Anticipating Halloween

This morning, Emily came running out of her room--she is one of those people who wakes up raring to go--leaped into my arms for a hug, and said, "Is it Halloween?" She can hardly wait! I told her she'd have to wait until tomorrow, but that today we would make chocolate covered spiders. She LOVED that idea. We just finished making them. I saw Sandra Lee make something like this on Food Network yesterday, but I changed the recipe a little.


Chocolate-Covered Spiders
12 oz semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 C peanut butter
6 C Rice Krispies cereal
1/2 C white chocolate chips
thin pretzel rods

In heavy bottomed sauce pan, melt together semi-sweet chocolate chips and peanut butter. Reserve 2/3 C mixture for "gluing" and decorating and pour remaining mixture over cereal. Stir to combine. Spoon onto waxed paper and add pretzel "legs" and white chocolate chip "eyes." Coat tops of spiders with additional chocolate-peanut butter mixture. Allow chocolate to harden (place in refrigerator or freezer to speed up the process).

We also made some spider "webs" which were just balls of the cereal mixture decorated with the chocolate. The spiders were taking a while to assemble, especially with my 3-year-old helper who kept eating the pretzels and white chocolate chips!