The perfect cookie for Halloween! A yummy double chocolate chip cookie topped with candy eyeballs that looks like eyes peeking out at night at you!
Bonus! Tutorial on the bottom of this post on how to make these cookies into Spider Chocolate Cookies!
MORE FUN TREATS USING CANDY EYES: Spooky Brownies, Bat Oreos, Halloween Monster Oreos, Banana Mummies, Reese’s Pumpkin Peanut Butter RIce Krispie Treats, Halloween Muddy Buddies, Halloween Sugar Cookie Bars, and Healthier Halloween Monster Cookies.
**Check out 11 Simple Halloween Desserts for more great ideas!**
Can you believe Halloween is already next month? I really don’t think I’ve been more excited. The older my kids get the more they enjoy it and it’s so fun for me to see their excitement! Plus by Halloween, I’ll have my cute little baby boy so it will be extra fun! My boys absolutely love fun and crazy Halloween recipes. I created these Spooky Cookies for them.
It’s a delicious double chocolate cookie with eyeballs peering out of the “night” at you! They thought it was so cool and so yummy too!
This recipe is part of the Cupcake Diaries “30 Days of Halloween” Series by Allison. It features 30 recipes and printables from bloggers. You can see all of these posts at the bottom of this post and remember to keep checking back each day in September as there will be a new post each day!
Candy eyeballs are the star of these cookies! I found mine at Hobby Lobby and used big and small sizes.
I based these cookies on one of my very favorite cookie recipes, my Dark Chocolate M&M Cookies. You can add a little black food coloring if you’d like a deeper shade of black or if you use regular cocoa powder instead of dark.
These cookies are so delicious! There are plenty of chocolate chips in the cookies and it’s just a fantastic chocolate cookie. Plus the candy eyeballs are so much fun!
My boys thought I was so awesome for adding them! It’s like the dark scary night sky with eyeballs creeping a look at you! So much fun for Halloween!
Enjoy!
How fun is this Spooky Cookie set up?! Looks like it’s time for a Halloween party!
The above picture is by Brittany York, who posted it on Instagram.
Spooky Cookies

Ingredients
- ½ cup unsalted butter, room temperature
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup dark brown sugar, packed
- optional: black food coloring
- 1 large egg, preferably room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- ½ cup + 2 Tbsp. Hershey’s Special Dark Cocoa Powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 2 Tbsp. milk
- 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips (I used semi-sweet)
- Candy Eyeballs for topping the cookies
Instructions
- Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine the butter and sugars. Optional add black food coloring to get a deeper shade of black in the cookies. Beat together on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, 2-3 minutes. Blend in the egg and vanilla, scrape down the bowl if needed.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt. Slowly add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients in the mixer on low speed just until incorporated. Mix in the milk on the lowest speed and fold in the chocolate chips.
- Roll about 2 tablespoons of dough into balls and place on the baking sheets. Flatten slightly. Top cookies with candy eyeballs. Place cookie sheet in freezer for 10-15 minutes. (Alternately you can chill the dough for at least 2 hours or up to 36.)
- Bake at 350˚ F for 10-11 minutes. Let cool on the baking sheets for about 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
BONUS RECIPE! UPDATE 10-31-22
I MADE SPIDER CHOCOLATE COOKIES WITH THIS RECIPE!
HOW TO MAKE SPIDER CHOCOLATE COOKIES:
The below recipe is to make about 10 Spider Chocolate Cookies. If you want to make enough for all of the Spooky Cookie dough/cookies, double the amounts to make the melted chocolate.
I used the Wilton Halloween Black Spider Cupcake kit from Walmart for this but if you can’t find that then I’m linking below to what you’ll need to make this recipe.
1- Follow the Spooky Cookie recipe, but don’t add the candy eyes on top.
2- Once cookies have cooled, melt a heaping 1/2 cup of chocolate chips or chopped chocolate bar with 2 tablespoons of butter in the microwave. Melt for 30 seconds, stir then melt for bursts of 15 seconds, stirring in between until melted and smooth. Make sure not to overheat.
3- Top the cookies, a couple at a time, with the melted chocolate. Immediately top with black jimmy sprinkles. Then top with 2 candy eyes, and white fangs. (Note- I can not find any online so you can do without if you don’t have the kit or use melted white chocolate or vanilla buttercream frosting and pipe it on in a triangle shape.) Then press in the 8 legs using black licorice.
Enjoy the only cute spiders out there. haha!
(I used affiliate links but only make a very small portion from your purchase.)
Check out all the other fabulous posts below for fabulous recipes and printables!
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I LOVE these cookies!! They’re so much fun. That dark cookie is awesome in contrast with the candy eyeballs. Such a fun treat! Thanks for your awesome post and for participating in the series this year.
Thanks so much Alli! You are so awesome for putting this fun series together! 🙂
Your cookies are really awsome ! I just tried your recipe and it was a little difficult to me because in France (yes, I’m french), we don’t use cup but gram. I think I am not too badly managed. But, my first plate of cookies just out of the oven and I am a bit disappointed because the candy eyeballs has completely melted. I did not put the dough in the freezer so it might be why. I hope the next plate will have beautiful eyes monstrous.
So thank you for your funny recipe ! 😉
Thanks! I’m glad you tried it. I’m not sure why the candy eyes would melt! I made a couple batches of this with no melting problems. Maybe it’s the brand of candy eyes you are using? I recommend next time chilling the dough for sure. You could also add the candy eyes half way through baking time. Good luck!
How many cookies does this recipe yield?
So sorry I didn’t include that info. I’ve made this recipe so many times (different variations of it like different toppings etc.) It depends of course exactly on the size you make it but it tends to make 16-20 cookies for me. Hope you enjoy this!
I made these cookies for halloween 2019. They came out perfectly, love them! I made my own eyeballs using meringue powder, water, coloring and icing sugar powder. Highly recommend this spooky treat.
Wow! That’s amazing you made the eyeballs! I’ll have to try that sometime. Thanks for letting me know you loved these Spooky Cookies! 🙂