Tuesday, October 17, 2023
Those of you who follow us regularly
know that one of our greatest wishes as Grands is to
We truly hope that this blog and its content reflects that in all we do!
❤ 🧡 ❤ 💜 ❤ 🧡 ❤
In our last post we shared
a GRAND idea for hosting a family Halloween party!
We hope you were able to check out
In that post we shared tips for organizing your celebration
and we offered fun games and activities to include
as part of your day of spooky family fun!
The one thing still missing from our Family BOO Bash! plans
is some spooktacular food to serve as part of the festivities!
So, today, we are remedying that with a tasty spin!
Today we are highlighting a simple menu filled with ghoulish goodness
and we’ll show you how to pull it all together…
we’ll even add some ideas for holiday decor to complete it all!
Enjoying a meal with loved ones is always a memorable event
and is always one worth celebrating!
You’ll find each aspect of our menu to be easy and delicious
AND
completely Little friendly!
This menu can certainly be adapted…
You can serve it near the beginning of your Boo Bash party
OR
you can enjoy a few snacks throughout the gathering
and then end with the meal as you reminisce about your afternoon of fun!
Elements of this meal would also be fun to serve
before trick-or-treating on Halloween night!
So many delicious options!
Feel free to pick and choose what meets your timing and your family’s needs!
You’ll notice that, for many of these dishes, there aren’t really recipes included.
Rather, we’ve chosen things that can be put together,
often quickly and even ahead of time
which, as Grands, is something that we always appreciate!
AND… AS AN ADDED BONUS,
if your Littles are around before the party begins,
they can lend a helpful hand with all the preparations!
Read on for all the details!
HALLOWEEN CHEX MIX!
This sweet and salty mix is the perfect combination to have on hand to snack on! (And… this is the only Boo Bash menu item that we’re including an actual recipe for, too!) NOTE: While the recipe below specifies certain seasonal candies, you can always adapt and add different ones or not as many kinds. You can also use this recipe during different times of the year by switching the types of candies used!
Here’s what we used to get started:
Once you’ve gathered the ingredients,
you’re ready to follow these steps…
We love using these fun eye candies in this recipe as well as other spooky dishes!
They quickly transform your cookies, cupcakes and more into fun Halloween treats!
If you'd like, add 1/4 cup to the mix above
when adding all the candy and then combine!
CHEESE BROOMSTICKS!
These quick and healthy cheese and pretzel broomsticks make a fun addition to any Halloween menu! You'll only need 3 ingredients - cheese sticks (any kind), pretzel sticks and chives, which are optional, but add a delicious flavor. Your older Littles will love constructing these with you!
Cut each cheese stick into 3 sections. Using a knife or a kitchen shears, slice vertical lines up the bottom of each cheese section (to look like a broom). Cut about halfway up each cheese section. (OPTIONAL - At this point you can tie a chive in a knot around the base of the cheese stick and knot it, We found that the chive broke easily so we only made half with them as you’ll see..) The last step is to attach the broom handle (a pretzel stick) to the top of the cheese broom!
A Grand Tip!
If you find that your pretzel sticks are breaking,
try using a toothpick to create a small hole in the cheese
before adding to the pretzel!
MAC & CHEESE JACK-O-LANTERN CUPS!
This is such a simple way to add a festive touch to a kid friendly classic!
Use clear plastic cups (the 9 oz size works well) and draw a jack-o-lantern face on each with a permanent black marker. Your Littles can even draw a face on their own cup (just carefully watch young Littles that are using permanent markers!). Once the faces have been drawn and you’ve allowed a few moments for the marker to dry, fill the cups with your favorite mac and cheese recipe. Add a pumpkin stem at the top with a piece of celery or green pepper!
MUMMY DOGS!
Mummy Dogs have been a classic Halloween food since our own kids were Littles, but they are a favorite for a reason! They are delicious!
To make these, you’ll need hot dogs (we’ve used turkey or all beef) and a roll of crescent rolls. Unroll the crescent rolls and press the seams together. Using a knife or pizza cutter, cut thin strips of dough, lengthwise. Wrap each hot dog in a strip of crescent roll dough (or two) and lay each on a cookie sheet covered with parchment paper. Repeat for all the hot dogs. Then bake at 350 degrees for about 15-20 minutes or until lightly golden. Add mustard eyes (or you can use the candy eyes as we did - we “glued” them on with a bit of mustard). Serve with more mustard (“zombie spit”) and ketchup (“vampire blood”).
BOO BANANAS & PUMPKIN CLEMENTINES!
Several years ago, when we still hosted annual Halloween parties in our kindergarten classrooms, we’d try our best to serve healthy snacks. These were both favorites!
Peel bananas and Cutie clementines. Cut each banana in half and add mini chocolate chips as eyes and a mouth to each. Add a stem from a small stick of celery to the top of each clementine to turn them into pumpkins! Place both on a tray… your Littles will love making and eating these!
PUMPKIN VEGGIE TRAY!
A healthy veggie tray is always a welcomed addition to a Halloween party menu and your Littles will absolutely love creating it with you!
