Halloween 2010

cheese finger food

Mozzarella string cheese

Green bell pepper

Cream cheese

Wearing plastic gloves or sandwich bags over your hands to keep the cheese as smudge-free as possible, use a paring knife (parents only) to cut each string in half and then carve a shallow area for a fingernail just below the rounded end of each half.Mark the joint right below the nail as well as the knuckle joint by carving out tiny horizontal wedges of cheese, as pictured.For the fingernails, slice a green bell pepper into 3/8-inch-wide strips. Set the strips skin side down on your work surface and trim the pulp so that it's about half as thick. Then cut the strips into ragged-topped nail shapes and stick them in place at the ends of the fingers with dabs of cream cheese.

apple bites

Ingredients

Apples

Slivered almonds

Instructions

Just quarter and core an apple, cut a wedge from the skin side of each quarter, then press slivered almonds in place for teeth.Tips:If you're not going to serve them right away, baste the apples with orange juice to keep them from browning.

carrot finger food

vegetable dip

4 long carrots

1 medium carrot

softened cream cheese

sliced-almond

baby carrots

To prepare them, just fill a serving bowl with your favorite vegetable dip. Wash and peel 4 long carrots for fingers and 1 medium carrot for a thumb.With a paring knife (a parent's job), cut a flat, shallow notch in the tip of each carrot. Then use a dab of dip or softened cream cheese to glue a sliced-almond fingernail atop each notch.Stick the fingers in the dip, as shown, and serve with plenty of peeled baby carrots for dipping.

Edible Eyeballs

Carrots Cream cheese

Pitted black olives

Instructions

Simply slice carrots into 1-inch-thick chunks, top each with a blob of cream cheese and one half of a pitted black olive, and serve.