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Looking for the ideal activity to get little ones in the mood for spooky season? They’ll love getting stuck in with this bake from Cook School – mixing up the ingredients before rolling their spiders into shape and adding pretzel legs and edible eyes for some fun finishing touches.
Cook School are a not-for-profit organisation that aims to equip young people with the skills, knowledge and confidence to cook delicious, affordable and healthy meals at home. Working with primary and secondary schools across the UK, they’ve hosted in-person and online cook-along classes for more than 250,000 students to date, all featuring straightforward ingredients and equipment, and easy-to-follow recipes. Follow them on Instagram and sign your local school up for free cookery courses on their website.
“A Halloween take on Cook School’s classic Chocolate Kisses, this is such a versatile recipe sure to become a go-to for your family baking sessions. Using store-cupboard ingredients, it’s super accessible and easy to adapt throughout the year (just add pretzel antlers and red reindeer noses for the festive season). As it’s so quick and simple to prepare and cook, it’s totally achievable as a mid-week treat, or after-school bake,” says Amanda Grant, co-founder of Cook School.
Makes approximately 30 chocolate spiders
Preparation: 20 minutes
Bake: 7 minutes
Equipment:
Scales
Mixing bowl
1 tablespoon
2 baking trays
Baking paper
Ingredients:
200g butter, softened
100g golden caster sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
250g self-raising flour
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
To decorate:
1 packet edible eyes
1 bag (175g) pretzels
Method:
Take the butter out of the fridge in advance – it needs to be really soft.
Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C Fan/Gas 4.
Line two baking sheets with baking paper.
Put the soft butter into a bowl, add the golden caster sugar and vanilla extract and mix together really well, until fluffy.
Add the self-raising flour and cocoa powder, and mix again with a spoon.
Break the dough into three big pieces, then break each piece into 10 smaller pieces.
Roll each small piece into a ball shape.
Evenly distribute the dough balls on the baking trays, leaving a gap in-between and decorate each ball with one or two edible eyes.
Snap the pretzels in half or into small pieces, and stick four on each side of each dough ball to make spider legs.
Bake for seven minutes.
Leave to cool, before enjoying.
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