Jazz Up Your Halloween Cocktails With This Spooky Martha Stewart Trick

Martha Stewart often focuses on more wholesome recipes and decor, but that changes during the wonderfully macabre month of October. Stewart loves the holiday and is known for elaborate costumes, themed parties, and seasonal treats, like the Halloween-themed drink she shared in a segment on "Today" alongside her old friend Snoop Dogg. 

The main event was a spooky season version of the salty dog cocktail, a sort of gin and juice in honor of Snoop. Stewart uses Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg's brand of the spirit, Still G.I.N. gin, mixed together with grapefruit juice. It's a straightforward cocktail, but here's where Stewart adds her first Halloween touch: Instead of a plain old salted rim, she uses a mixture of sugar and black salt atop the glass.

But she doesn't stop there. Stewart adds a creepy crawly Halloween drink upgrade in the form of unsettling cockroach ice cubes. It's pretty easy to do. Just fill up an ice cube tray with water, drop a toy bug into each one, and then freeze the ice cubes normally. Stewart goes out of her way to remind viewers that she uses artificial cockroaches. "Although you could use freeze-dried if you'd like," she quipped (via YouTube). Stewart mentioned that fake plastic roaches are easy to buy online, while Snoop Dogg joked that the real ones are technically free.

There are a few things to keep in mind when trying out Martha Stewart's Halloween ice cubes, the most important being that you should wash those fake bugs with soap and water before placing them in your ice cube tray. You also want to go with an ice cube tray that makes larger ice cubes so that the bugs fit neatly, and you should not be using toy bugs that are small enough to turn into a choking hazard once the ice melts. 

Otherwise, freezing creepy crawlies into ice cubes gives you lots of room to get creative. If fake cockroaches remind you a bit too viscerally of an old apartment, then you can go with more cartoony fake spiders or plastic Halloween rings. If you'd prefer that everything in your cocktail be edible, you can use candy bugs – bugs made of candy or gummy worms, not candied real bugs.

The rest of the cocktail should be built around making the fake bugs pop in the cocktail glass. While DIY black vodka is good for some Halloween cocktails, it would make it harder to appreciate the ice cubes. Make sure whatever drink you make is relatively transparent by choosing clear over dark liquor and lightly colored mixers, like sparkling water, lemon-lime soda, or citrus juice. A lighter cocktail ensures your guests will notice the bugs straight away, so you can explain they're fake and avoid any awkward moments where someone tosses their glass away in a panic.