Halloween "Witches’ Brew" Punch Recipe

Ingredients:

1 quart grape juice
1 quart orange juice
1 quart ginger ale

Directions:

Combine all ingredients in a Halloween punch bowl. Add spooky Halloween decorations, such as spooky ice-cubes or a gruesome mask made of punch.

Note:  To make a mask, fill a plastic mask with punch and freeze overnight. Unmold and add to the punch bowl. 

Halloween "Bloodshot Red Ghoul Eyes" Recipe

These devilled eggs are gruesome looking but really taste great and they will be the hit of the party.  For the best bloodshot effect serve them within 2 hours of making them.

Ingredients:

3 C of hot water
2 T red food coloring
1 T of white vinegar
6 hard boiled eggs, cracked but not peeled
1/3 C of mayonnaise
1/4 C of green onions, chopped fine
2 T cilantro, minced
2 t Dijon style mustard
12 ripe olives, sliced
1 t ketchup
 
Directions:

Pour the water into a large mixing bowl.  Add the food coloring and vinegar and whisk to blend together well.  Add the eggs and if the water does not completely cover the eggs add more hot water.  Let the eggs stand for 30 minutes. 

Remove the eggs with a slotted spoon and peel.  Cut the eggs in half.  Remove the yolks and place in a small mixing bowl. Place the whites on a platter and set aside.

Mash the yolks with a fork. Add the mayonnaise, onions, cilantro and mustard and stir until well combined.

Stuff the egg whites with the egg yolk mixture.  Press 1 slice of the olive into the egg yolk mixture.  Fill the center ring of each olive slice with a dab of ketchup.

Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Makes 1 dozen

Total Time:  25 minutes


Recommended:
New! Halloween Recipes Ebook. Over 50 Recipes With Photos.
Plus 3 Bonus Ebooks - Halloween Crafts, Halloween Drawing and Halloween Printable Games!

Wrapped Up Mummy Dip Recipe

This fun loving mummy makes a great centerpiece for your Halloween table. Any type of ranch dip mix can be used such as regular or fiesta.

Ingredients:

1 (1 lb.) loaf of frozen bread dough, thawed
3 pieces of string cheese
1 (16 oz.) container of sour cream
1 envelope of ranch dip mix
1 black olive

Directions:

Preheat the oven temperature to 350 degrees.
Allow the dough to rise according the directions on the package. When the dough is ready, roll it out on a flat surface to form a 12 inch oval with the bottom narrower than the top.Make an indention on both sides 1 inch from the top of the dough oval to form the mummies head.Spray a baking sheet with a non stick cooking spray and lay the form dough onto the sheet. Allow the dough to rise 20 minutes in a warm area.

When the dough is ready bake for 22 minutes or until it turns a golden brown.

Lay strips of the string cheese over the bread from the top to the bottom. Return the bread to the oven for 2 minutes or until the cheese has melted. Remove the dough to a wire rack to cool.

Place the sour cream into a mixing bowl. Fold in the ranch dip mix until blended in well. Refrigerate until ready to serve.

When the dough has cooled cut it in half horizontally. Remove the bread in the middle leaving a 3/4 inch shell. Place the bottom half of the bread onto a serving plate. Fill the bottom half with the prepared dip.
Replace the top of the bread. Cut two slices from the olive and place on the head of the mummy for eyes.

Cut the removed bread into cubes and serve with the dip along with fresh vegetables or crackers.

Makes 16 servings

Preparation Time: approximately 25 minutes + rising
Baking Time: approximately 22 minutes + cooling
Total Time: approximately 47 minutes

Recommended:
New! Halloween Recipes Ebook. Over 50 Recipes With Photos.
Plus 3 Bonus Ebooks - Halloween Crafts, Halloween Drawing and Halloween Printable Games!

(affiliate link)

Easy Additions for Perfect Halloween Meals

It’s Halloween! With just a few little changes or additions to things that you probably already make, you can put the spirit of Halloween on your table.

Scary Eyeballs – Add a little more mustard into the centers of deviled eggs or a thin dollop under where you will lay a black olive into the creamy center.

Ghost Sandwiches – Cut your bread into ghosts, add the filling of your choice and your children will have a ghostly treat for their school or after school sandwich.

Wormy Hot Dogs – Thinly slice your hot dogs and then microwave. This will make them curl to look like worms. Put them on a hamburger bun and dress with mustard, catsup and pickles to make a slimy swamp underneath.

