These spooky Halloween cupcakes are almost as fun to make as they are to eat, and kids will love to join in.

Use any one of the following decorating ideas on its own, or put several together to create a tray of different treats. Easy to bake, all of these cupcakes are based on the same devil's food cake recipe.

Tombstone Cupcakes How-To
1. To make a cupcake cemetery, spread devil's food cupcakes with chocolate ganache icing (all recipe links follow). Dip the top of each frosted cupcake in crushed chocolate wafers to create the look of dirt, then insert shortbread-cookie tombstones, piping them with scary messages like "Boo!" or "R.I.P." in royal icing.

2. Top more devil's food cupcakes with chocolate ganache and chocolate-wafer "dirt," make a hole in the center of each cupcake with your finger, and position half a Gummi worm to look like it's slithering out of the hole.

3. Enlist your kids to draw scary Halloween figures, or copy Halloween images out of books. Cut the pictures out, tape them to cocktail straws (you can cut the straws shorter, if necessary), and insert them into cupcakes you've decorated with orange-tinted cream-cheese frosting.

4. Decorate more devil's food cupcakes with orange cream-cheese frosting, then spell out words or phrases like "Happy Halloween" by forming one to three letters out of thin black licorice on top of each cupcake.

5. Serve your cupcakes on a tray covered with candy corn.

Recipes
Devil's Food Cupcakes
Chocolate Ganache Icing
Shortbread Tombstones
Cream Cheese Frosting (tinted with orange food-coloring paste)
Royal Icing