The Making of: Spider Cookies

As I mentioned before, I saw the design for these on Bakerella. She used a cake box mix for hers, but since I am selling these after Halloween, too, I made my Chocolate Cookies from scratch.
I made one batch, made chocolate balls, put it in the oven, and waited for them to flatten out, like cookies usually do. But nooooooo, these ones decided to stay in the form of a ball! (Did someone forget to add baking powder???). How was I going to decorate them? I smooshed them with a spoon, but still, they weren't flat enough! So as you can imagine, I baked another DOUBLE batch this time, and layed them flat on the cookie sheets. These came out much better.

I didn't use a cookie cutter or a guide for the size since I was behind schedule with the non-successful batch, so some of them came out smaller than others. After they cooled completely, I made the Chocolate Frosting and spread it on top.
I wasn't sure what to do for the spider webs. I really wanted to use Royal Icing, but I didn't have enough left for all the cookies. So as a quick way out, I mixed icing sugar with some water to the consistency I wanted, and did the 3 circles.

Then I took a toothpick and formed the lines. If I had used Royal Icing though, I think it would've looked more spidery-webby like, but they still looked like webs. (Ok maybe not so much in this picture).

And then, the fun part! Adding the spiders! Well, I DID have some orange royal icing, so I used that for legs on all my spiders. I also used the green and orange that Bakerella used since it matches with the Halloween theme. I also added some brown ones, too. That's m & m's. With the peanut in them. They look more spidery rather than the plain ones :). I added eyes on the brown ones, too.

It was tons of fun! I received many good comments about these cookies. I think I'm going to put them on my menu and name them "Brownie Cookies." Everyone seemed to think they were just that. When I asked people what they liked, some said "Those Brownie Cookies." That must mean it reminds them of my brownies. Since I know those taste good, then that was a good complement.