Ghostly Toast – Toast your bread. When it is cool enough to cut, with a gingerbread girl cutter or a plain knife, cut to make a ghost body. Top with whipped cream cheese or flavored yogurt with raisins or dates cut for eyes.

Orange Jack O Lantern – With a toothpick, gently carve a face into the orange. Careful not to injure the meat/pulp of the orange, your child will have a small version of the Jack O Lantern that is healthy and edible.

Graveyard Snack – Take a cup of plain or buttered popped popcorn; add a half cup each of mini pretzels, mini marshmallows, chocolate chips, goldfish crackers and raisins.

Spider Snack – Taking two round crackers, such as the ritz, put peanut butter in the middle. Take 8 small pretzels and stick all around, 4 on each side to make the legs. Add raisins for eyes.

Salty Bones – Making breadsticks for your spaghetti tonight? Here’s a Halloween twist. Unroll a tube of refrigerated breadstick roll and separate the triangle pieces. Stretch each individual piece to make a long bone like figure. Cut about a 1 and a half inch slit in each end with your kitchen scissors. Roll the remaining 4 flaps into what would make the end of a dog bone. Sprinkle with coarse salt and bake as directed.

Goblin Tongues – Using mini bagels, spread cream cheese or mayonnaise, your preference, onto bagel. Cut slices out of circular pieces of bologna lunch meat to look like tongues and put into the top center of the bagel, leaving it to hang out like a tongue.

These are just a small sampling of things you can do to impress the kids or grandkids. Nothing fancy, quite simple for you but they’ll love them. Presentation and excitement is part of children accepting new and different things. Let them help you when creating these treats and they may just be a little more receptive to the new Halloween changes in foods they already love.

Bubbling Cauldron Recipes: Dip and Witch Brew Fit for Halloween Parties

Throwing or attending a Halloween party this year and wondering what to make? Bubbling cauldrons are the dish of choice for the ghosts and witches of the night. Here are two recipes everyone in attendance is sure to enjoy.

Goblin Dip

Ingredients:

1 pkg (16 oz.) Velveeta processed cheese, cubed
16 oz shredded Swiss cheese
1 can(10 ½ oz.) cheddar cheese soup
2 cans (15 oz.) black beans (drain well)
1 jar medium or hot salsa
1 can (4 oz) diced jalapeno peppers, (drain well)
1 round loaf of pumpernickel or round marble rye bread, unsliced
2 loaves (18 ounces each) round marble rye bread, unsliced
Pretzel rods

Directions: 

Put canned soup into saucepan. Add the processed and swiss cheese into the pan. Melt cheeses over low heat, stirring often. Remove from heat. Stir in beans, salsa and jalapeño peppers, if desired.

Carefully cut center out of bread, leaving 1-1/2-inch shell. Cut or tear bread center into pieces for dipping. Fill your emptied bread bowl (cauldron) with the cheese.

Take your cut or tore bread pieces that you took from your bowl and place on a serving plate. For an added extra touch, you could “assemble a campfire” of pretzel rods around the bowl. Put 1 full pretzel rod into the cheese dip and serve immediately.

Alternate Ideas for Goblin Dip

If you want more of a Mexican taste to your cheesy dip, add a package of taco seasoning into the saucepan when cooking and a can of Ro-tel tomatoes with green chilis.

Using Halloween cookie cutters (you can purchase them) and cocktail bread, cut out some decorative pieces of bread for dipping.


Witch’s Brew Recipe

Ingredients:

2 packages lime Jell-O
Ice (if needed)
Lime Kool-Aid
1 Gallon Green Punch Kool-Aid or Green Punch (any brand)
Cauldron or Punch Bowl
Ladle

Directions:

The night before, using the lime Kool-Aid prepare ice cubes. You’ll need to use the flavored ice cubes as this particular witch’s brew does not do well watered down with plain water ice cubes. It will water it down too much.

In enough time for the Jell-O to set before serving, prepare both packages of lime Jell-O. Place in fridge to set. Make one gallon of Green Punch Kool-Aid or you can purchase a gallon of any brand green punch. Chill.

When ready to serve, using a fork, mash up the set Jell-O into globs. Pour the punch into punch bowl or cauldron. Add Jell-O globs and Kool-Aid ice cubes.

