Easy Halloween Spider Donuts - A spooky treat the kids will love, made with store bought donuts, candy and pretzels. These make a yummy and creepy treat for Halloween!
If you're looking for more fun Halloween treats, try out my Halloween Spider Cupcakes for a similar recipe. Also try these easy Halloween recipes: How to Make Scary Good Halloween Donuts or Eyeball Oreo Truffles.
Why i love these spooky spider donuts
- It’s a Halloween treat the kids can make. My 9 year old son and 12 year old daughter made these Halloween Spider Donuts. It’s their favorite holiday, besides Christmas. So easy and fun to eat! Anyone can do it!
- Such a fun activity to do with your kids and family! It is also a great Halloween snack.
- Perfect no bake treat to bring to Halloween parties.
- The best thing about these Halloween Spider Donuts is that you don’t even have to turn on the oven!
- These mini spider donuts have a nice crunch to them with the pretzel pieces.
What you need
Ingredient notes
Donuts - You can buy any store bought donuts you want. You can get whichever flavor too if you would like! If you want to follow the exact recipe you can either get the Little Debbie Mini Frosted Chocolate Donuts or TastyKake Frosted Mini Donuts. Find them at your local grocery store (fun fact I actually found them at a gas station). You can also make homemade donuts with a Mini Donut Maker Machine if you prefer fresh donuts!
Pretzels - Use large thin pretzels. You can either use the Rold Gold Thins, Snyder’s Thins or your favorite brand.
Vanilla Frosting - You can buy the Pillsbury Creamy Supreme Vanilla Frosting (which I used) or any store bought vanilla frosting that comes in a tube like the Betty Crocker cookie icing. If you prefer homemade buttercream, you could make a small batch by mixing ¼ cup softened butter with 1 cup powdered sugar and 2 teaspoons heavy cream or milk. Stir together until smooth.
How to make these adorable spider treats
- Spider legs: Start by making your pretzel legs by breaking off the 2 curves of the pretzel. I would make about 60 legs (for 10 donuts), each donut has 6 legs (3 on each side OR two if you like!).
- Next, place ½ cup of your vanilla frosting into a ziplock bag or piping bag. Seal and set aside.
- Spider eyes: Gather 20 M&Ms (for 10 donuts) and arrange them so you have 10 pairs of the same color. You can use any color for the eyes of course. Then draw on little black dots with your edible pen in the center of each M&Ms (if you desire to).
- Assemble: Gently press each pretzel leg into the top of the donut - 3 on each side. Grab your piping bag with icing and cut the tiny corner. Place a small dot of icing on the back of each candy eye. Then stick each candy eye on the side of the donut.
Expert tips
- The hardest part is breaking the pretzels properly. It's not that hard, but you want to use the top two rounded sections of a large pretzel. Once you do it a few times, you will get the hang of it!
- For an easier break for the pretzels, make sure your finger is in the right spot where you want to break it and be extra careful because you don’t want to break the whole leg!
- Using a black edible Foodwriter pen for the edible eyes helps a lot and makes it look very clean! Plus it is very easy to use.
- When scooping the vanilla frosting into your pastry bag or ziplock bag, use a cup to make it easier. Insert the pastry bag or ziploc bag into the cup then open it up so you could put the frosting in. Put your frosting in with a small spatula.
- If you’re in a hurry, you can use a Wilton icing tube to glue the candy eyes. You can find it at craft stores, Walmart or online.
Frequently asked questions
How do I make homemade mini donuts? There's a handy dandy Mini Donut Maker Machine that I found on Amazon. It even comes with a little recipe book with lots of donut recipes.
Can I use homemade frosting instead of store bought? If you prefer homemade buttercream, you could make a small batch by mixing ¼ cup softened butter with 1 cup powdered sugar and 2 teaspoons heavy cream or milk. Stir together until smooth.
Where can I find the Foodwriter edible pen? You can find it at your local craft store, grocery store, or online. I found this Wilton FoodWriter Edible Pen on Amazon.
How do I store my delicious spider donuts? You can store them in an airtight container for up to three days. I would not recommend putting them in the refrigerator because the M&Ms will lose their color.
Helpful Hints
• Putting these together this spooky treat is a snap. My son put the pretzels in the donuts. We decided to make 4 legs on most of them, just because we were in a hurry. Then I piped some icing and placed the candies for the eyes. You could do more legs if you wanted to.
• We did some with 6 legs. My daughter did the legs and eyes all by herself without a problem. Her 9 year old friend helped her too.
• Halloween is just a few days away. You can throw together these fun spider donuts in a hurry and the kids will be so glad you did!
related recipes
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Halloween Spider Donuts
Ingredients
- 30 Store bought mini chocolate donuts (or you could make them homemade with a Mini Donut Maker Machine)
- 1 cup large pretzels
- 60 M&Ms candies
- ½ cup vanilla frosting (I used a store bought vanilla creamy ready-to-spread frosting)
- 1 black food writing pen optional
Instructions
- For the spider legs - break off the top 2 curves of the pretzels. Each curve will be a leg. You will need at least 120 "legs". That would give you 4 legs per spider. Break off more if you want more legs. Set aside.
- Place ½ cup frosting in a small resealable food storage plastic bag; seal bag. Set aside.
- For the eyes - if desired, draw a black dot in the middle of 60 M&Ms (make sure there are 2 of each color).
- To assemble - gently press the pretzel legs into the donuts. Cut a small corner off the tip of the plastic bag. Pipe 2 dots of frosting for the eyes. Place the 2 candies on each donut.
- Serve immediately or cover to store at room temperature up to 2 days.
- Recipe adapted from www.itsalwaysautumn.com.
Scott Cherek says
Hi, I’m the interactive marketing coordinator at Goodwill Industries of Southeastern Wisconsin and Metropolitan Chicago, and we’re interested in using your recipe on our AmazingGoodwill.com website to highlight Halloween DIY projects.
We will be providing proper credit and linking directly back to your website. Please feel free to contact me if this is at all an issue, and we will gladly remove the content.
Regards,
Scott Cherek