No matter your age, Halloween is all about dressing up, letting your hair down and getting into the spooky spirit. Whether you’re young or just young at heart, we all love decorating the house with cobwebs and pumpkins, donning some wacky costumes and, of course, eating some suitably scary food. 

Did you know that our favourite Halloween tradition of dressing up as scary creatures actually started out as a way of trying to hide from ghosts? People believed that when they left their homes after dark, if they tried to blend in with all the ghosts and ghouls, they wouldn’t trouble them. 

Another fun Halloween fact is that the trademark orange and black colour combination was actually created by the ancient Celts. As part of their celebration of Samhain (which marked the end of the harvest season, when the boundary blurred between the living and the dead). With this occasion in mind, the black came to be representative of death, while the orange harks back to Autumnal colours and the bright changing leaves.  

We love this highlight of the Autumnal months. But, what with everything that’s been going on lately, Halloween has crept up on us a bit this year (you’re not the only one to have checked the calendar and been in total shock to see that it’s October already).

So, for those of you who love getting involved in the seasonal celebrations, we’re on hand to help make your slightly last-minute Halloween full of fun, thoughtful touches, and eerily realistic grub. In this blog post, we’ve put together our favourite recipes for little Halloween-inspired treats which, when all laid out together, make up the perfect creepy buffet to delight your little ones. 

Plus, what we love about this collection of Halloween recipes for kids is that they’re a quick, easy and affordable way to bring some seasonal fun to your dinner time come October 31st. Everyone can get involved in making these treats, and your little ones will have a great time decorating everything! 

So, without further ado, let’s crack on with these spooktacular treats. First up, we’ve got the recipe for our savoury pizza bagels, which are topped with sweet little mozzarella ghosts. 

TikTok Spider Cookies

Ingredients

• 1 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1 cup Extra Fine Granulated Sugar
• 1 large egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup dark candy melts or dark chocolate
• Spider Heads* Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Minis
  

Method

1. Preheat oven to 180°C.
2. In a large bowl, mix peanut butter and sugar. Add egg and vanilla and mix well.
3. Shape into 1 tablespoon size balls. Flatten gently to prevent cracking sides.
4. Dip into sugar (optional) and place on parchment lined cookie sheets. Use your thumb to press a thumb size indention in center of each cookie. 
5. Place in oven and bake for 8 minutes. Remove briefly from oven and use a wine cork or bottle cap to repress the each indention. Bake an additional 2 minutes and remove from oven. Allow to cool completely before proceeding.
6. Melt candy melts or chocolate over very low- barely simmering water.
7. Pour into a piping bag or into a plastic food storage bag and cut a tiny hole in one corner. Pipe 8 spider legs on each cookie.
8. Glue candy eyes onto the reese's cups minis with melted chocolate and pipe a small amount of chocolate into center of cookie to adhere candy heads onto each cookie. 

Casper’s Pizza Bagels

 

Ingredients: 

• Mozzarella, 8 thin slices 
• Mini bagels, 8 
• Marinara sauce, ½ a standard can
• Black olives, 4

Method: 

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Using a paring knife, cut the mozzarella slices into ghost shapes.
2. Spread a thin layer of marinara over each bagel, then top with the mozzarella ghost.
3. Bake the bagels in the oven until the cheese is melted (this should take about 10 minutes).
4. While the bagels are baking, cut the olives into little pieces. To finish, pop two olive pieces onto each ghost and position them to look like eyes. 

Eyeball Cake Pops

Ingredients: 

• Madeira cake, 100g, roughly chopped  
• Oreos, 100g, roughly chopped  
• Milk chocolate, 100g, melted
• White chocolate, 200g, melted

To decorate: 

• Wooden skewers, 10 
• A small pumpkin, halved and deseeded (to use as a cake pops stand)
• Green and blue Smarties
• Red and black icing pens

Method: 

1. Using a food processor, whizz together the Madeira cake, oreos and milk chocolate.
2. Tip the mixture into a bowl, then use your hands to roll the squishy cake dough into 10 walnut-sized balls. Chill for 2 hours, until the cake is really firm.
3. Push a skewer into each ball, then carefully spoon the white chocolate over the cake balls, ensuring that the cake is completely covered in the chocolate. 
4. Stand the cake pops in the pumpkin, then press a Smartie onto the surface (while the chocolate is still wet). Return the cake pops to the fridge, until the chocolate has set.
5. Before serving, use the icing pens to add a pupil to each Smartie and wiggly red veins onto the eyeballs.

Sweet Surprise Halloween Biscuits

Ingredients:

For the biscuits: 

• Unsalted butter, 200g, softened
• Golden caster sugar, 200g
• Egg, 1
• Vanilla extract, ½ tsp
• Plain flour, 400g (plus extra for dusting)
• Popping candy, 20g (or you could use rainbow sprinkles)

For the decoration:

• White, black and grey sugar paste
• Icing sugar, 100g 

Method: 

1. Heat the oven to 200°C, then line a baking tray with baking parchment.
2. In a large bowl, beat butter with an electric mixer (or a bit of elbow grease!) until soft and creamy. Then beat in the sugar, followed by the egg and vanilla. Then finally add in the flour and mix until a dough consistency is achieved (you can always add a little more flour if the mixture is a bit too sticky). Wrap in cling film and chill in the fridge for about half an hour.
3. Heavily flour a work surface, then cut the pastry in half. Roll out one half to 5mm thickness. Using a cookie cutter in the shape of a ghost (or any spooky shaped cutter you like), cut out 12 ghost shapes (this will make 4 cookies). Place your shaped dough on the baking tray and return to the fridge. Repeat with the second half of the pastry. 
4. Using a smaller cutter (or a knife), cut out a ghost-shaped hole in the middle of 4 of the biscuits on the tray (this is the space where you’ll add in the surprise centre). Put these biscuits into the oven to bake for 10-12 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Then bake the other tray of biscuits.
5. Once all the biscuits have cooled completely, they will be ready to assemble. For the icing, mix the icing sugar with 3 tbsp of water. 
6. To assemble, take a biscuit without the centre missing, and spread a little icing around the edge. Press a biscuit with a centre missing on top, then sprinkle popping candy into the pocket that you have created. Spread icing on the edge of the second biscuit and press another whole biscuit on top. Leave aside until the icing is completely set.
7. Use the sugar paste and icing pens to decorate the biscuits (you can use the icing to glue down the sugar paste, if needed).

These simple yet super effective creepy treats are a fantastic way to transform your dining table this Halloween. Without blowing the bank or spending hours slaving away in the kitchen, you can whip up a few delicious creepy delights. 

You can even make the whole day one long spooky celebration by getting the kids involved in the baking and decorating. They’ll love the chance to create a yummy buffet for dinner, before they dash upstairs to get changed into their costumes.

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