Halloween on a budget: five simple recipes

If you're having guests over for Halloween, the least you could do is cook up some frightening food. Read on for some killer recipes this Halloween.

Make spooky cookies for your Halloween party (Ralph Daily)

Like most students, you might be in the midst of planning a Halloween party with neighbours, people who live in your halls, or your course mates. What kind of a host would you be if you didn’t provide some fun nibbles and drinks? A terrible one.

Bloody cocktail

Requires: Test tubes, 350ml blood-orange juice, 6 tbsps Solerno or another blood-orange liqueur

1. Pour liqueur and juice into a large pitcher. Refrigerate for 30 minutes, then pour into test tubes and serve!

You can also use a Bloody Mary recipe for this.

Slime soup

Requires: 500g frozen peas, scallion, chicken/vegetable stock cubes, 750ml boiled water, 1 ball mozzarella chopped roughly

1. Boil frozen peas and scallion in water with stock cube until tender and cooked through
2. Remove and discard scallion once the peas are soft enough
3. Put chopped mozzarella into a blender with the peas and their liquid
4. When ready to cook, pour the green, slimy soup into the pan and heat gently, to melt the cheese into the soup
5. Serve in spooky cauldrons or themed bowls

Broomstick crackers

Requires: One sheet of puff pastry, one egg (beaten). A small amount of milk optional

1. Set oven to 180c or gas mark 4
2. Place a baking tray in the oven to heat up
3. Make broomsticks by cutting out a broomstick shape (twisting it and leaving one end flat) from the puff pastry
4. Use a sharp knife to gently draw the broom bristles on the flat end
5. Place on baking paper and brush with the egg white (and milk if wanted)
6. Bake for 10-15 minutes until golden and crisp
7. Serve with a dip

Spooky cookies

Requires: 250g softened butter, 140g caster sugar, 1 egg yolk, 2 tsp vanilla extract, 300g plain flour. For the icing: 400g icing sugar, 3-4 tbsp water, 2-3 drops of food colouring – piping bag optional

1. Set overn to 180c or gas mark 4
2. Mix softened butter and sugar in a large bowl with a wooden spoon
3. Add the egg yolk and vanilla extract and beat to combine the ingredients
4. Sift the plain flour over, and stir until well combined
5. Use your hands to make sure that everything is mixed well and press the dough together
6. Roll out the dough and cut out the shapes that you want, then put them on a baking tray
7. Bake in the oven for about 12 minutes

For Icing:

1. Sift icing sugar into a large mixing bowl and stir in enough water to make a smooth mixture
2. Stir in the colouring
3. Spread the icing using a knife or piping bag

Alternatively, you can buy icing that’s ready to pipe from the supermarket

The great thing about cookies is they’re so versatile and can be themed for different events. You can add different flavouring, like orange if you’re creating a pumpkin cookie.

Edible spiders – no baking

If you have the egg white left over from the previous recipe, you can make edible icing spiders!

Requires: 1 egg white, 225 sieved icing sugar, black food colouring, piping bag

1. In a bowl break the egg white up with a fork and gradually beat in about half of the icing sugar
2. Gradually add the other half of the icing and food colouring
3. Beat until there are stiff peaks that stand on their own
4. Place icing in a piping bag and pipe a small circular shape with eight legs onto a lightly greased sheet of baking paper
5. Allow to dry
6. When ready, serve the spiders on a paper plate decorated with a spider web