Spooky Treats to Make This Halloween

It’s Spooky Season. I really love this time of year. The ghoulish costumes and creepy decor are so much fun! I am a big fan of making cosy and comforting food, so it is always lovely to see the return of the darker nights and chilly weather. Halloween is a really great excuse to be creative and playful with food.

My favourite spooky recipes:

Every year I look forward to Halloween. I hope to see some trick-or-treaters out in their costumes and party goers enjoying spooktacular food and drink. It’s a great excuse to be a kid again, to let your creativity out and be playful.

Do you have plans this Halloween? Fancy making some vegan and gluten free treats for trick-or-treaters or just to enjoy with friends and family?

I have many simple but effective recipes to share with you……..

My Halloween Cupcakes are a great option as you can cheat. Simply use store bought cupcakes if you are short on time or bake them yourself in advance (they freeze really well). You can decorate them yourself or involve the kids, for a fun after-school activity.

The decoration techniques are relatively simple, but it is best to give yourself plenty of time to decorate them so you aren’t rushing. I have given three options for decoration so you can choose the best option for you. Little kids might find the maggots too real!

If you want a more balanced Halloween meal (not just all the sweet stuff!) you have to give these vegan sausage rolls a go. They are in the shape of super scary mummies and witches’ fingers.

They can be served hot or cold but if you are using gluten free pastry don’t put them in the fridge. Refrigeration dries out gluten free pastry.

Choose your favourite vegan sausages or make your own and then wrap them in puff pastry. You could use our recipe for red pepper sausage rolls - click HERE to see the recipe.

This is a really fun recipe to make, it’s like playing with paint so it’s a great creative outlet. I always say “play with your food”!

My Punk Pumpkin Cake takes a little while to make as you have to make the batter three times. Twice for the bundt cakes to create the pumpkin shape and then once again to make the muffins for the stem.

The cake is sandwiched with chocolate fudge icing and orange icing for a truly ghoulish bloody effect. The UK supermarket, Sainsburys, has an extensive line of vegan icing, both fondant and tubes. They are perfect to use in this recipe.

Super creepy eyeballs that are actually totally delicious. This recipe is really simple and quick to make for a terrifying treat at Halloween. But again, it’s too realistic for some little kids, you have been warned!

Essentially, this is a panna cotta recipe with the addition of berries and syrup. You can utilise this recipe any time of year, just pour into ramekins rather than the mould used for the eyeballs.

I use the bottom half of a pop cake mould but you can also use a half sphere mould. If you need to substitute the agar powder with agar flakes you need to increase the amount. For every 1 teaspoon of agar powder you should use 3 teaspoons of agar flakes. The ratio is 1:3. In the recipe I use 2 teaspoons of agar powder, so if you are using flakes you will need 2 teaspoons.

I use this recipe for my very own version of apple bobbing. Each person gets a plate of eyeballs. They have to suck up all the eyeballs as quickly as they can, the first one to eat them all is the winner!

You can watch the cooking show for this recipe HERE.

Banana bread is a staple for most vegan bakers. I have added a gruesome zombie twist to my classic banana bread recipe to create my Walking Dead Banana Bread! Once again, you can make the base ahead of time and freeze if you need to.

Utilise a cocktail stick to help you make the indents in the marzipan. This helps to lead the food colouring and collect it in the indents. If you don’t want to use marzipan you can easily swap it out for white fondant icing.

The arms are kept upright with wooden cocktail sticks but be sure to remove them before anyone eats the arms.

Top tip: To give it a more autumnal flavour you can add a teaspoon of cinnamon and half a teaspoon of ground ginger.

And last but not least, a ghostly version of my speculoos recipe - Spookuloos. Speculoos are a spiced shortcrust biscuit or cookie that are great for any festive occasion. They are like sugar cookies in that they don’t spread making this recipe perfect for using with cookie cutters.

I buy my cookie cutters from Bakerlogy on Etsy, click HERE to see their wonderful (and completely bonkers) cookie cutter.

If you need an activity for your kids, you could bake these and have them decorate them however they like.