Tips for serving: Because this is a Jell-O punch, do not use a pitcher to serve. The Jell-O will try and sit on the bottom. Make certain you stir the punch well and ladle it into your guests’ cups.

Halloween Dinner Recipe: Crispy Witch Fingers

These claws will really “grab” your guest’s attention. The Cajun seasoning gives these strips a bold taste while the cornflake covering helps to keep the chicken moist during baking. The Cajun seasoning can be left out if preparing these for children.



Ingredients:

1 sweet red pepper
2 T flour
2 t + 1 T Cajun seasoning, divided
3 eggs
1 1/2 C cornflake crumbs
2 T green onion, chopped
1 lb. boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into 16, 3/4 inch strips

Directions:

Set the oven temperature to 350 degrees allowing it to preheat. Lightly spray a baking sheet with a non stick cooking spray.

Cut the pepper into 16 triangles and set aside.

Place the flour and 2 t of the Cajun seasoning into a plastic zip lock bag. Close and shake the bag to combine the ingredients together well.

Place the eggs in a shallow bowl and beat lightly with a fork.

Place the cornflake crumbs in a shallow bowl.

Add the green onion and remaining Cajun seasoning to the cornflake crumbs and toss to combine. Place a few strips of chicken into the flour mixture, close and shake to lightly cover. Dip the coated strips in the egg shaking off any excess. Roll in the cornflake mixture covering the strips well and place on the baking sheet.
Repeat until all the chicken strips are covered.

Place the chicken into the oven and bake for 20 minutes or until the juices run clear. Remove and allow cooling enough to handle.

Cut a small slit into one end of each of the strips. Insert a pepper triangle; point out, into the strips.

Makes 8 servings

Preparation Time: approximately 15 minutes
Baking Time: approximately 20 minutes
Total Time: approximately 35 minutes

Easy Wormy Cupcakes - Halloween Recipe

Ingredients:

Prepared Cupcakes
Frosting of choice
1 package gummy worms
1 package chocolate cookies or graham crackers

Directions:

Place a few cookies in a plastic bag and using the back of your hand or a rolling pin press down until mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Using a teaspoon make a small well in the center of each cupcake. Frost cupcakes around well and sprinkle with cookie crumb mixture. Stick a gummy worm into the center of each cupcake.

Sweet Skeleton Bones - Halloween Recipe

Ingredients:

4 large egg whites
2 cups icing sugar

Directions:

Preheat oven to 250F.

In a large bowl beat egg whites until stiff. Gradually start adding the sugar, one tablespoon at a time. Keep beating and adding sugar until you have a meringue. Line baking trays with paper. Using a piping bag with a plain nozzle pipe a straight meringue bone line (approximately 4 inches long). Pipe a meringue ball at the end of each bone. If necessary shape bones further using a small knife.

Bake for approximately 1 hour and 15 minutes or until bones have dried out. Remove from oven and let cool on paper.

Recommended:
New! Halloween Recipes Ebook. Over 50 Recipes With Photos.
Plus 3 Bonus Ebooks - Halloween Crafts, Halloween Drawing and Halloween Printable Games!

Halloween Themed Party Foods

When it comes to Halloween Themed Party Foods, the world is your oyster. It's relatively simple to turn anything you might serve into a creepy, crawly Halloween treat.

Here are a few simple ideas:

Rice Cereal Halloween Treats

The regular, run of the mill rice cereal treat can be turned into a sweet and unique Halloween treat by adding a few drops of orange food coloring (or a combination of red and yellow) into the marshmallow/butter mixture as it melts. When you cut the treats into squares, add one candy corn to the top of each square.

Marshmallow Haystacks

Here's a great variation to the rice cereal treat recipe. Replace the rice cereal with corn flake cereal. Follow the instructions combining the cereal, melted marshmallow and butter mixture. Mold the cereal mixture into the shape of haystacks. Add an orange candy corn pumpkin to the top of each haystack.

Candy Corn Ice Cream Sundae

Into one cup of partially thawed vanilla ice cream, mix in one tablespoon of candy corn (coarsely chopped) and one tablespoon of dry roasted peanuts (coarsely chopped). Scoop into ice cream bowl. Freeze until firm. When ready to serve, drizzle caramel ice cream topping over the ice cream mixture, a dollop of whipped cream and some additional candy corn and peanuts.

