This week my quest to find the web’s weirdest dishes has taken me into the spooky realm of Halloween and the ever concerning recipe for hotdog spiders in blood sauce.
When it comes to Halloween the traditional toffee apples, monkey nuts and pumpkin pies are just not enough to satisfy my appetite for terror. I want a dish that sends shivers down the spine, something that, on first sight, will make everyone who dares attempt to eat it jump. What I want is hotdog spiders, a concoction based on an eight-legged creature that can spark fear and turn even the bravest of us into jibbering wrecks.
Now, I am one of the lucky ones, I like spiders, an admission that I have been told on more than one occasion makes me ‘weird’. My friends, on the other hand, can’t stand them and will usually leave a room if I even mention that I have spotted one.
As a result, I can think of no better treat to enjoy during Halloween than this delicious, if slightly scary, dish, and so I turn to the internet (after all it’s not the first time spiders have been found on the web!) in search of a recipe that I am assured will turn the humble hotdog into a spaghetti legged terror.
The premise of the recipe is to use chunks of hotdogs and broken strands of spaghetti to create little edible spiders. It is more of a Blue Peter project than a cooking one but it is still something that I am really excited to try and, if I get it right, I think it could look fantastic.
I start by cutting my hotdogs into sixths and breaking my strands of spaghetti in half and then begin threading four pieces of the pasta through each chunk of meat to create the spiders.
The little meaty creatures do have an eerie and creepy quality about them and it feels almost cruel to drop them in boiling water to cook. However, after taking a deep breath, I drop them in the pan and start work on my blood sauce, which is made using chopped tomatoes, basil leaves, olive oil, garlic and a squirt of ketchup.
After 10 minutes it is finally time to dunk the spiders in the blood sauce and get munching.
The finished dish, although not an exact replica of a hoard of spiders, looks and tastes great and it has the desired effect, with a couple of my friends looking genuinely concerned as they tuck into the arachnid delicacy.
A delicious Halloween dish that genuinely gives people the creeps... excellent!
If you would like to try making hotdog spiders in blood sauce follow the recipe below.
One packet of hotdogs
A packet of spaghetti
2 cartons of chopped tomatoes
2 cloves of garlic, sliced
2 basil leaves, chopped
A squirt of ketchup
Olive oil
1. Cut the hotdogs into sixths
2. Break strands of spaghetti in half (the quantity depends on how many spiders you are making but you will need four halves of spaghetti for each chunk of hotdog)
3. Thread four of the halved spaghetti strands through each chunk of hotdog at regular intervals to create the spider’s legs
4. Put the spiders in a pot of boiling water and cook for 8-10 minutes
5. Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a frying pan, add the sliced garlic and cook for 2 minutes
6. Add the chopped tomatoes, basil leaves and ketchup to the pan and cook for 5 minutes, stirring regularly
7. Add the sauce to the spiders and serve
If you have got a weird recipe that you would like me to try email me. Alternatively, if you have tried making this recipe, why not let me know how you got on by leaving a comment in the box below.
Happy cooking!
Click here to read my Weird World of Food: giant KitKat blog
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