Check out Canadian Living’s Creepy Witch’s Fingers. This style of cookie shows up in all the Halloween mags and books. It is so popular I just had to try making them from scratch myself!
This recipe uses a very traditional cookie dough and I like that it adds some almond favour with some extract. I only did half the recipe which was a little tricky, but doable, and put the dough in the fridge to chill until I had some time to make them.
My one big pet peeve? Not a lot of instructions on how to go about making the fingers. It just says to use one heaping teaspoons of dough and shape into a finger. Really? That tiny amount of dough would make a super small finger with a GIANT almond fingernail on top. Maybe that is what they wanted but how would I know that?
I wanted realistic witches’ fingers so I took more like a generous tablespoon of dough and rolled it approximately into a 3 1/2″ long x 1″ wide log. With both my hands I squeezed the middle together so it would arch into a knuckle. Then I shaped the front into a knuckle too. With a pairing knife I sliced wrinkles into the top of the middle knuckle.
I wedged a whole blanched almond on top of the fingernail bed I made and to me, that looks like a finger! Right? Or am I totally off here?
Just to give you a sense of the size, here is the finger in the middle of my tiny hand. Can you imagine that finger a third of this size with the almond on top? I couldn’t so I just kept going.
I ended up with a dozen cookies but according to this recipe I should have had 30 (since I divided the recipe in half). Uh oh. Oh well, too late now! I baked them in the 325F oven for 20 minutes like the recipe instructed and they came out perfectly. If these had been a third of this size they would have burned. I don’t get it.
This part is super clever. The almonds will slip off after baking so, using some store-bought decorating gel, put a generous amount in the imprint and then re-attach the almond. You want to see the gel to give it a creepy feeling so do not be stingy. I had orange so that is what I used and I love the look. You could use black, green, red…
The fingers did inflate, bloating out a little, but still pretty darn realistic. Not to mention yummy!
Despite the instructions driving me crazy, this recipe was quite easy to make for such a realistic and impressive outcome. Had there been more of a helpful tutorial I would have given this recipe a perfect score but I was left in the foodie weeds which was annoying. I really hate recipes that look simple and clear but really do not have enough instructions.
The cookies are quite tasty, I love that almond flavour throughout. They are a little dry, kind of like a shortbread cookie, but are they ever good dunked in some Nutella. I give this recipe four out of five wooden spoons.
First glance gave me shudder.
Indeed very creepy!
The gel under the fingernails and those big arthritic knuckles are nice touches! Here’s another idea — a bit of green food colouring in the cookie dough? Wicked!
I used to make these every year. I would use red jam to stick the nails on. I also sometimes added green colouring to the dought to make pale green fingers and once made them sort of purple. They are such great cookies. Yours look terrific!
I saw this recipe on Canadian Living and I was thinking of making them as well. Great minds think alike 🙂 Your review was very helpful. I will have to be careful with the sizing I guess. Thanks for the tip. They look great!
What fun, I know because we made these last night as well. Must be witching season for sure. They look amazingly creepy, my hubby won’t eat them, he said they’re too gross. Dipping in Nutella sounds fabulous, will have to try it.
In case you’re interested in checking out the recipe I used, it was Martha Stewart’s Ladies’ Fingers. I found her instructions pretty straight forward and divided the dough ahead of time to ensure they were similar sizes. Check FN later today, I’ll post my pic.
http://www.marthastewart.com/recipe/ladies-fingers-are-easy
I think you did a great job, and I agree, 1 tsp of batter would have been way to small with almonds for finger nails.
I’m loving all your Halloween treats! Love the addition of the decorating gel!! Def. more creepy! ha
I hope everyone is inspired to make their own and Ava, yours are super creepy! I saw them on FNC’s site and wow, so gross and awesome, LOL. Hehehe. Love it! And yes, by all means change the colour of the skin too, go for it.