Yes, we’re still with the Halloween goodies, get used to it, we’ve got at least another week of Halloween themed treats. I know, I know, any good blogger would have planned ahead and made them before the holidays so they could go up early and provide you lovely readers with inspiration.. Well, I never said I was a good blogger, or at the very least an organised one *grins*

I made all these treats for Halloween and as such they’re going up now! Today’s treats are some Halloween cookies. I got so distracted by all the baking that I forgot to take many photos so I’m cramming two types of cookie into one post.. That, and to save you from putting up with Halloween for any longer than you have to.

First up, gingerbread. As I expressed a couple weeks ago with the gingerbread cake, I like my gingerbread rich and dark and full of spice. This is a recipe I adapted a while back, it appeared in it’s original form in the BBC Good Food magazine. Since it’s for a house it holds it’s shape very well, and for cookies you don’t need to bake it out as dry as you do for a house. I like them nice and soft in the centre.

I completely failed to take photos of the dough being made, so you can see them as they come out the oven. They’ll be just firm to the touch and will have changed colour  evenly across the surface (darker in the centre means raw dough). I went with a skull, a tombstone and a pumpkin.

Back in the summer when I did the lemon sugar cookies I used a technique known as flooding to decorate them. These were a little simpler. Because all the designs had a single base colour I spread that on (in royal icing) with an offset palette knife (white for skulls, grey for stones, orange for pumpkins). It can get a little uneven, but if you’re careful you can get a nice smooth edge.

Once they’re dry to touch you can add the detail work.. Whatever you want! For the skulls I used black to outline some eyes, noses and mouths. For the stones I added some black inscriptions and came back with the green to do some grass and vines creeping over the graves. The pumpkins got red faces (I ran out of yellow, they have red lights inside them!) and then a green stem and vines.

Be creative, have fun!

The second cookie made for Halloween takes up back to the lemon sugar cookies. Using that dough, which we know is nice and firm and keeps its shape, we made witches fingers.

The dough was made, and then me being me, split into one ounce portions. Roll the dough into a sausage shape.

As you’re rolling form the knuckles. You want very defined, knobbly knuckles, swollen and arthritic! This took some effort and practice, the first few looked a little….. interesting!

Place onto a baking sheet and using a knife score the knuckles. Add a sliver of almond for a finger nail. I went for mostly whole slices of almond, but the occasional broken one was used as it looked like a ragged or torn nail.

Chill them! I can’t stress this enough. I thought half an hour would do the trick and it really didn’t. Rolling these out will warm the butter up more than you realise (especially if you have warm hands like me). After 30 minutes in the fridge my fingers still spread out and attached to each other when they were baked. Less like long, spindly witches fingers, more like stubby, chubby ghoul fingers!

Still tasted good though!

Our centrepiece cake this year was a pumpkin cake.

Well, actually it was a butter cake, but it was shaped like a pumpkin.. that still counts as a pumpkin cake right?

We were attempting not to be left with too much leftover cake so we just made it an 8 inch round cake, 3 layers tall to get a good pumpkin shape that wasn’t too squat. So he was knocking 6 inches tall.

We made the butter cake a day ahead. It got stacked with vanilla buttercream and raspberry jam. Next up came the carving. I prefer to use a short serrated knife when carving cake, but find the knife you’re comfortable with and go with that, with some practice you’ll find what fits you best.

I put a few deep grooves in so they would really stand out and then crumb coated with a thin layer of buttercream. The cake was put in the fridge for the buttercream to firm up.

First up came a layer of yellow fondant, work quick to smooth it down and press it into those deep grooves.

Next came a layer of orange fondant. Once it’s smoothed down I used a ball tool to do the rest of the grooves, coming back with an airbrush to accentuate the shadows, it’s barely noticeable and that’s the point, but it makes the pumpkin look more natural.

Once the airbrush dye had dried I used an exacto (with a new sharp blade) to cut out a jack-o-lantern face, peeling out the orange fondant leaving the yellow showing through.

Dark green fondant was shaped to form the stem and then a fresher green made vines and tendrils curling around the base. I added some tylose to the fondant to form the tendrils so it would dry quickly, forming the shape around the handles of paint brushes.

He took pride of place on our dessert table for Halloween!

Pumpkin ice cream is a little confusing, the flavours, the warmth of the spices all taste like pumpkin pie. But pumpkin pie has neither this texture, or the temperature of the ice cream!

To have something that is cold, frozen in fact, but gives off a warmth tricks the palate so it no longer knows what you’re eating. It’s a comfort food for many people, pumpkin pie that is, this allows it to be enjoyed during the summer and warmer months when you don’t want to have the hassle of making a pie (or have the oven on heating the house up).

You start with a basic custard, this used just yolks, sugar and milk. I split the sugar between the milk and the yolks as it was too much for the yolks alone.

In a separate container whisk together the cream, spices and pumpkin puree. Once the custard is done strain it over the pumpkin mix then whisk the two together.

Cover it in cling wrap and leave it to chill. Adding the custard to the cold pumpkin and cream helps start the cooling process but you really want to leave it for a few hours, overnight is better.

I found that this ice cream churned rather hard. It’s texture now that it’s frozen is a little icy. I’m contemplating following David Lebovitz’s lead and adding a tablespoon or two of liquor to the mix, I imagine a dark rum or brandy would augment the flavour well.

If you don’t want to used canned pumpkin you can make your own puree by either boiling or roasting the pumpkin (depending on the flavours you want) then blending until smooth.

I also think turning it into an actual pumpkin pie ice cream (as opposed to pumpkin ice cream) might be a nice touch, either with some baked pastry flaked in, or a graham crust broken in.. yes? no? maybe?

Either way this recipe is definitely on the first steps to becoming a winning recipe.. Now, if only I liked vegetables in desserts!

Recipe – from Ice Cream! by Pippa Cuthbert
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Makes 1 qt

400ml Whole Milk
3 Egg Yolks
200g Sugar
450g Pumpkin Puree
1/2tsp Nutmeg
1/2tsp Cinnamon
250ml Heavy Cream

July seems to be a popular month for birthdays. This is a cake we made for one of the many July babies, though we won’t mention how old this one was turning *grins*

The recipient is a regular on the blues dancing scene so the design needed to incorporate that general theme.

A testament to the fact that pumpkin isn’t just for winter, the cake is a spice cake with a pumpkin cream cheese icing, covered in fondant. All the musical notes round the sides are fondant and the hat and shades are gumpaste.

The only non-edible item on the cake is the ribbon around the hat.

We briefly considered a tiered cake, with each person getting a tier each, but put that idea to the side after deciding that it would be unfair to have one person get a large cake while the person who got the top tier would get a tiny one.

In the end all four cakes were 9″ round, with the flavour and the base colour as the favourites of the intended recipient. The patterns are in the other three colours to tie the cake together. Each cake was able to move around the centre pole so they could be positioned as desired, but we felt the spiral looked best.

The top purple cake is a super intense, chocolate fudge cake made with 100% Venezuelan Black Cacao with a chocolate fudge icing.

The blue is a spice cake with a pumpkin buttercream, a new recipe for us that we were very excited to be able to use.

The red cake is a pina colada, a pineapple cake with a coconut buttercream.

The red cake is a red velvet with a cream cheese icing.