Holidays

41 Scary Halloween Food Ideas for Your Next Party

Instacart

Instacart

Last Updated: Nov 2, 2021

Whether you’re planning a Halloween party for adults or kids, having fun with food is always a great idea! Serving Halloween-themed snacks, meals, and desserts can make your gathering memorable and exciting.

Need some inspiration? Take a look at these 40+ scary Halloween food ideas.

Creepy Halloween food ideas for the snack table

Setting up a snack table is a great way to display all of your creepy Halloween food ideas! Simply cover your table with a festive tablecloth, display your snacks, and add a few pieces of décor in between. Your guests will be impressed, and you’ll be thrilled with just how easy it was to prepare.

1. Mummy jalapeno poppers

Plate of Halloween mummy jalapeno poppers, top view with a dark wood background with spiders

Turn frozen jalapeno poppers into scary Halloween food by wrapping them in refrigerated crescent roll dough, so they look like little mummies. Add some eyes using frozen peas or tiny pieces of roasted red peppers.

2. Saucy spider

For your saucy spider, make a round dipping bowl out of pizza dough, then use the remaining dough to make eight legs. Fill the bowl with your favorite pizza sauce and enjoy!

3. Cheesy spiders

Cheesy spiders are one of the easiest Halloween scary food ideas. Simply mix cream cheese and shredded cheddar cheese together. Shape the mix into 1.5-inch balls. Roll the balls in more shredded cheese to coat, then place each one on a cracker. Make spider legs out of chow mein noodles and add tiny bits of black olives for each spider’s eyes.

4. Deviled spider eggs

Make a spooky version of deviled eggs by cutting large black olives in half and placing one half in the center of each egg. Then, cut the other half into eight “legs” to make a spider. These scary Halloween appetizers are sure to disappear fast!

5. Veggie skeleton

Use a small bowl of ranch veggie dip for your skeleton’s head. Add two slices of olives for eyes and some romaine lettuce for hair. Then, arrange fresh veggies like cucumbers, red peppers, celery, mini tomatoes, mushrooms, and broccoli in the shape of a skeleton’s body. This fun and healthy treat is sure to impress your guests.

6. Shrunken potato heads

Roasted Sweet Potato Carving Halloween Face.

Start with fingerling potatoes or sweet potatoes and use a small knife to carve faces into them. Drizzle them in oil and bake for 40 to 45 minutes until they’re crispy and golden brown.

7. Slime dip

Your guests will love dipping their crispy potato heads in delicious slime dip! To make it, just mix avocado, sour cream, and garlic. Top the dip with chives, and it’s ready to go! Don’t have time to make a dip? Just use some premade guacamole instead!

8. Spooky Halloween hand

To make these fun and scary Halloween snacks, start with non-powdered, food-safe gloves. Put a piece of candy corn in each finger, so it looks like a nail, then fill the rest up with popcorn. You can even add a spider ring to give it an extra scary touch.

Spine-chilling Halloween entrees

The Halloween fun doesn’t have to stop when it’s time for the main meal! Try your hand at these scary Halloween recipes.

1. Mummy meatloaf

To make this fun meal, cook mini-meatloaf in a 12-cup muffin pan with foil liners. Then, put mashed potatoes in a pastry bag with a half-inch ribbon tip. Apply the potatoes, so they look like a mummy’s wrapping. Then, place two peas on top of each meatloaf to make spooky eyes.

2. Monster wraps

Start with spinach wraps and fill them with your favorite deli meats, cheese, and condiments. Then, roll them up and use pimento-filled olives, pickles, and sliced cheddar cheese to decorate them, so they look like Frankenstein faces.

3. Mummy mini pizzas

Who doesn’t love pizza? Make a Halloween version by topping English muffins with pizza sauce and thin strips of mozzarella cheese to look like mummy wraps. Add some sliced olives for the eyes, then bake them in the oven.

4. Spider caesar salad

In a large bowl, make a classic Caesar salad with romaine lettuce, Caesar dressing, garlic croutons, and parmesan cheese. Add some spider rings on top to give it a creepy final touch.

5. Spaghetti and eyeballs

Halloween eyeball pasta, above view on old wood with spiders

For this easy main meal, simply make a large bowl of spaghetti with sauce. Add some large meatballs and top each one with a slice of mozzarella cheese and an olive to make it look like eyeballs.