Halloween Napoleons

Thaw one sheet of frozen puffed pastry. Divide the puff pastry into three equal sections and bake according to package directions. Crush enough Oreo cookies to make 1-½ cups. Set aside.

Prepare one package of vanilla pudding only add a few drops of orange (or combination of red and yellow) food coloring. Set pudding aside. Whip one small carton of whipping cream until stiff. While whipping, add two teaspoons vanilla and one teaspoon sugar.

To build the napoleon, lay one sheet of baked puff pastry on serving tray. Spread ½ of the pudding mixture on the puff pastry. Sprinkle 1/3 of the crushed cookies on top of the pudding. Spoon dollops of whipped cream on top of the cookies and follow by a second layer of puff pastry. Continue layering pudding, cookies and whipped cream.

Once the third and last layer of puff pastry is set on top, spoon three small dollops of whipped cream (do not spread) and top with some additional crushed Oreos. Slice and serve.

A Fun Halloween Breakfast

Breakfast is many times an overlooked meal when celebrating the holidays. The simple addition of orange food coloring (or a combination of red and yellow) into a glass of milk will give your kids a surprise on Halloween morning.

For some spooktacular Halloween pancakes, melt ¼ cup of chocolate chips in a microwave safe container. When melting chocolate, melt at 30-second intervals and stir each time. Pour or spoon melted chocolate into a heavy-duty plastic zip top bag. Press all the chocolate into one corner of the bag and with a scissor, cut a tiny corner off the edge of the bag. Make pancakes and with the melted chocolate, pipe a jack-o-lantern face on the pancakes.

Recommended: 
New! Halloween Recipes Ebook. Over 50 Recipes With Photos.
Plus 3 Bonus Ebooks - Halloween Crafts, Halloween Drawing and Halloween Printable Games!

Sweet and Salty Pirate Caramel Apples

Ingredients:

6 Granny Smith apples
6 wooden sticks
1 (14 ounce) package individually wrapped caramels, unwrapped
2 tablespoons water
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 tablespoons coarse sea salt
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
Extra chips for decorating

Instructions:

Insert wooden sticks 3/4 of the way into the stem end of each apple.
Combine caramels and water in a saucepan over low heat. Stir often to get a smooth caramel mixture. Dip apples into caramel. Place standing up on a sheet of foil or a cookie sheet for easy decorating and chilling. Sprinkle with the coarse salt and place in the fridge. Melt chocolate chips in a microwave safe dish. This is easiest if you microwave for 30-40 seconds, stir, and repeat until you have a whole bowl of smooth creamy melted chocolate. Drizzle melted chocolate over the apples. Sprinkle with the extra chocolate chips. Return to refrigerator until ready to eat.

Fruity Ghosts on a Stick

It just turns out that pears are just the right shape for making spooky ghost treats! These are an interesting alternative to the traditional candy apples.

Ingredients:

Wooden craft sticks, like for a popsicle
6 medium sized pears
10 - 12 squares of almond bark (2 ounce squares)
Handful of mini chocolate chips for ghostly eyes
Halloween cupcake papers

Instructions:

Line a cookie sheet or other flat serving tray with waxed paper, we aren't actually putting in the oven so any moveable flat surface is good for this treat. Line up the cupcake papers across the sheet. Melt almond bark following the package directions. Poke craft sticks firmly into the pears. Dip each pear into the melted bark, you can use a spoon to help evenly coat the entire pear. Place each one in a cupcake paper, standing up as much as you can get it to. Place mini chocolate candies for face decoration. You can use any leftover almond bark to spoon ghost tails into the paper cups. Refrigerate until ready to eat.

Munchy Mummy Appetizer Dip and Party Mix

Munchy Mummy Appetizer Dip

Ingredients:

1/4 cup mayonnaise
3/4 cup plain low-fat yogurt
2 teaspoons tarragon vinegar
1/2 teaspoon curry powder
1/8 teaspoon thyme
2 teaspoons chili sauce
1 celery stick, chopped

Instructions:

Combine ingredients and chill for at least one hour before serving. Perfect in the center of your veggie tray. In addition to veggies, use Halloween shaped cookie cutters to cut out mini finger sandwiches, the dip can also be used as a spread on those, yummy! For super festivity on the serving table scoop the dip into a hollowed out mini pumpkin.


