Long legged spider cupcake
What You Need: 1 cupcake; chocolate frosting; chocolate sprinkles; black (or dark brown) M&Ms; black licorice (strand style); knife or kitchen shears.
How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Sprinkle with chocolate jimmies. Place two black M&Ms, letter side down, for eyes. Cut licorice into eight equal strands and insert into cupcake for legs.
Nonpareil spotted spider cupcake
Make an easy spotted spider cupcake for Halloween using nonpareil candies. (They’re chocolate wafers coated in little white ball thingies.)
What You Need: 1 cupcake; orange icing (we just used Pillsbury’s Halloween icing); 2 red hot cinnamon imperials; black writing icing or gel in tube.
How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Use dab of icing to stick red candy eyes to nonpareil wafer. Place in center of cupcake. Use black gel or icing to draw eight legs.
Purple spider cupcake
Not all spider cupcakes have to have black spiders. Purple ones are great for Halloween, too, or any occasion.
What You Need: 1 cupcake, orange frosting (we just used Pillsbury’s Halloween frosting already tinted); purple gumdrop; purple and black gel icing in tube (we used CakeMate); 2 candy eyes (optional); toothpick.
How to Make It: Frost cupcake. Use black gel in tube to “draw” three circles, one inside the other. Drag toothpick through gel, starting at the center, at several points to form web. (Wipe toothpick clean in between). Squish gumdrop a bit to make it flatter. Use gel to attach eyes and place in center of web. Use purple gel to draw legs.
Want to make friendly spider cupcakes for Halloween or another occasion? How about mean ones with evil fangs? Well, you can make both!
What You Need: 2 cupcakes (baked and cooled); chocolate frosting; red and black licorice strings; mini Oreo cookie; 4 cinnamon imperial (“red hot”) candies; 2 Tic Tac mints.
Make Those Cupcakes!: Frost both cupcakes with chocolate frosting. Cut licorice into 8 lengths for each cupcake and stick into cupcake to form legs. For friendly spider, place mini Oreo near front of cupcake for head. Use dab of icing to adhere 2 red hot eyes and a bit of licorice for smiling mouth. For mean spider, use 2 red hots for eyes and cut small stands of black licorice for frowning eyebrows. Add 2 Tic Tacs for fangs. These would also be great for a kids’ bug-themed party.
These long-legged spider cookies are quick to make and fun to eat, thanks to a chocolate sandwich cookie perched on top.
What You Need: 1 cupcake, baked and cooled; white or off-white icing; orange paste or red and yellow liquid food coloring; chocolate sandwich cookie (such as Oreo; we used Joe Joe’s from Trader Joe’s); black licorice whips; cinnamon imperials (red hots).
How to Make It: Tint icing orange and frost cupcake orange. Cut licorice into eight equal lengths and press four into each side of the cookie. Use dab of icing to attach red hot eyes to cookie. Place cookie on cupcake. Couldn’t be easier!
There’s a little trick with this treat: a fun spider web pattern that may look hard to make but is really quite simple.
What You Need: 1 cupcake (baked and cooled), white frosting, black writing icing or gel, plastic spider or toy spider ring, toothpick.
Make That Cupcake!: Frost cupcake white. Squeeze a small (about 1/2″) blob of black icing on the top of the cupcake (or off-center, depending on how you’d like your web to look). Use writing tip with icing or gel tube to draw two circles, one inside of the other, around the center blob. Place toothpick in center icing blob and draw toothpick in one smooth motion from the center to the edge of the cupcake. Wiping off toothpick in between, continue around the cupcake, nine or 10 times equally spaced until you have a nice web shape. Place spider in center of cupcake. Make sure no one eats the spider!
Here’s a quick and easy cupcake that will make for a deadly fun Halloween treat. It’s a black widow spider, complete with the telltale hourglass. That plump spider body is actually a Junior Mint and an M & M candy.
What You Need: 1 cupcake (baked and cooled); white frosting (from a can or homemade); small amount black and red frostings plus piping bag and writing tip, or purchased writing icing or gel; Junior Mint; dark brown M&M.
How to Make It: Spread cupcake with white frosting. Place M & M directly above Junior Mint. Using writing tip to make eight black legs on spider. To make red hourglass, “draw” an X with icing, connect top and bottom and fill in. Super creepy!
