 minutes or until golden.
8. Immediately, gently press an upside frozen Reese's cup on top of each cookie and move to wire rack to cool.
9. After placing and moving all the cookies on the wire rack, put in place the candy eyes while chocolate is still slightly soft.
10. Place in refrigerator for 10 minutes to allow cookies to firm.
11. Melt chocolate in a bag and cut the corner to pipe the spider's legs on to the cookie. I used frosting in a tube.
12. Place in refrigerator for 10 minutes to allow legs to set.

Pumpkin Season!

Not to be cliche, but one of my favorite things about fall is the abundance of pumpkins. I love carving and decorating them and I love eating them in various kinds of desserts. And since today is National Pumpkin Day, I wanted to share some pumpkin fun! 

I started my day with these cute Halloween themed donuts from Krispy Kreme. The monster donut is a cream filled pumpkin donut and the other one is a pumpkin spice donut. And, of course, I paired it with a pumpkin spice latte. Yuuuumy! 

Every year I go to a pumpkin patch here in Los Angeles and buy pumpkins to carve and decorate with my boyfriend and this year, I painted them with a black, white, and gold color scheme. I wanted to make them look like they were all part of a collection. I loved how they turned out! They look like decor you can buy at Home Goods. 

I bought some gold studs in square and circle shapes and added them to a black painted pumpkin. I alternates the two stud shapes to add contrast. I painted the mini pumpkin in alternating black and white and added gold glitter to add sparkle. 

I made the owl pumpkin using a cool kit from Target. It was super easy...I just painted the pumpkin black and attached the owl eyes, wings, and stars on its chest with adhesive stickers. 

My favorite technique was on the white pumpkin. I repurposed some gold flash tattoos I had leftover from the summer and applied them to the skin of the pumpkin. I think it made it look super chic! 

Wherever your pumpkin adventures take you, I hope you enjoy it. Take advantage of this yummy treat before the season is over! 

Trick or Treat.

If you know me, you know that Halloween is one of my favorite holidays and I love to celebrate it. Who says its just a holiday for kids? This year I really got into the spirit and tried out different activities to really celebrate. Because let's face it, nothing says fall like Halloween treats and crafts and getting a pumpkin spice latte at Starbucks simply won't cut it!


Decorating Pumpkins

I started out the week decorating pumpkins with my boyfriend. He's more a carver, whereas I like to paint and glue stuff on my pumpkins. To each his own, but all I'm gonna say is that I won a pumpkin carving/decorating contest at work with one of my pumpkins!

Obviously, the check engine light is my boyfriend's and very true to his character. I used washable tempera paint and sticky rhinestones and plastic spiders for my pumpkins. 

Halloween Witch Truffle Treats

Next, I wanted to make a Halloween themed treat for a work potluck and I also wanted to try my hand at making chocolate truffles so this was a great recipe for me to try out. They're little witch truffles!

The decorating needs a little perfecting but what I did was make the truffles by mixing 1.5 cups of bittersweet chocolate with 2/3 cup of cream, let it sit for a couple of hours and roll them into 1 inch balls and stuck a tic tac in it as a nose. I then dipped them in candy coating and topped them with an Oreo + Hershey's kiss hat.


Costumes

I was lucky enough to attended two costume parties this year. One was on actual Halloween day and one was a week before for my friend's birthday. Naturally, I had two costumes, both put together by me, instead of store bought. At my friend's birthday, I went as Audrey Hepburn from Breakfast at Tiffany's. My friends' costumes were so cute as well!

On actual Halloween day, I went to a party and I went all out with my and my boyfriend's costumes. I really like being creative with our costumes rather than typical girls' sexy costumes. Last year we were a sushi chef and a piece of sushi and the year before we were Ash Ketchum and Pikachu. And this year, we went as Roger Rabbit and Jessica Rabbit!

I made Roger's bow tie with felt and hot glue and pretty much bought every piece separately and put it together. It's so much more fun having a creative costume rather than a common store bought costume.



Rise of the Jack O'Lanterns

Finally, I went to The Rise of the Jack O'Lanterns at Descanso Gardens where over 5,000 carved pumpkins were put on display. The pumpkins had carvings of celebrities and popular TV shows and even multiple pumpkins put together to create elaborate works of art. Here are some of my favorite pieces I saw...

Tulips pumpkins. 

The details on this solar system is incredible!

Dinos. 

                       

                      Sinatra and Walter. 

Chinese calendar. 

It's very faint but I see the Kardashiansss...you can't escape this family. 

I hope everyone had a happy Halloween!

Halloween 2013.

I hope you guys all had a great Halloween! This year my boyfriend and I went as a sushi chef and sushi. I'm ALL about creative, original costumes rather than generic, store bought costumes. I made my ginger and wasabi headpiece out of felt and and for the sushi piece, I sewed an orange pillow case on a small rectangular pillow and drew some white lines on it with paint to resemble salmon. Seto's wearing a chef coat and a Japanese headband! Added chopsticks for effect ;)

Halloween Pumpkins!

Fall is so great and Halloween is my favorite holiday, so needless to say...I take my pumpkin decorating very seriously! This year, I let my boyfriend in on the fun. Here are our creations...

Getting ready to carve!

Minion and Storm Trooper.

Fall family + pumpkin owl.