Party Mix

This is also really good for fall football parties. The nice part about it is you can make this without getting the kitchen overheated or it leaves the oven free for making other things.

Ingredients:

4 cups Wheat Chex® cereal
4 cups Cheerios® cereal
3 cups pretzel sticks
1 (12 ounce) can salted peanuts
1/4 cup butter or margarine, melted
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
1 teaspoon celery salt
1/2 teaspoon seasoned salt

Instructions:

Get out the crock pot! Mix up the cereals, pretzels and peanuts and put in the crock pot. Combine butter, parmesan cheese and salts. Drizzle over the dry mixture and toss for coating. Put the lid on and cook on low for 3 - 4 hours. Stir at least once each hour to avoid burning.

Vampires Be Gone Spaghetti

Ingredients:

10 garlic cloves, coarsely chopped
Several pinches of hot red pepper flakes
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, or as desired
1 pound spaghetti
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 head of broccoli, broken into bite-size florets
Freshly grated Parmesan, or other grating cheese

Instructions:

Boil water and add noodles to cook as usual, except about half way through cooking add the broccoli and let the noodles and broccoli finish cooking at the same time. Drain, but reserve about half the cooking water for later. Warm approximately half of the garlic with the pepper flakes in the olive oil over medium heat (turn on the vent and open the kitchen window or you'll be crying in your spaghetti!) Toss the pasta and broccoli with the garlic/chile oil and add the remaining garlic to the mix and continue to toss to coat. Add a few spoonfuls of that reserved water and keep tossing, add more water as needed. Kind of have to eyeball it until it's well coated and tossed to your liking. Serve up and sprinkle with grated cheese. There will be no fear of vampires bothering you after this dinner!

Halloween Party Punch

What's a Halloween party without a big bowl of punch with floating eyeballs in it?

Ingredients:

1 (32 fluid ounce) bottle apple juice, chilled
1 (12 fluid ounce) can frozen cranberry juice concentrate
1 cup orange juice
1 1/2 liters ginger ale
1 apple (optional)
Eyeball candies (optional)

Instructions:

Get a large punch bowl or other container to serve your punch from. Combine the apple juice, cranberry concentrate, and orange juice. Stir until any frozen parts are dissolved. Slowly mix in the ginger ale. Slice the apple in whole slices to float on top as brain slices among the floating eyeballs.

After Trick-or-Treating Pumpkin Bars

Ingredients:

4 eggs
1 2/3 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
1 (15 ounce) can solid pack pumpkin
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt

ICING:
1 (3 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
2 cups confectioners' sugar
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon milk

Instructions:

Get out the big mixing bowl and beat together eggs, sugar, oil and pumpkin. Combine the dry ingredients, flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Gradually add this to the pumpkin mixture and beat together well. Pour your mixture into an ungreased jellyroll pan and bake at 350 degrees F for 27 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool before frosting.

Recommended Frosting:

Beat together cream cheese, sugar, butter and vanilla. Add just enough milk to help get a nice spreading consistency. You can add a few drops of orange or green food coloring to make them even more trick-or-treat like!

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

It's not Halloween until you've stuck your hands into a pumpkin to pull out all the guts to carve your jack-o-lantern. Now you've got all those pumpkin seeds sitting there. Don't just toss them in the trash! Roast them for a nice evening treat.

Instructions:

Rinse pumpkin seeds under cold water and try to get off all the pulp strings. Spray a baking sheet with non stick spray, or oil it down with your favorite cooking oil. Sprinkle with salt to taste, you might find yourself using a little more salt than usual. Bake at 325 degrees F until toasted for 15 minutes. STIR and flip. Bake at 325 degrees F until toasted for another 15 minutes. Let them cool off completely before eating them. You don't want a burnt tongue. Store in an air tight container or Ziploc bag.

Optional: If you'd like you can soak your pumpkin seeds overnight in salt water for a more salty flavor and an easier to eat seed. It doesn't make a huge difference in the result, but some people prefer doing it that way.

Bobbing for Candied Apples

Okay, so we're not really bobbing for them because that would be sticky and messy.