Scary Halloween desserts

You can’t have a spooky party without scary Halloween desserts! In fact, sweet treats make some of the most fun Halloween food decorations. Check out these awesome ideas.

1. Candy kebobs

This eye-catching dessert is super easy to make! Start with a large vase and add layers of black jelly beans, marshmallow pumpkins, and candy corn. Then, grab some wooden skewers and stack them with Halloween-themed gummies and marshmallow treats. Stand them up inside the vase, and you’re ready to go!

2. DIY Halloween cookies

A Halloween cookie decorating table is a great way to keep younger guests entertained. Simply make plain sugar cookies in fun shapes like pumpkins, monster heads, and bats. Then, let your guests use icing, sprinkles, and candy to create their own Halloween cookie design.

3. Dracula’s dentures

These scary Halloween treats are sure to leave your guests impressed! Simply place red frosting and mini marshmallows between two cookies, so it looks like teeth. Then, add almond slivers to make Dracula’s “fangs.”

4. Graveyard mousse cups

Fill large shot glasses or small juice glasses with chocolate mousse and top with crumbled Oreo cookies to make “dirt.” Then decorate sugar cookies like tombstones and place them on top.

Diabolical Halloween drinks

These diabolical drinks are the perfect complement to your scary food ideas!

1. Scary fruit punch

Ghoul's orange punch with bloody ice hand in a glass bowl on dark halloween background.

To make a scary fruit punch, simply fill clean, unpowdered, food-safe gloves with water and freeze them to make hand-shaped ice cubes. Then, pour your favorite fruit punch and some ginger ale into a punch bowl and float the ice to make it extra spooky.

2. Monster smoothie

To make this fun and healthy party drink, start with small mason jars decorated with googly eyes and other funny faces. Then, blend up some almond milk, baby spinach, a frozen banana, and a splash of orange juice and serve it with a straw!

3. Jack-o-lantern floats

Start by decorating plastic cups, so they look like pumpkins. Add a small scoop of vanilla ice cream to each cup and top it off with orange soda for a fun Halloween float.

More scary Halloween Foods

Looking for more terrifying food ideas to help celebrate the spooky holiday? Look at the ideas below!

1. Batty chocolate pretzels

Combine these chocolate-dipped pretzels with wings cut out of berry fruit leather to make a batty snack.

2. Bloody syringes

Fill syringes with ketchup and add to a platter of fries.

3. Bloodshot eyes

Melt a bit of white baking chocolate and mix in some red food coloring. Stick a chocolate drop onto each donut hole. And then drizzle with the red chocolate.

4. Rice Krispy Treat mummies

Halloween theme homemade marshmallow crispy rice treat in bar form.

Dip Rice Krispy Treats in white chocolate, then place them on a lined baking tray and leave to set. Once the first layer of white chocolate is firm, melt white chocolate and drizzle over the bars to look like the strappings of a mummy. Create the eyes with dollops of red jelly.

5. Bloody eyeball ice-cream

For a dramatic dessert, place a scoop of ice cream onto a bed of berry syrup. To complete the eyeball look, place a slice of kiwi and a blueberry on top of the ice cream.

6. Franken-kiwis

Kiwis are the perfect Frankenstein green. Peel your kiwis to leave a little bit of the skin on the top of the kiwi in a zig-zag Frankenstein-head fashion. Use chocolate drops for the eyes and a small piece of pretzel for the mouth.

7. Carrot eyeball crudités

Slice large carrots in the round, about ½ inch wide, and place them on a platter. Pipe a blob of cream cheese on each carrot round. Top off with an olive half.

8. Pumpkin face hash browns

Decorate your hash browns with slices of cheese cut out to look like the mouth and eyes of a jack o’ lantern.

9. Monster mouth apple wedges

Funny halloween eadible monsters scary food healthy vegetarian snack dessert recipe for party decoration.

Core an apple and cut it in quarters. Slice a wedge from the middle of each apple quarter. Smear some nut butter on the inside of the apple wedge. Stick a strawberry slice and sunflower seeds or peanuts inside the mouth to create the tongue and teeth.

