Carving a big pumpkin into a jack o’ lantern is one of those Halloween traditions that no one should ever grow out of. The spooky faces of those pumpkins generally indicate to kids that there is candy to be had nearby. For adults, carving those faces is a fun way to get into the Halloween spirit and get a lot more creative than you were as a kid. And having the opportunity to to toast a bunch of fresh pumpkin seeds while you’re carving doesn’t hurt either. I like to put a foodie twist on my pumpkins these days, rather than just sticking with the classic grinning jack o’ lantern face. Whether you start with a commercial pumpkin carving kit or are just relying on your arsenal of kitchen knifes, here are a few Foodie Jack o’ Lantern ideas to inspire you:
The first is the Skeleton Chef Pumpkin, pictured above. This pumpkin features a skull topped with a chef’s hat, ready to serve up a variety of tricks and treats to anyone who approaches. It’s a simple design, but it never fails to catch the attention of anyone who sees it.
Another skeletal design comes in the form of this skeleton hand reaching for a cupcake. The design is a little more detailed, with many small cutouts to represent the bones of the hand. Fortunately, you can take plenty of anatomical liberties when working with Halloween designs. Carve a little sleeve underneath the hand and it can double as a zombie arm!
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Candy corn is a fall and Halloween staple, even though many people have a love-hate relationship with the candy. They’re quite pretty to look at, they make a great addition to a candy dish and my favorite brand (Brach’s) as nice notes of honey and vanilla to it. Brach’s actually sells enough candy corn (and the related Mallowcremes) each year that, if they were all laid end to end, they would circle the globe four times. On the other hand, candy corn’s over-the-top sweetness and slightly gritty, yet marshmallowy, texture means that these are not on the top of everyone’s Halloween candy list. I happen to be a candy corn fan when they come in small doses, and find them to be a good source of inspiration for some colorful desserts, including this Candy Corn Terrine.
This frozen dessert has no candy corn in it. It consists of white, orange and yellow layers of ice cream and sorbet that mimic the colors of a classic candy corn. I used a good quality vanilla bean ice cream for the white portion, a blend of orange sherbert and vanilla ice cream for the orange, and a mixture of mango gelato and lemon sorbet for the yellow layer. The different colors are layered in a loaf pan and then frozen. You can serve it in slices, or carve it into candy corn-shaped triangles to serve.
The vanilla bean ice cream was an obvious choice when I needed a white layer. The mango was a very dark yellow color (I used Ciao Bella gelato) and the lemon sorbet (Haagen Dazs) was almost white, so combining the two resulted in the perfect bright yellow. I mixed the softened ice creams in the food processor to blend them. The orange was a bit more problematic because my orange sherbert was a very pale color. I ended up blending it with some ice cream and adding a small amount of orange food coloring (I recommend a gel coloring) to get the bright orange I was looking for. You can use the same trick or look out for a dark orange sorbet when making yours.
Candy corn – Brach’s brand, anyway – is made with real honey, and in the past when I’ve made a candy corn-inspired recipe, such as Candy Corn Cookies, I’ve used honey to help capture that flavor. I did the same thing in this terrine, adding layers of honey in between the layers of ice cream. The honey isn’t a dominant flavor, but it oozes out between the layers when slicing and when you’re eating the terrine you get just enough honey to know it’s there.
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I’ve made molded chocolates before many times, filling up plastic or silicone molds with melted chocolate and letting them set. I don’t typically attempt anything too fancy, like you might see at a gourmet chocolate shop, although I can fill the chocolates with relative ease and consistency. When I spotted this Wilton Halloween Candy Kit on the Halloween shelf at a local store, I immediately liked the cute look of the candy molds, but was a bit skeptical of whether I actually wanted – or needed – a kit to make them when I could simply buy similar molds and work with those alone. I was swayed by the fact that I needed an activity to do with some very helpful taste-testing kids I know, and bought the kit to give it a try.
I was immediately impressed with the fact that the kit came with every single thing you need to make the chocolates. It included not only the plastic Halloween molds (3 sets of different designs), four different colors of chocolate candy melts (cocoa, vanilla white, vanilla orange, and vanilla green), piping bars, lollipop sticks, a decorating brush and a variety of treat bags with colorful twist ties for packing up the goodies. The convenience of having everything in one box is not something to underestimate when you’re undertaking a potentially very messy project.
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The companies that make specialty pans and other baking accessories are getting more and more creative with the holiday ideas that the come out with, so where we once had just two pumpkin-shaped pans to choose between for Halloween baking, there is now a wide array of everything from Witch’s Fingers to 3D Skulls. This Monster Pops Cookie Pan from Wilton is just another fun Halloween-inspired pan to add to the list. The pan bakes eight little monsters in each of four different shapes: a vampire, a Frankenstein, a tri-clops and a mummy. Like most cookie pans, all you need to do to use this pan is press your dough down into the nonstick cavities and bake. The dough will conform to the spooky shapes of the cookies and you can either leave them plain or use Wilton’s instructions to decorate them and give the monsters a little more character.
Since this is a cookie pop pan, there is a small depression at the base of each mold where you can rest a popsicle stick (after inserting most of it into the unbaked dough) that can bake into the cookie. You don’t need to turn these into cookie pops, of course, but when your cookies are on sticks they make much handier treats for trick-or-treaters and can be easier to display at a Halloween party.
Fall puts me in the mood for pumpkin desserts and an extra bag of Pumpkin Spice Marshmallows in my kitchen put me in the mood to make some pumpkin spice cereal bars. Homemade rice krispy treats were always a favorite of mine growing up, but it wasn’t until recently that I started to put some new flavor spins on them, such as Black and White Rice Krispy Treats and Peanut Butter Cup Rice Krispy Bars. This time around, I opted to turn that bag of fall spice marshmallows into a batch of Pumpkin Pie Rice Krispie Treats.
To create these bars, I made a graham cracker crust and then put a batch of Rice Krispy treats made with the Pumpkin Spice Marshmallows on top. I like pumpkin pies with a crisp graham cracker crust, so adding that element to this cereal treat version was a logical step. The graham crackers added a whole new layer of flavor (literally!) and also captured the full flavor of a slice of pumpkin pie. The crust needs to be completely cool before you add the cereal treat mixture to allow the marshmallow to stick to it. To avoid breaking up the crust as you add the cereal layer, try to distribute the warm cereal treat mixture evenly and press it into place, rather than trying to spread it over the crust.
Adding the graham cracker crust is what gives these an actual pumpkin pie flavor, as opposed to just a spicy one.
In addition to the batch of these that I made using the Pumpkin Spice Marshmallows, I also made a batch using regular spices. The spice-only version does not require any special edition marshmallows (you’ll still need regular marshmallows) and uses cinnamon, ginger and cloves to add a spicy flavor. It doesn’t have quite the same color as the store bought spice marshmallow bars do, but it has a great flavor and still turns regular cereal bars into a fall treat. These bars keep very well for several days when stored in an airtight container.
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