Busted!

So. I've been working on my cooking skills for nearly two years, and thought, why not foray a bit into baking?? Our school's Halloween Happening Carnival, featuring a bake sale, seemed a great opportunity. Hence, I've spent the week with many a baking misadventure.

There were the Mud Monsters - too chocolatey. (Yes, such a thing exists).
The glazed pumpkin cookies - delicious, but not pretty. (Dude, these things are for sale.) Not pictured. : )

And the delicate spiderwebs - oops, won't transport well. (Duh.)

Now, these treats didn't go to waste. We had a big party for our departing school psychologist (wah!) on Tuesday night, and that's where the mud monsters and friends headed. No complaints!

Finally, though, with time running out - I decided to go with a quick and easy mix (that's the busted part) Betty Crocker sugar cookie. Of course, I still had to make it complicated for myself! I think I finally got it right, though, a solid Halloween (transportable) cookie.


(doesn't the shadowy photo add a little spooky ambiance? I totally planned that.)

Voila! The Ghostie.

I'm sure many a sugar cookie would do. For kicks, here's what I did. I took the Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix and followed the directions adding an egg and a stick of softened butter. Then, I added two cups of flour. (The directions specified less, but I found I need those two cups.) I refrigerated the dough for 45 minutes (another must, I found). Then, I rolled out the dough, and used my ghost cookie cutters to cut out these guys. I baked for 8 minutes. I've heard the key is to underbake j-u-s-t slightly. I added prepared white icing. Now, to make the eyes, there are many options. I found Target has little candy eyeballs around Halloween time that work well (see Mud Monsters). If you are not transporting, black gel looks good. Chocolate mini M&M's would work. I used chocolate chips. Not my first choice, as they made rather big-eyed ghosts, but that's what I had available.

I'm happy to report that they seemed to go over pretty well at the bake sale. I called people who bought and ate them 'Ghost Busters.' If you are planning a bake sale, cake pops, donuts, and popcorn are hot items!

All the kids, including mine, had a great time at the event.

And the icing on the cake was, I did too! (Buh duh dum!)