I don’t get a thrill from dressing up in Halloween costumes anymore, but I look forward to all of the silly “scary” foods that crop up. Peeled grapes become monster eyeballs; ground Oreos transform into graveyard dirt; spaghetti somehow turns into a bowl of worms; and blackened chicken wings are re-branded as “bat wings.” Overlooked, however, are the best snack in the world, which is, of course, pigs in blankets. Overlooked until now, that is. Behold: air-fried “mummy fingers.”
The mummy theme is a thinly veiled excuse to incorporate strips of Pillsbury crescent dough into my diet. While I like to use Banquet Brown ‘N Serve Sausage Links as fingers for a breakfast treat, you could easily use hot dogs or chicken sausage. An almond manicure is the final piece, lending authenticity to your tale of excavating a tomb in Giza.
How to make air fryer mummy fingers
1. Crack open a tube of crescent roll dough and unroll it onto a cutting board. You’ll be cutting the dough into strips, so if you can find the sheet-style tube of dough, use that. If not, the original tube with perforated triangles is fine, just pinch the seams together once it’s on your cutting board. Cut the dough into 1/2-inch thick strips. You can cut lengthwise or widthwise, depending on how thoroughly you want the fingers to be covered in burial wrappings. I tried both and found that I liked the extra yardage I gained by cutting the dough lengthwise.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann
2. Open a pack of pre-cooked sausage links, or hot dogs. The Brown ‘N Serve box has 10 sausages, which is exactly how many fingers mummies have. Take a strip of dough and wind it around the sausage one way, then loop back up the other direction, so it’s criss-crossed. Leave one end of the sausage peeking out as the finger tip.
3. Use a small knife to make a slit at the exposed end of the sausage. I cut into it at a slight angle, so the fingernail wouldn’t poke up too much. That would be unnatural. Tuck a raw almond into the flap, with the pointy end facing out. Use raw almonds because they’ll toast in the air fryer; almonds that are pre-roasted might overcook. Repeat this with all of the fingers.
Credit: Allie Chanthorn Reinmann
4. How long you cook the mummy fingers may vary slightly because of your air fryer or if you used thicker sausages. The Brown ‘N Serve cooked quickly. Set the air fryer to 325°F on the “air fry” setting, and cook the mummy fingers for five minutes, or until the pastry is puffed and browned to your liking. The sausage is already fully cooked, so there’s no need to fret about the meat’s doneness.
Serve these horrifying sausage fingers with splatters of bloody ketchup, or slimy green pesto scrambled eggs. After all, you’ll need to eat something wholesome before that bag of candy later. This mummy sausage (or mummy hot dog) recipe reheats fine as leftovers, but it’s at its best served right from the tomb—er, air fryer.
Air Fryer Mummy Fingers Recipe
Ingredients:
1 tube of Pillsbury crescent dough (sheet-style preferred)
1 box Brown ‘N Serve breakfast sausages (or hot dogs)
10 shapely raw almonds
Unroll the sheet of Pillsbury crescent dough and cut it into half-inch strips, lengthwise. Unbox the pre-cooked sausages. Wrap each sausage in a strip of dough on a diagonal. Once you reach the bottom of the sausage, come back up the other direction so the dough criss-crosses. (This is how mummies do it.) Leave one end of the sausage exposed as the finger tip.
Use a small paring knife to cut a slit in the exposed end, and tuck an almond halfway into the sausage so it looks like a pointy fingernail. Repeat this with all of the sausages. Put the sausage fingers into an air fryer set to 325°F on the “air fry” setting, and cook the mummy fingers for five minutes, or until the pastry is puffed and browned to your preference. Serve with any ghoulish dips you like.