This week I've teamed up with HARIBO to bring you another fun and easy Halloween recipe. These delicious swamp monster cookies are quick to whip up and perfect for a spooky Halloween treat the whole family will love!
A few days ago we received very exciting box in the post. Everything about it, from the outside, to the spooky noises it made as we opened it, to the creepy cobwebs, pretend eyeballs and delicious haul of Halloween themed HARIBO sweets inside, made for the most fun parcel we've received in some time!
HARIBO challenged me to use their fun Halloween themed treats to 'share the scare' this month, so I picked out my favourites and got to work in the kitchen, creating a new creepy recipe to celebrate the spooky season!
I made the base of my Halloween cookies from my basic shortbread recipe - this super simple shortbread has only four ingredients but it tastes amazing, though I say so myself!
My Halloween cookies were topped with a simple glacé icing coloured a lovely bright green with a few drops of gel food colouring.
I finished them off with candy eyeballs and trick or treat themed sweets from HARIBO - these yummy Halloween themed sweets come in a range of spooky shapes, from maggots to spiders, frogs and bats to pumpkins so they were the perfect finishing touch for my swampy Halloween cookies!
Swamp Monster Halloween Cookies
Ingredients (makes 20):
- 250g butter
- 125g sugar
- 375g plain flour
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
To decorate:
- 200g icing sugar
- green gel food colouring
- 6 small bags Haribo trick or treat sweets
- handful edible candy eyeballs
Method:
Preheat oven to 160°C (Gas mark 2/325°F).
Line 2 baking trays with baking paper.
Place the butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl, then whisk together until pale and fluffy.
Sieve in the flour, then add the vanilla extract. Whisk again until the mixture comes together in a dough.
Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface to around 1cm thick. Cut circles from the dough (I used the fluted side of my cookie cutter), then carefully transfer them to the baking trays.
Bake for around 15 minutes until golden.
Once cooked, leave the shortbread rounds to cool on the baking trays for a few minutes then transfer to a cooling rack to finish cooling.
When the shortbread cookies are completely cool, make the icing:
Sieve the icing sugar into a bowl then add 25ml water. Stir well until the sugar has dissolved, then add gel food colouring and stir until the icing is completely green. Add a little more water if needed to get the correct consistency of icing - it should be runny enough to spread but not too drippy!
Drop a small spoonful of icing onto each shortbread cookie and spread to the edges with the back of the spoon. Don't worry if the icing drips down the side - this will just add to the swampy effect!
Working quickly, decorate the cookies with HARIBO trick or treat sweets and edible candy eyeballs, pressing them gently into the top of the icing to hold them in place.
Once you've decorated all of the cookies, leave the icing to dry and set.
Once the icing has completely dried, you can store the cookies in an airtight container, layered with baking paper to separate them, until ready to serve.
Enjoy!
We're really looking forward to Halloween night when we'll share some more of our yummy Haribo sweets with our local trick-or-treaters!
For more details about the awesome HARIBO Halloween range, visit www.haribo.co.uk.
Are you celebrating Halloween this year? You can share your own spooky ideas on social media by using the hashtag #HariboShareTheScare on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook.
Grace
Disclosure: This recipe and blog post was commissioned by HARIBO. I received a selection of Halloween themed HARIBO sweets to use in my recipe and was compensated for my time and the cost of ingredients, however all opinions expressed in this post are my own.
Swamp Monster Shortbread Halloween Cookies
Ingredients
For the shortbread cookies:
- 250 g butter
- 125 g sugar
- 375 g plain flour
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
To decorate:
- 200 g icing sugar
- green gel food colouring
- 6 small bags Haribo trick or treat sweets
- handful edible candy eyeballs
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 160°C (Gas mark 2/325°F). Line 2 baking trays with baking paper.
- Place the butter and sugar in a large mixing bowl, then whisk together until pale and fluffy.
- Sieve in the flour, then add the vanilla extract. Whisk again until the mixture comes together in a dough.
- Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface to around 1cm thick. Cut circles from the dough (I used the fluted side of my cookie cutter), then carefully transfer them to the baking trays.
- Bake for around 15 minutes until golden.
- Once cooked, leave the shortbread rounds to cool on the baking trays for a few minutes then transfer to a cooling rack to finish cooling.
- When the shortbread cookies are completely cool, make the icing:
- Sieve the icing sugar into a bowl then add 25ml water. Stir well until the sugar has dissolved, then add gel food colouring and stir until the icing is completely green. Add a little more water if needed to get the correct consistency of icing - it should be runny enough to spread but not too drippy!
- Drop a small spoonful of icing onto each shortbread cookie and spread to the edges with the back of the spoon. Don't worry if the icing drips down the side - this will just add to the swampy effect!
- Working quickly, decorate the cookies with Haribo trick or treat sweets and edible candy eyeballs, pressing them gently into the top of the icing to hold them in place.
- Once you've decorated all of the cookies, leave the icing to dry and set.
Notes
Love this spooky Halloween recipe? Why not save it to Pinterest so you can easily find it again!
bob says
cool idea and its sounds nice as