Bow's Hallowe'en

Wow Knot, awesome pumpkinspiration! I aim to at least have one this year which will be half as good as one of those - do you happen to have a turkey cutter I can borrow? Here's my pumpkin from last year - Jack Skellington - those teeth were not easy with a giant blunt kitchen knife.

Here's a link to the nail polish I'm in love with, they are so cute and I'm a sucker for a gimmick! 


Fringe, the cupcake class was smashing - if your cushions turn out as good as your cupcakes then Mr Fringe will be a happy bunny! I'm not sure whose these are but they were just so pretty! 

And back to Hallowe'en - a much under celebrated holiday in the UK.  I'd love to do it USA style, those guys know how to celebrate a holiday!  This year I want to make loads of pumpkins for the front step and make candy apples to give out to the trick-or-treaters... that's the plan anyway! With that in mind, I decided to have a trial run of the candy apples, and just as well! 


Of course this was a spur of the moment idea at about 9.30pm on a rainy night, involving a bike ride on flat tyres to get vinegar and food coloring before I was all set to go.  The only thing I was missing was a thermometer to keep an eye on the temperature (note to self, buy one of these).  It's a pretty simple recipe which can be found here here.  

I followed all the steps and was feeling pretty smug about how well it was going - the kitchen was filled with the aroma of sweet toffee and so far everything was going to plan.  It takes ages for the recipe to start looking like toffee and not like brown water!  And here's where it all went wrong!  In my smugness, whizzing around the kitchen with my spotty apron on, I grabbed the food coloring and free-poured it straight into the pan... it was blue.  Not shiny red like on youtube, more greeny-blue bubbling potion that the Evil Queen would be proud of. 

A poison apple, sleeping death? Perfect!

Yeah I agree, not the tastiest looking concoction.  This is the really tricky part though, after a google search I had found some tips for how to know if your mixture is ready without a thermometer - apparently dropping some mixture into cold water will let you know, if it goes hard and toffee-like, its ready.  

Spot the difference?

As i found out - not so! The mixture dripped straight off the apples and formed a lovely mess on the baking paper which never dried hard and shiny but stayed a goopy mess for three days.  This didn't stop my better half from eating one of course, his verdict being that it tasted nice but he couldn't look at it when he ate it.  

Some spooky cupcakes too! Made from a kit though
so doesn't count!

So that would be my Hallowe'en adventures so far! Any tips on how to make some appetizing candy apples (other than not using blue coloring?) And what ideas do we have for costumes this year?