Frightfully Easy Ghost Cookies

Three ingredients, no oven, and kids can help. This is the Halloween cookie you pull together the night before the class party when you forgot it was your turn for snacks. Store-bought peanut butter cookies stand in for the ghost body, melted vanilla candy coating plays the sheet, and two mini chocolate chips land as spooky eyes.

Melt the coating low and slow. Candy coating seizes into a chalky mess if it gets too hot or if even a drop of water gets in, so dry the saucepan first and keep the heat gentle.

Dip with tongs, not your fingers. The coating drips cleanly off the edges that way and leaves you with an even, poured-over look instead of thumbprints.

Set each dipped cookie on waxed paper immediately and press the chocolate chips into the still-wet coating. Wait too long and they’ll bounce right off the hardened surface.

Kitchen Tips

• A microwave works if you go in 20-second bursts and stir between each one. Overheated coating turns grainy fast.
• Use a fork instead of tongs to fish out thin cookies that might break under tong pressure.
• Point the chocolate chips tip-down for classic round eyes or tip-up for cartoon-style ones.
• Store in a single layer. Stacking while still soft smudges the ghostly faces.

Variations

• Use Oreos or graham crackers instead of peanut butter cookies for a nut-free version.
• Tint a portion of the coating orange for pumpkin twins alongside the ghosts.
• Add a tiny dot of black gel frosting for a surprised “O” mouth.