Lyle’s Spooky Halloween Tree

Sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda and ginger. Add the butter and rub until it resembles fine breadcrumbs, stir in the sugar.

Add the golden syrup to the dry ingredients with the egg and milk.  Mix until a dough forms then turn onto a floured surface and knead until smooth.

Roll out on a lightly floured surface about 5mm thick and using Halloween novelty cutters cut out about 30 shapes, gathering up the scraps and re-rolling them for more cookies.  Carefully transfer to baking trays.

Bake in the oven for 12-15 minutes until golden.  Cool 1 minute then if wished, using the end of a plastic straw, make a hole in the tops of the cookies so they can be hung on a tree.

Sift the icing sugar into a bowl and add just enough cold water to make a thick glace icing.  Remove portions of it to another bowl and add orange food colouring for the pumpkins and black for the bat wings. Spread over the cookies and allow to dry.

Using writing icing pipe faces on the pumpkins and outline the bat wings with white writing icing.  Allow to dry before hanging on the tree.

Tie ribbon or raffia through the holes to hang from some branches anchored in a plant pot weighted with stones.