With Halloween Weekend creeping up on us (no pun intended!) we thought it would be the perfect time to share some spooky party ideas that will get the kids super excited. We've included our favourite Halloween recipes for ghoulish, yet tasty party treats, and our pick of the best hair-raising party games that your kids will love.
Party Food
Our top three delicious and fun recipes to make your party the scariest (but tastiest) ever!
Slime Bug Cups
You will need:
- 4 x 135g packs lime flavoured jelly
- a selection of animal and bug sweets
- 2 x 154g packs Oreo biscuits
Method:
- Follow the pack instructions to make the jelly. Pour a third of the mixture into 12 small pots (or glasses). Add a couple of bug sweets to each pot, then leave to set in the fridge. Keeping remaining jelly at room temperature.
- Once set, add more bugs to each pot, leaning some against the edges to make them poke out the top. Pour over a third of the jelly and leave to set in the fridge. Repeat with remaining bugs and jelly.
- For the soil topping, place cookies in a plastic bag and gently crush with a rolling pin.
- Just before serving, sprinkle a layer of soil over each slime cup, then top with a few left over creepy crawlies. Perfect!
Eye Ball Pops
You will need:
- 100g/4oz Madeira cake
- 100g Oreo cookies
- 100g bar milk chocolate, melted
- 200g bar white chocolate, melted
- few Smarties and icing pens, to decorate
You will also need:
- 10 wooden skewers
- ½ small pumpkin or butternut squash, deseeded, to stand pops in
Method:
- Break up the Madeira cake and Oreos and whizz together in a food processor along with the melted milk chocolate.
- Tip the mixture into a bowl, then using your hands, roll into about 10 or 12 walnut-sized balls. Chill for 2 hrs until firm.
- Push a skewer into the base of each ball, then spoon the white chocolate over the balls to cover. Stand the cake pops in the pumpkin, then press a Smartie onto the surface while wet. Pop them back into the fridge until the chocolate has set. Before serving, using the icing pens, add a pupil to each Smartie and some red veins to the eyeballs.
Owl Cupcakes
You will need:
For the cupcakes
- 280g butter, softened
- 280g golden caster sugar
- 200g self-raising flour, minus 1 rounded tbsp
- 1 rounded tbsp cocoa powder
- 6 medium eggs
For icing and decoration
- 200g butter, softened
- 280g icing sugar, sifted
- 1 tube orange ready-to-use icing
- 1 small bag Maltesers
- 1 tube chocolate M&Ms minis (just the brown ones) or Cadbury's mini buttons
- 1 tub jelly diamonds (just the orange ones)
Method:
- Heat oven to 190C/fan 170C/gas 5. Line a 12-cup muffin tin with brown cases. Beat the cupcake ingredients to a smooth batter and spoon into the cases. Fill them up to the top (you may have a little left over). Bake for 20-25 mins until risen and spongy. Leave to cool on a rack.
- Beat the butter and icing sugar until smooth. Slice off the very tops of the cakes and cut each piece in half. Spread a generous layer of icing over each cake.
- Work on one cake at a time, squirt a pea-sized blob of orange icing onto two Maltesers and use to fix a brown M&M (or button) on each. Sit the eyes, two pieces of cake top (curved edge up) and a jelly diamond on the icing to make an owl. This can be great fun to get the kids to help with.
Party Games
Now that you have the food sorted out, it's time to invite the guests round and get the party started! Here's our top three party games to play at Halloween that the kids are sure to love. Enjoy!
Dress the Mummy
You will need:
- a big supply of toilet paper!
Separate the party guests into groups of three or four (two is fine for smaller parties) and give them a few rolls of toilet paper. The object of the game is to try and turn one member of the group into a mummy by wrapping them up in the toilet roll! There are special prizes to be won for quickest or the best attempt.
Witches Cauldron
You will need:
- a large cooking pot
- a damp sponge
- a shelled hard-boiled egg
- a large piece of orange peel
- selection of rubber toys from the toyshop (frog, snake, etc)
- blindfold
Fill your cooking pot with items such as the above (and any other suitable things you can think of - you'll need enough items to allow each child a turn). Each child has a go at being blindfolded and sticking their hand into the 'cauldron' to find the imaginary item you name.
For example, you could ask them to look for: 'A hairy giant's tongue' (the damp sponge), 'a dragon's eye' (the egg), a goblin's skin (the orange peel), 'a frog/snake' (rubber toys), etc.
Brain Digging
You will need:
- a big bowl of cooked spaghetti
- some ping-pong balls or similar
- some small bags of sweets
Get the kids to dig in amongst some bits of 'brain' to find a trick or a treat! Cook a big pan of spaghetti, leave to cool for a moment and then turn into a big bowl. In amongst the pasta hide some ping-pong balls or similar. Three balls will have 'treat' written on them, and the other three will have 'trick' written on them. Each child gets a turn to dig through the 'brains' and pull out a ball. If they choose a trick ball they have to do a forfeit (something silly, like go for a run around the garden, or do a silly impression), but if they pick a treat they get a small prize, such as a small bag of sweets.
We hope you like our ideas for hosting the perfect kids spooky party! Enjoy, and Happy Halloween!