Meringue ghosts? Check. Jack o’lanterns? Check. Chocolate spiders? Oh wait, here they come - straight from the pages of Sharon Bowers’ fun new cookbook, “Ghoulish Goodies.”

CHOCOLATE SPIDER CLUSTERS
Makes about 24
Ingredients:
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
2 cups chow mein noodles
¼ cup red hots or red mini M&Ms

Directions:
1. Line 2 baking sheets with wax paper or parchment. Melt chocolate chips in a microwave-safe bowl in a microwave oven on high power 60 seconds; stir well. If not quite smooth, continue to heat in two or three 10-second bursts, stirring well after each burst.

2. Stir chow mein noodles into melted chocolate and drop mixture by tablespoons onto prepared baking sheets. Press 2 red candies onto one edge of each cluster to make eyes and lift a few chow mein legs up to give a spidery impression. Refrigerate about 20 minutes to cool and harden. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator up to 1 week.
— Sharon Bowers, “Ghoulish Goodies”

We’ve been giggling madly over Sharon Bowers’ clever new cookbook, “Ghoulish Goodies” (Storey Publishing, $14.95), and its scary-fun recipes for peanut butter monsters, Cheddar eyeballs and pretzel rod toes. We’ll share her darling recipe for chocolate spiders tomorrow, but first, here’s a handful of Bowers’ quickie party ideas, in case you still need inspiration for those classroom parties tomorrow:

Pumpkin Rice Krispie Treats: Make your usual krispie treats, but after you melt the marshmallows with butter, remove a small portion and tint it green. Tint the rest orange, then add Rice Krispies separately to orange and green mixtures. (Don’t try to tint after adding the cereal as the mixtures won’t dye properly, cautions Bowers.) With buttered hands, mold orange pumpkins and add green stems.

Screaming Red Punch: Rinse a new surgical rubber glove thoroughly. Fill it with cold water and tie the wrist with a twist tie. Freeze solid. In a large punch bowl, mix up a batch of red punch. Just before serving, cut off the glove with scissors and drop in the frozen hand.
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Out of all the tempting things in Julia Usher’s yummy new book, “Cookie Swap,” these meringue ghosts may be the most adorable — and the easiest. They’re filled with date nut balls but you can skip that step (actually steps #2 and 3) entirely and just pipe the meringue directly onto a baking sheet

MERINGUE GHOSTS
Makes about 2 dozen
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Five ideas for weekend family fun:
Dia de los Muertos: Once the trick-or-treating’s done, head over to the city for a dash of Mexican music and culture at the San Francisco Symphony’s Dia de los Muertos Family Concert on Sunday. The matinee includes family activities, colorful displays, refreshments and, of course, music. Lobby festivities begin at 1 p.m., concert downbeat is at 2 p.m. $15-$65, children younger than 17 get in for half price.
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Here’s a deal for you, especially if you’re concerned about your little trick-or-treater’s candy consumption. Nestle and San Jose’s Tech Museum of Innovation are turning leftover Halloween candy into art. Starting this Friday, Oct. 30 (and running until Sunday, Nov. 8), The Tech Museum is offering a 10% discount on admission for kids who donate candy - it’s OK, it can be the icky kind, and the museum staff will even give them a little Nestle Crunch bar in exchange. Then renowned junkyard artist Leo Sewell will use the treats to build a rocket ship sculpture comprised entirely of candy. It’s a four day art project - Sewell starts building on Nov. 8 and the whole, fabulous thing will be unveiled Nov. 12.

We are in such a Halloween-y mood these days, thanks in large part to Julia Usher’s new book, “Cookie Swap: Creative Treats to Share Throughout the Year” (Gibbs Smith, 160 pages, $19.99). Why, the former Bay Area engineer-turned-bakery diva asks, should the winter holidays get all the good cookies? Halloween ought to get its share of gingerbread too in the form of haunted houses, or spice cookie balls formed into tiny vine-festooned pumpkins.

So today we’re sharing her recipe for candy corn cookies - a particularly yummy take on ye olde sugar cookie, flavored with a hint of maple. Come back tomorrow for more as we count down to Halloween!
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Nothing dresses up a Halloween party like a big punch bowl full of slimy green stuff! If you’re looking for libations for tonight’s trick-or-treat shindig, we’ve got several possibilities for you - frothy concoctions to drink and creepy decorating ideas for your glassware. You’re looking at Slimy Lime Fruit Punch, but we’ve got a bloody Witch’s Potion and a green Witch’s Brew for you too. Let the haunting begin…
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Got kids with braces? The American Association of Orthodontists just asked celebrity chef Michael Chiarello for a slew of colorfully creepy, braces-friendly Halloween recipes and the results are so appealing… well, you have to check them out. Here are Chiarello’s frozen Black & Orange Bon Bons. (But we’re also smitten by Chiarello’s Green Goo Slimedoo, a green-tinged chocolate fondue with apples, strawberries, bananas and pretzels for dipping. Mmmm…)

BLACK AND ORANGE BON BONS
Ingredients:
1 quart vanilla ice cream
1/2 cup powdered orange drink
12 ounces bittersweet chocolate, in chunks
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It’s hard to get little trick-or-treaters to down something nutritious on Halloween night. They’re much too eager to go scavenging for candy to wait for you to, like, cook something. But if you whip up this “ghoulash” the night before, you can just nuke it and scoop it on Halloween night. This recipe’s both delicious and easy, and it’s from our new favorite book, “A Ghostly Good Time: The Family Halloween Handbook.” You’ll find even more recipe ideas - including the cheesy spider perched on the bowl above - in this morning’s Times and Tribune food section spread on Halloween parties. Here’s how to make the Ghoulash…
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Need a quick craft or game for that classroom Boo Party? Halloween bingo fills the bill. Make them yourself for a game station, or have the kids construct their own. Here’s how:

MATERIALS:
Heavy paper
Markers - candy corn or plastic spiders
Halloween rubber stamps, clip art or stickers with 25 different images (if you’re making six cards, you’ll need seven identical sets of images).

1. Open a new Word document on your computer. Hit the “insert a table” button near the top, and make one that’s five columns across and six rows down.
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