Spider Pretzels from Familyfun.com

Spider Pretzels from Familyfun.com

These arachnid treats are easy to make and they look positively lifelike crawling across your child's snack plate.
For each:

2 round crackers

2 teaspoons smooth peanut butter

8 small pretzel sticks

2 raisins

With the peanut butter, make a cracker sandwich. Insert eight pretzel "legs" into the filling. With a dab of peanut butter, set two raisin "eyes" on top. Makes 1.

Pizza Mummies From FamilyFun.com

Pizza Mummies from Familyfun.com

RECIPE INGREDIENTS:
English muffins
Pizza sauce
Black olives
Scallions
Red or green pepper
Cheese sticks or slices
1. Heat the oven to 350° F. For each mummy, spread a tablespoon of pizza sauce onto half of an English muffin (toast it first, if you like). 2. Set olive slices in place for eyes and add round slices of green onion or bits of red or green pepper for pupils. 3. Lay strips of cheese (we used a pulled-apart cheese stick) across the muffin for the mummy?s wrappings. 4. Bake for about 10 minutes or until the cheese is melted and the muffin is toasty.

Cheese-finger food from Familyfun.com

RECIPE INGREDIENTS:
Mozzarella string cheese
Green bell pepper
Cream cheese
1. Wearing plastic gloves or sandwich bags over your hands to keep the cheese as smudge-free as possible, use a paring knife (parents only) to cut each string in half and then carve a shallow area for a fingernail just below the rounded end of each half. 2. Mark the joint right below the nail as well as the knuckle joint by carving out tiny horizontal wedges of cheese, as pictured. 3. For the fingernails, slice a green bell pepper into 3/8-inch-wide strips. Set the strips skin side down on your work surface and trim the pulp so that it's about half as thick. Then cut the strips into ragged-topped nail shapes and stick them in place at the ends of the fingers with dabs of cream cheese.

From Familyfun.com

Cranberry Cider

Cranberry Cider

Submitted by: Becky Quinn

1 1/2 cups sugar

4 cinnamon sticks

1 qt. Cranberry juice

1 qt. Water

2 cups Orange Juice

2 Tbsp. Lemon Juice

Mix ingredients together

Simmer for 30 mins

Serve warm!

Apple Bites from FamilyFun.com

These toothsome treats are a fun and healthy break from Halloween sweets.
RECIPE INGREDIENTS:
Apples
Slivered almonds
1. Just quarter and core an apple, cut a wedge from the skin side of each quarter, then press slivered almonds in place for teeth. 2. Tip: If you're not going to serve them right away, baste the apples with orange juice to keep them from browning.
Recipe from FamilyFun.com

Amish Breakfast Cereal

1/2 cup Vegetable Oil
1 cup Brown sugar
2 eggs
3 cups Quick Oats
2 teaspoons Baking Soda
1 teaspoon Salt
1 cup Milk
1 cup Apples, chopped
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup Dried Cranberries

Mix oil. sugar, and eggs in a bowl. Add in the oats, baking powder, salt, and milk. Stir in the fruit. Place in a 9 x 13 baking pan. Bake at 350 for 30 mins. Pour milk or cream over the top. Yum!

Becky said she stores the leftovers in the frige and it's still yummy.

Kelli's Fabulous Caramel Apples

The key to great caramel apples is proper temperature and homemade caramel. (The caramel we had was "Kneaders" caramel and Kelli isn't allowed to share it.) So everyone be on the look out for a good caramel recipe.

You should begin by washing your ROOM TEMPERATURE granny smith apples (really you can use whatever apples you like, but granny smith are nice and tart which goes well with the sweet caramel).

Then insert the stick into the center of the apple that has the stem removed. Place the clean apples on a cookie sheet lined with wax paper so they won't stick once they are dipped in the caramel.

Candy temperatures are the VITAL step. Caramel should be heated to 180-200 degrees. You can do this in the microwave for short intervals stirring occasionally. If you plan on making alot of caramel apple and frequently you might want to invest in a digital candy thermometer. If this is more of a once in a while kind of thing you could just use any kind of theremometer and shoot for more around 190 degrees to be on the safe side.

Once your caramel is hot and ready, dip your apples into the caramel and then twirl the extra caramel off the apple. This requires a little bit of shaking too. Be sure to wipe the bottom of the apple against the side of the bucket and set the apple onto the waxed paper. If you place the apple in the fridge for a few minutes, it will help keep the caramel nice and shiny! If you are going to add toppings add them while the caramel is still warm. Anything with chocolate isn't a good idea because it melts and will fall to the bottom. You can however dip the entire apple into chocolate and then add toppings. If you are going to dip the entire apple into chocolate let the caramel apple cool completely and then heat your chocolate to 120 degrees and no warmer. Begin heating your chocolate in the microwave stirring it and checking it's temperature until you reach 120 degrees. If it gets to hot, which happens almost everytime, simply add some more non-melted chocolate. Kelli had a bowl of unmelted chips ready to go if this happened. After the caramel apple is dipped you can either sprinkle other toppings on or let it cool.

Here are some topping ideas:

Cinnamon and sugar- This is mine and Tiffany's favorite!

Nuts- Kelli uses Peacansp

Crushed oreos

Caramel then milk chocolate drizzled with white chocolate

Some other suggestions were to place the finished caramel apples in little paper muffin cups and then wrap them up with clear celophane. Who wouldn't want that as a gift?

To cut your apple get a long seraded knife and simply cut round all four sides of the apple stick. It leaves the core of the apple and gives you a "flower" look with the apples pieces.