So October in dental school can suck, a lot, so my practice leader decided that we needed a practice pot luck, and since it was going to be the day before Halloween, she thought that we should all bring some ghoulish dishes. I signed up for "deviled mice" and while searching for ways to improve it, I also found another cute idea for "eye of newt". Of course I had to make some changes, and I was very happy with how they came out. Here's how they're made:

Boil eggs, let cool, peel, slice in half (length-ways) and remove the yolk. Side story- as much as I love to cook, every time I have to boil eggs I lose confidence in myself. Do I boil them for a certain amount of time and then rinse under cold water? Do I bring them to a boil, cover and then remove from heat for 15 minutes??? I'm so confused. Shortly after I graduated from college I was enjoying cooking all these new meals and I remember having to call home to ask my mom how to boil eggs. Embarassing, and I still haven't gotten over this. To set the records right, this time I brought the eggs to a boil, covered, removed from heat and then let cook for 15 minutes before cooling in ice water.

Combine all of the yolks in a bowl. Add mayonaisse (I used ~ 1/2 cup for 18 eggs) and yellow mustard (I used ~ 1 TBSP). Just make sure its a consistency you like. Add salt and pepper. Because I was using this as the basis for both eye of newt and deviled mice, it's time to start assembling the deviled mice.

Deviled mice: slice ~ 5 olives. Place a couple of slices into each of the spaces the yolk occupied. Then fill with yolk mixture. Do not over fill, as these will be placed yolk-side down on your serving dish. To make look like mice, cut 2 toothpicks in half for whiskers, arrange 1 olive slice with pimento as the eyes and ears. The original recipe suggested placing an olive slice as the tail and then use chocolate sprinkles as droppings. While cute, I didn't have enough room for the tails and most of my friends know that I truly dislike chocolate, and I thought the mice were cute enough as it.

Eye of Newt (sweet and spicy): Tony Packo's has the BEST pickles ever! The only problem is that they are based out of Ohio and I have to order them online, but it is totally worth it. Start out by dicing sweet and spicy pickles and placing a couple into each of the spaces the yolk occupied. Now, add 1 tsp Tobasco, 1 tsp of Sriracha and enough blue or green food coloring to give the filling a greenish tint. Spoon into eggs, you can overfill. Next place a black olive slice on top of the yolk mixture. Fill the center of the olive with white horseradish. Next, mix a little red food coloring with horseradish sauce and paint jagged lines on the eye whites.

Enjoy!