Baking

Easy (and spooky) Halloween ghost shortbread cookies with jam filling

Name: Easy Halloween ghost cookies with jam filling
Prep time: 45 min
Cook time: 20 min
Total time: 65 min
Yield: 22
Ingredients: 400g unsalted butter; 220g icing sugar; 500g plain flour; 4 large egg yolks, at room temperature; Jam, to fill (strawberry, raspberry or cherry)

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45m

20m

ghostcookies — Halloween ghost cookies.

Credit: Supplied

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by Lucy Nunes

Delicious Team

Sep 29, 2025

These adorable ghostly shortbread biscuits are here to haunt your Halloween table with some irresistibly sweet charm. The rich, buttery shortbread melts beautifully in the mouth, proving that not all phantom encounters need to be frightening. You’ll need an 8cm heart-shaped cookie cutter for this recipe.

400g unsalted butter
220g icing sugar
3 1/3 cups (500g) plain flour
4 large egg yolks, at room temperature
Jam, to fill (strawberry, raspberry or cherry)

Method

1.

To make the shortbread, place butter and icing sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment and beat for 6-8 minutes, until soft and pale. Add flour, egg yolks and a pinch of salt flakes and beat to form a soft dough. Turn dough onto a flat surface and shape into a disc. Cover and chill for 30 minutes.
2.

Line 3 baking trays with baking paper. Roll pastry out between 2 sheets of lightly floured baking paper to just under 1cm thick. Using an 8cm heart-shaped cookie cutter, cut heart-shaped biscuits, re-rolling scraps to make 22 biscuits. Cut each heart in half and place on prepared trays, leaving a 3cm gap between each (see recipe notes). Push the pointy end of each biscuit slightly to the right to create the tail of the ghost. Chill for 20 minutes, then cut out eyes and a mouth from half the biscuits.
3.

Preheat oven to 180°C/160°C fan-forced. Bake shortbread for 15 minutes, or until light golden. Cool on trays.
4.

Spread a generous amount of jam on the cooled biscuits with no eyes and mouth, then sandwich with remaining biscuits on top. Serve.

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Recipe Notes

You can use any size for the cookie cutter, making your ghosts smaller or larger. The quantity of biscuits you make will change.

These biscuits are beautifully short as they contain quite a bit of butter, which means the dough will soften quickly if the kitchen is warm. If the dough becomes hard to handle, simply pop it back into the fridge for 10-15 minutes to firm up again.

Biscuits will keep in an airtight container in a cool place for up to 5 days.