Ingredients:

2 cup granulated sugar
2 cup corn syrup
1/3 cup cinnamon candy
1 cup water
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teapoon cloves
3/4 teasppon red food coloring
6 of your favorite type of apple, roughly medium in size
wooden skewers (these are often found in the produce dept this time of year)
cookie sheet sprayed with no stick cooking spray or a long sheet of waxed paper

Instructions:

First thing you want to do is as you usually would remove the apple stems and wash them up. Grab a skewer and stab it right into the middle of the apple and repeat for each apple. Be careful not to poke out the other side of the apple though. In a small or medium sized saucepan combine sugar, corn syrup, cinnamon candies, and water. Stir and keep stirring until everything is dissolved. Then stir some more to make sure it's all dissolved. Medium heat here, you don't want it to boil at this point because that will just make a mess. Once you've got it all dissolved add cinnamon, vanilla, cloves, and food coloring to the mix. Now we want that to boil to a 300 degree temperture on the candy thermometer. Dip your apples into your candy coating and be sure to coat them well. Place them skewer pointing up on the waxed paper or cookie sheet and allow them to harden.

Make sure you let them cool completely to room temperture before eating! They will be hot for sometime and no one wants a burnt mouth on Halloween.

Halloween Poke Cake

Ingredients:

CAKE:

3 ounces orange Jell-O mix

3/4 cup boiling water

1/2 cup cold water

1 package white cake mix

TOPPING:

1 1/2 cups cold milk

1 small package instant vanilla pudding mix

1 envelope dream whip topping

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 handful of candy corn

Instructions:

Dissolve gelatin in boiling water. Add cold water and stir until mixed and set aside until ready to use. Prepare cake following the package directions for a 13x9 pan sized cake. Let the cake cool for some time. Using a meat fork or a bamboo skewer "poke" holes to the bottom of the cake about an inch apart, you can do it at random or in a pattern it's up to you. Pour the liquid gelatin into the holes! Beat together the topping ingredients until stiff peaks begin to form, add food coloring if desired. Frost your Halloween poke cake, sprinkle with candy corn for decoration. Allow to chill so that gelatin sets.

This recipe can be altered for other holidays and themes as well but changing the flavor of gelatin and adding food coloring to the frosting.

Rocky Horror Picture Show Halloween Squares

Ingredients:

1 (12 oz.) pkg. semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 (14 oz.) can sweetened condensed milk
2 tbsp. butter
2 cups dry roasted peanuts
1 (10 1/2 oz.) pkg. white miniature marshmallows
Assorted soft Halloween candy

Instructions:

Line a 13x9 baking pan with waxed paper, trust me you'll be glad you used waxed paper at the end! Melt chocolate in double boiler with milk and butter, remove from heat. Combine nuts and marshmallows. Fold those into the chocolate. Press mixture into the lined baking pan, spreading it out evenly as possible. Sprinkle the soft candy mixture evenly over the top of that. Refrigerate until firm enough to cut into squares, then store at room temp.

This is a nice adaptive recipe, if someone has an allergy to peanut use another nut, or mix in some candy pieces or dry cereal. You can even add other things in addition to what's listed here! Make it colorful and fun.

Vampire Bat Stew

Ingredients:

1 1/4 pounds lean pork stew meat (buy whatever cut is on sale and cut into chunks to save some money!)

1 medium (1/2 cup) onion, sliced

2 cups baby-cut carrots

1 cup frozen whole kernel corn

1 tablespoon chili powder

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

2 (14 1/2-ounce) cans diced tomatoes with chile peppers, undrained

Pastry:

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/3 cup butter or margarine

2 ounces shredded cheddar cheese

3 tablespoons cold water

Chili powder or seasoning to taste

Instructions:

Brown pork and onion in skillet over medium to high heat, stir occasionally to get an even brown (just browning, not cooking and if you want you can skip this step since we're headed to the crock pot anyway *wink*). Put meat, carrots and corn in crock pot. Sprinkle with chili powder, cumin, and garlic. Stir in the diced tomatoes. Cook on low for 7 to 9 hours (or high for 3 to 4 hours).

To make the pastry bats:

Combine flour and cheese in large mixing bowl. Cut in butter until it looks like coarse floury butter crumbles. Using a fork, fluff in the water to moisten the mixture. Shape dough into ball and flatten, grab a rolling pin and roll it out (remember to flour your rolling area). Cut out dough using bat shaped cookie cutters! Sprinkle with chili powder for added color and flavor (optional step). Bake at 450 degrees F for 6 to 8 minutes until lightly brown. When serving, place a biscuit bat on top of each bowl of stew!