Where can I find the original treat?
- These treats can be found at the Cozy Cone Motel in DCA during Halloween Time.
One treat Disneyland is (mostly) good at transforming each season are their churros. When a new foodie guide is out, expect to see several variations and themes. For this Halloween season, there were a number of delicious options, but for today, I chose to recreate the Haul-O-Ween churro.
Now, it might look like a crazy concoction some child cooked up in their Fisher-Price kitchen, but believe me, this was surprisingly good. Even with its edible green slime, and cookie and candy decorations, this churro treat was not too sweet. The cookie crumb coating worked really well with the classic cinnamon-sugar churro flavor; just adding a hint of cocoa.
Now, with this post I’ve gone and updated the piping tip that I usually use to a larger, closed star style. This resulted in a thicker, wider churro that was able to hold on to more cookie crumbs. Despite the size, it fried up light and crisp and this might be my new favorite churro style. I’m going to write up a quick kitchen tip post soon comparing the two types of pastry tips so you can decide which way you’d like your churros. Expect that excerpt here when that drops.
Also, let’s discuss the edible green slime for a minute. The description for the treat lists it as icing but it didn’t really, well, taste like icing. In fact, it didn’t have too much of a taste except kinda sweet, but not too sweet, and so I just made the executive decision here to make a thin style pudding and use that to decorate, and also dip my churros in for a sauce. It worked just fine. (Maybe next time at the park I’ll just ask for a side of sauce and take it home when it’s a little mysterious like this…)
Once the churros have cooled slightly, kids can take over coating and decorating the treats. Give kids edible green slime and they are gonna have some fun. But don’t worry adults, you’ll have fun with this too.
As usual, we’ve got plenty of notes and tips following the recipe, so please check those out. Now let’s get ready to churrrrroooooooooo!
Haul-O-Ween Churros
- Yield: 10–16 churros (depending on tip size) 1x
Description
These delightfully fun classic cinnamon-sugar churros get the Oogie-Boogie treatment for Halloween with a cookie crumb coating, edible green slime, creme filled cookies, and candy toppings. A Disneyland-inspired treat.
Ingredients
Edible Green Slime:
- 1 package of vanilla instant pudding
- milk or milk alternative per instructions on the box, plus 1/4 cup (see notes below)
- 1–2 drops of green food coloring (Americolor “Leaf Green” used here)
Churro:
- 1 cup water
- 1/2 cup butter
- 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
- big pinch of salt
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 2 eggs
- vegetable oil for frying
- 12 creme filled cookies, like Oreos
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
Additional Toppings:
- candy corn
- gummy worms
- Oreo cookies, slightly crushed
Specialty Tools
Instructions
For the green slime:
- Make vanilla pudding according to instructions, adding in any additional milk to thin it out (see notes below).
- Add in 1-2 drops of food coloring and stir well.
- Chill, covered, in the refrigerator until ready to use.
For the churros:
- First, line two half sized sheet pans with parchment, set aside. Mix together 1/2 cup of granulated sugar and cinnamon in a long shallow bowl or loaf pan, set aside.
- Next, crush cookies in a ziplock bag with a rolling pin until finely ground. Alternatively, you can pulse in a food processor until a sand-like consistency forms. Set aside in a large, shallow bowl.
- In a medium sized saucepan over medium-high heat, combine water, butter, sugar and salt. Bring to a boil, or until butter has melted.
- Turn burner to low and pour in all the flour at once. Stir until there are no visible flour lumps and dough has begun to stick together in a ball and pulled away from the sides of the pan.
- Remove pan from heat and let sit 5 minutes. Then stir in each egg until incorporated. Dough will appear to break or become lumpy. Continue to stir until it forms a smooth, sticky dough.
- Fill a pastry bag fitted with a Wilton 1 M open star tip (for thinner churros) or with a Ateco 847 closed star tip (for thicker churros) half full with batter (see notes below on filling pastry bags) and pipe 6-8″ long dough onto the sheet pan. I was able to fill two sheet pans with all the batter.
- Refrigerate dough at least 30 minutes and up to two days. Batter will stiffen the more it sits, so let the dough come to room temperature before frying. (Note below for frying immediately after making dough)
- Fill a dutch oven or deep frying pan with vegetable oil at least 2″ up the side of the pan (I found a 1/2 gallon of avocado oil worked for me in my large dutch oven. See note below about reusing oil.). Heat oil to 340-350°f, using a candy thermometer to keep the temperature constant. You may need to adjust heat up or down during cooking.
- Place churros 2-3 at a time in the cooking oil for 6 minutes, turning after 3 minutes with a spatula or spider. Wait until oil comes back to temperature before adding next batch. Thicker churros may need an additional minute to fully cook through.
- Using a spider or large spatula, remove churros from oil and drain on a cooling rack over parchment or on a paper towel. Wait at least a minute and then toss the churro in the cinnamon sugar, tapping off any excess. Then roll churro in the cookie crumbs, lightly pressing to adhere. Set churro aside. Repeat with all the churros.
Decoration:
- Plate churros and top with edible green slime, candy corn, crushed Oreo pieces, and gummy worms.
- Enjoy!
Notes
- To make a thinner style pudding, add in about a 1/4 to 1/3 cup extra of milk or milk alternative to the pudding. This will make a more liquid sauce for the churro. Keep measurements the same if you want it thicker.
- Do not overfill your pastry bag! Fill in two to three batches. If there is too much dough, it will seep out the top and will be hard to pipe.
- Slowly pipe out dough all of a consistent size, smaller spots on the churro can cause them to become more fragile while handling and can break in the oil or while coating in sugar.
- Churro dough can be piped out onto parchment and covered in the fridge up to 48 hours.
- If you want to make you churros immediately after making dough without the chilling time, once oil has reached temp, starting about one inch above the oil, pipe a small line of dough down into oil and either snip end with scissors, or break the dough off the pastry tip on the side of your pan. Follow directions above for frying.
- Thicker churros will require a longer cooking time to fully cook through the center. Test one churro first to adjust your cooking time.
- Cooking oil can be fine strained and stored again for another use. I strain back into the bottle it came from. Well strained oil can be stored in a cool, dry place and used up to several times.
- Churros curling? That could be one of a few reasons. One is that it will naturally shrink and change shape as the dough hits the oil and puffs up. I found that the stiffer dough from sitting in the fridge resulted in straighter churros while fresher dough tending to curl more. Also, if you’re using a circular pot like a dutch oven, churros may rest against the inside edge of the pan while cooking causing them to take on the curved shape of the pan. To prevent this, nudge your churro with the spider or spatula immediately after placing in oil when it pops back up to the surface. Continue to nudge gently back and forth for about 20-40 seconds or until the dough has gotten stiff in the oil.
