Ghosts, Skulls, and Jack-o’-Lanterns: 4 Halloween Cookies to Bake Before October 31

Butter, flour, and sugar are all it takes to start a haunting. Roll out the dough, cut it into hearts, discs, or pumpkins, and a few clever pinches turn each one into a ghost, a skull with pine nut teeth, or a jack-o’-lantern with a jam filling. One of the four even hides a surprise inside: a window full of candy sealed between the layers.

Ghost Cookies are made from a vanilla shortcrust cut with a plain heart-shaped cutter. Each heart is split in half and the tip twisted into a drop shape, which gives about 50 little ghosts. Two piping nozzles of different sizes press in the mouth and eyes, and the cookies bake at 340°F for 13 to 15 minutes.

Pro tip: don’t worry if the dough looks separated after the eggs go in. It comes together once the flour is added.

Skull Cookies get a nutty edge from hazelnut flour mixed into the shortcrust. Discs of dough are pinched on two sides to shape the skull, with a wooden spoon handle pressing the eye sockets and a toothpick drawing the nose. Pine nuts become the teeth, and the 30 cookies bake at 356°F for 20 minutes.

Pro tip: no hazelnut flour? The same amount of almond flour works.

Two-Tone Cocoa and Pumpkin Cookies use steamed pumpkin purée in the dough, which is then split in two, with cocoa worked into one half. Pumpkin-shaped cutters cut 20 dark and 20 light cookies. Strawberry jam goes on the dark ones, and the light ones, with carved eyes and mouths, close the sandwich. They bake at 350°F for about 25 minutes.

Pro tip: carve the faces only into the light cookies. The dark cookie and the jam underneath show through the cutouts.

Halloween Shortcrust Cookies are the trick-or-treat cookie. Pumpkin shortcrust and cocoa shortcrust are cut into pumpkin and ghost shapes, three layers per cookie. The middle layer has a hole in the center, filled with colored candies, and the three layers are glued together with icing. They bake at 340°F, and monstrous faces are piped on top.

Pro tip: bake the cookies with the hole on a separate tray, as the recipe suggests. They need less time than the whole ones.

By October 31 the tin should be full: ghosts leaning on skulls, pumpkins stacked next to sandwiches with their jam peeking out. All four keep well for several days in an airtight container, from three days to a week. Two of the doughs can even be frozen raw, so the baking can start well before the first costume shows up.