Breadstick Snakes

Today is Alex's class party. Not being sold on all the usual sugar and creepy that accompanies Halloween, I have made it my mission to find cool alternatives. Check out these little guys - inspired by these little guys. 

Alex helped by rolling and wrapping the dough and by drawing the eyes on (with food coloring markers). I manned the green color mist and the carrot tongues.  They each have their own little personality and Alex is so excited to share them with his friends!

We bought wooden dowels at our local home improvement store and cut them to fit the length of my baking sheets.  Then I covered them in foil and lightly greased them with a little spray olive oil.  We used store-bought breadstick dough and rolled them a little before wrapping them around the sticks.  They baked according to directions and I removed them from the sticks as soon as they were cool enough to touch.

All lined up on a baking rack, I held them over the sink and sprayed them with Color Mist in green (they're not kidding about that overspray warning- it's so fine you almost can't tell it's there -until you add water- so be very careful.  I laughed when I blew my nose before bed and had bright green snot!).  Then, Alex used a food-coloring marker to draw on the eyes.  The markers came in a set and were a bit pricey, but they're what really made the whole process interactive for Alex.  He was able to help with the dough and with the decorating.  He's been complimented by his teachers for having excellent spacial skills, specifically the ability to put facial features where they belong, so I got to employ one of his talents.  He did such a great job.

I wasn't going to put tongues on them, but when I explained the project to Alex he informed me "Mommy, snakes have tongues" and I'm so glad he did.  They'd just be worms otherwise.  I added a little sliver of carrot for a tongue (using a veggie peeler on baby carrots, then just notched a little v out, and I had to cut a little slit in the breadstick with the paring knife before pushing the carrot into place). 

We had a lot of fun working on this project together.  As Alex drew the eyes on, he would speculate about each snake - "this one's sleepy", "this one's looking up at the sky", "this one's funny".   And we managed to get all but the last batch (9 of 36) done between dinner and bedtime.  I'd call that a success.

Funny Bones

Found this in one of Epicurious' recipe collections for Halloween, thought it was an adorably light-hearted take on traditional Halloween goodies! It was a big hit at Alex's school party and was rather quite easy to make.

I used 50/50 white chocolate chips and almond bark to reduce the cost (and because I had leftover almond bark to be used up). I also made my own double boiler by using a pot half-full of water on low with a SS bowl over. Make sure you don't exceed 120 degrees F or you'll wreck your chocolate!! Use a digital or candy thermometer if you're not sure. I used a plain ol' dinner fork and was able to turn out 200+ of these in about 2 hours. Hubby helped putting on mallows after I finished the trial run batch worth. I stored them in airtight containers with parchment paper between the layers for 1 week before packaging (as seen above).

I'm reminded, once again, never to play with chocolate unless you're using a double boiler!! Makes the whole process so much better.

Next: White chocolate covered fresh cranberries!!