Trick or treat!!!
Halloween is just around the corner. This means that it’s time to fill your house with sweets, pumpkins, and costumes!
But what do you do if you’re trying to give your kids healthier snacks? Or you’re trying to avoid too much temptation yourself? How do you keep everyone away from all the sugar-laden treats that come with Halloween?
It’s not easy if you’re trying to watch your weight and you’re surrounded by sweet treats, so we’ve put together a list of healthier Halloween alternatives for your family.
Here are some of our favourite Halloween treats that you can try to make at home for the little ghosts and goblins:
1) Gruesome Grins – Core an apple and cut into wedges – green or red apples work just as well for this. Use some smooth peanut butter to glue 2 wedges together with yoghurt covered raisins or berries in between to make up some wonky, wobbly teeth.
This healthy treat has plenty of flavour to keep your little monsters happy, and contains protein and fibre.
2) Ghost Banana Pops – For this tasty treat you’ll need: a couple of bananas, wooden lolly sticks, white chocolate for melting and some dark chocolate chips.
Cut each banana in half and put it on a stick. Melt some white chocolate and gently coat each banana pop in a thin layer. Add a couple of deliciously bitter dark chocolate chips for ghostly eyes and put them somewhere safe to chill. Delicious!
3) Halloween Fruity Ghosts and Pumpkins – Just like the recipe above, you’ll halve bananas and use chocolate chips to create some ghostly boo-nanas, just without the white chocolate coating.
For the mini fruit pumpkins, peel some clementines and use a little bit of celery to make the pumpkin top. These are great for lunch boxes!
4) Spider Sandwiches – these tasty spider sandwiches look like spiders but don’t worry! What you’ll need: some sandwiches with whatever fillings you and your little terrors like (ham, cheese, anything goes), pretzel sticks, peanut butter and chocolate chips. You’ll also need a round cookie cutter or some steady hands.
Cut every slice of bread into a circle and make your round sandwiches. Poke some broken pretzel sticks into the filling to make your 8 spider legs and then use the peanut butter and choccy chips to make some creepy spider eyes. Mmm… spidery…
5) Halloween Hummus and Crackers – Perhaps one of the easiest recipes we’ve got for you – find the brightest orange colour of hummus in your local supermarket like the red pepper hummus, maybe. Arrange your crackers and cut up some carrot and cucumber sticks. Use a chunk of cucumber to make a stalk and make ridges in your bowl of hummus so it looks like a pumpkin! Easy peasy!
6) Pumpkin Quesadillas – Kids love quesadillas and these are easy to make into a delicious Halloween treat.
You’ll need some tortillas, tomato sauce (homemade pasta sauce is great, or you can use some from a jar – but ketchup will work in a pinch!), grated cheese (Red Leicester is the best for this recipe) and some green and red peppers.
Chop up the peppers to go inside the quesadillas, keeping some big green chunks for the pumpkin stalks.
Next, cut out pumpkin faces from half the tortillas.
Now get building! On a tortilla without holes in it add sauce, peppers and cheese, then add your chunk of green pepper poking out for the stalk. Add the top tortilla with the holes cut out and gently dry fry in a pan until the tortilla is golden and the cheese is all gooey. Yum!
7) Pumpkin Chips – Who doesn’t love chips?
These pumpkin chips are a much healthier alternative to regular chips and in keeping with the season.
You’ll want to peel and chop a whole pumpkin up into chips.
Next, use a tiny bit of olive oil to lightly coat your pumpkin fries.
Give them a light dusting with either curry powder, paprika or your favourite spice blend, then pop them in the oven at 200 degrees C for 15 to 20 minutes until crisp and golden. Add a touch of salt and serve with your favourite sauce to dip them in.
8) “Frankenstein” Chocolate – Ok, a lot of the recipes above have been fairly far over on the healthier side, so how about satisfying that craving for chocolate? This recipe couldn’t be easier.
Melt dark chocolate either in the microwave or over a bain marie. Add chunky chopped pistachio nuts and a pinch of salt, then stir and spread on greaseproof paper or baking parchment. Once it’s cooled and set, just smash it up and serve!
So now you can treat yourself and your littles ghosts with healthy and fun snacks on Halloween!