This pumpkin tray is especially appropriate for our young Littles! Use our photo as inspiration and feel free to get creative with the veggies you include and then, as a final touch, add small bowls of dip or hummus for the eyes!
A Grand Alternative!
The Skeleton Veggie Platters photographed below
are another fabulous option!
Your older Littles will love putting these together!
SPIDER BROWNIE BITES!
This dessert requires little explanation… and your own Littles will be delighted with the results! Check out this photo to see what the final product looks like!
We purchased brownie bites at our local grocery store but you can certainly make your own brownies and cut them into squares or into circles. You will also need pretzels (not sticks) and a small bag of Skittles or M&M’s candies. Using a knife, carefully cut the pretzels into curved sections. Do this to several pretzels (you’ll need 8 curved sections for each brownie bite). Push the pretzel sections into the brownie, four on each side of the brownie. Then, choose 2 Skittles or M&M’s that are the same color and, depending on the size of your brownies, either press the two candies into the brownie bite or “glue” them on with a small dollop of frosting. (We simply pressed ours on and while they quickly fell off when picked up to put on a plate, that actually added to the silliness of the day!)
A Grand Alternative!
These Monster Cupcakes would be the perfect dessert to add to your celebration!
Make cupcakes as you usually would.
As they cool, make your frosting by using a favorite recipe
or by using ready made vanilla frosting.
Divide the white frosting into 2-4 smaller bowls and add food coloring to each
to create different colors.
Frost each cupcake (see the photo for variations we created)...
our's were piped on, using different decorator tips!
Then add one, two or three eyeball candy decorations to each
OR
use a smaller decorator's tip and swirl on white eyes and black eyeballs,
using frosting, as shown!
Place the cupcakes on a platter or cake stand
and,
voila…
your one-of-a-kind monster cupcakes are ready to be gobbled up!
MAGIC POTION PUNCH WITH EYEBALL ICE CUBES!
Finally, you’ll need a beverage to serve with your meal. Give this refreshing drink a try!
You’ll need chilled cranberry juice as well as ginger ale, sparkling water or lemon lime soda. You’ll also need blueberries! Make the ice cubes first to give them time to freeze. Add 1 blueberry to each section of the ice cube tray. Fill each section with water or the clear beverage you’ll be adding to your punch (this option will keep the punch from becoming watered down).
When you are ready to serve, you can fill individual glasses or a punch bowl with the cranberry juice and ginger ale, sparkling water or lemon lime soda. (We used equal portions of both.) Finally add eyeball ice cubes to the punch! NOTE: We added chilled plastic eyeball pingpong balls to the pitcher of punch for added spookiness! DO NOT add these to your Littles' glasses of punch to avoid any possibility of a choking hazard.
A Grand Alternative!
If you’d like your Littles to have milk as their beverage,
you could make Monster Milk!
Add food coloring to the milk you are serving
and then add a few mini marshmallow monster teeth!
To set the stage, we went through the Halloween decor we store each year
(YES... as former teachers, we have a lot!)
and we pulled out anything that was kid friendly.
Here are a few ways we customized our spooktacular look!
#1 - We layered two tablecloths and added our paper goods to the table first.
#2 - We used some of our Halloween decor to create a centerpiece. We created different heights by covering a plastic container or two with pieces of tablecloth or fabric and set some of our decor on top of each container.. Then we also added some flameless tealights for atmosphere! We had some Halloween pumpkin garland we laid down and then we added pieces of white yarn and cotton balls we’d pulled apart to mimic spider webs! We also had some spider web placemats that added the perfect touch. Your older Littles would totally get into helping with this step!
#3 - We placed our serving platters and utensils on the table next. We’d picked up skeleton tongs and a few other goodies at The Dollar Tree for added inspiration!
#4 - Finally, we scattered plastic spiders around the table and even placed some on our serving plates once the food had been added! We also added some candy pumpkins to a few of the serving platters!
And... just in case you need one more activity to add to your Family Boo Bash! fun,
why not have a Pumpkin Carving event as part of the festivities!
Everyone brings their own imagination and pumpkin to carve,
you provide the tools and space and everyone leaves with their
jack-o-lanterns ready for the BIG night!!
You could even give awards for Biggest Pumpkin, Most Colorful, Most Creative, Scariest...
the list goes on and on!
(Just be sure to have enough awards for all your Littles!)
Here's our recent Instagram reel to give you some inspiration!
Of course, we'll be sharing more Halloween highlights
We hope that our two Family Boo Bash! posts
have given you some ideas for celebrating the days ahead!
We’d love to hear about your family’s Halloween celebrations and traditions!
Feel free to comment at the bottom of this post
or email us directly at ourgrandlives@gmail.com
With Halloween quickly approaching,
we still have more Halloween goodness to share!
so be sure to check out our next post featuring a few of our favorite activities and crafts!
We'll be back later this week with
Wishing you all a wonderful week ahead!
❤️ We are delighted to join these link up parties and blog hops:
Anything Goes Linky/ The Happy Now Blog Link Up/ Tell it To Me Tuesday/ Unlimited Link Up/Grammy's Grid