10. Creepy hot cocoa toppers

Make creepy-crawly toppers for your hot chocolate. All that you need are a couple of marshmallows and chocolate-dipped pretzel sticks. Arrange and stick the sticks to the marshmallow to make it look like a spider. Then rest it on top of your hot cup of cocoa.

Creepy cakes and scary Halloween treats

Whether you are making a few treats to add to the trick-or-treat stash or laying out a delicious dinner spread. Add a few tricks to your treating with these creepy sweets:

1. Cinnamon roll brains

For a gory Halloween cake, arrange the cinnamon rolls on a platter to look like a brain.

2. Bloody Cheesecake

Top your cheesecake with splatters of berry coulis and a knife stuck in the center.

3. Scary spider surprise cake

Make a surprise cake with these plastic spiders inside. When your guests cut the cake open, they will shriek with delight at the sight of the spiders coming tumbling out.

4. Monster cake

Halloween gourmet cake pops with purple background.

Ice your party cake to look like a hairy monster. Stick candy eyes onto a few brightly colored cake pops and stick them into the cake to make a googly-eyed monster.

5. Zombie cupcakes

This crafty cooking cupcake set makes light work of creating creepy zombie cupcakes!

6. Ghost cake

Adorn your Halloween party stopper cake with white chocolate-dipped kisses decorated with chocolate chip eyes.

7. Spiderweb chocolate cake

For a spiderweb effect on your chocolate cake, ice the cake with chocolate icing. While the chocolate icing is still wet, pipe white icing or condensed milk onto the top of the cake in concentric circles starting from the middle. Drag a toothpick from the center of the cake towards the outside to form a web-like pattern.

8. Halloween sugar biscuits

Have some fun baking and decorating Halloween-themed iced sugar cookies with these cookie cutters.

9. Cotton candy ghosts

For a creepy cupcake topper, shape cotton candy to look like little ghosts. Place the mini ghouls on top of your cupcakes. For the eyes, you can use chocolate vermicelli.

10. Cookie dough bats

For these creepy-yet-cute, sweet treats, all that you need is cookie dough and a packet of Oreos. Separate the Oreos, remove the filling, and cut each half in half. Roll the dough into balls. Stick the Oreo quarters into the dough balls to look like bat wings. Dip the batty cookie dough balls into melted chocolate and dust with black sanding sugar. Use red M&Ms as the bats’ eyes.

11. Toothy s’mores

Cut your chosen s’more cookie in half. Sandwich the two halves together with a bit of berry jelly and mini marshmallows to look like teeth in a bloody maw.

Bring your scary Halloween food ideas to life!

If you’re ready to take your party to the next level with these scary Halloween food ideas, we’ve got your back! Simply head over to Instacart, choose the items you want, and leave all the shopping to your Instacart shoppers. They’ll carefully select your items and deliver them right to your door!

Instacart

Instacart

Instacart is the leading grocery technology company in North America, partnering with more than 1,400 national, regional, and local retail banners to deliver from more than 80,000 stores across more than 14,000 cities in North America. To read more Instacart posts, you can browse the company blog or search by keyword using the search bar at the top of the page.

Most Recent in Holidays

33 Traditional and Modern Shabbat Dinner Recipes

Holidays

33 Traditional and Modern Shabbat Dinner Recipes

In Jewish households, Friday night is a sacred time to celebrate with the family over dinner. After praying over the candles, drinking wine, and enjoying some challah, it’s time for Shabbat dinner. This meal also…...

Apr 14, 2023
55 Passover Recipes: Modern and Traditional Seder Foods

Holidays

55 Passover Recipes: Modern and Traditional Seder Foods

Planning and cooking for Passover can be overwhelming. Not only do you have to ensure you have the six ingredients for your seder plate, but you also have to plan an entire feast without leavened…...

Feb 24, 2023
43 Green Foods for St. Patrick’s Day: Luck of the Irish Recipes

Holidays

43 Green Foods for St. Patrick’s Day: Luck of the Irish Recipes

You don’t need to visit Ireland to satisfy your cravings — you can enjoy green food for St. Patrick’s Day in the comfort of your home. Host your very own Irish celebration with green food…...

Feb 15, 2023

Free delivery or pickup on your first order of $35 or more. Sign up now! Terms apply.