Hello my pretties! Take my (severed) hand and let me give you a peek into my annual Halloween party. It’s an event that gets me going throughout the year. This month was particularly busy with the Sydney International Food Festival and before I knew it, it was the 20th of October and I hadn’t even sorted out my costume.
Luckily I had been planning this party even before last year’s finished (yes I’m an obsessive kind of person, can you tell?) and I had my menu sorted. I wanted to make different things from last year and I wanted it to be even more grisly than last year. I waited and waited and waited for my oven. It was about a month late and was on the way to me from the nice people at LG. It finally arrived and I can already see that she (and it is a she no doubt) is also something that loves dramatic entrances so we’ll get along just fine. I was set for my baking duties and so I had to get my costume together.
Bloody Brain Pannacotta and Shortbread Witch’s Fingers
I am not one for sewing. In fact the only craft I can muster up is really cooking. So I chose to buy my costume and there was one I had my heart set on, the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland (I even had the tiara ready for it). Now that I had my outfit sorted, I needed to turn my attention to the decorations. Places were selling out of their Halloween goodies and whenever I’d walk into a shop, there would be a gaggle of people amongst the Halloween section with adults and kids alike grabbing costumes and decorations.
I wanted to go more ghoulish and squeamish this year so I went with Donna the Dead, the moaning sensor activated animated moaning head. I picked up my charming severed head from The Party People in Sans Souci and discovered a treasure trove of ghoulish goodies. We got to chatting and they agreed to lend me some props for the party including these two charming mummies and a faux bloody brain and severed hand! Mr NQN dressed up as a surgeon gone psychotic and answered the door holding the body parts (he was originally to go as Hannibal Lecter holding a bottle of chianti, fava beans and a liver).
But enough dithering, let me show you the food which is always one of the most important parts to a celebration aside from the company!
Spaghetti Mummy
Mummies seem to be the order of the day here (see Mummy Hot Dogs) and when I saw a picture of this in Claire Crespo’s The Secret Life of Food, I knew this was a definite winner. It’s easy too and can be done with pre bought sauce and pasta (and you’d better believe I used pre bought with the amount of prep I had to do).
- 500g packet of spaghetti
- 500g jar of pasta sauce
- 300g Chevups skinless sausages (skinless preferred or simply cut the skins off regular sausages and remove)
1. Boil the spaghetti in plenty of salted water as directed. In the meantime, shape the sausage meat into balls with 2 large balls for the eyes and some tiny ones to hide under the spaghetti. Fry the meatballs until cooked through (the larger ones will take longer to cook than the smaller ones).
2. Drain the spaghetti and toss with the pasta sauce. Place the spaghetti in a bowl and hide the little meatballs underneath so that they can’t be seen from the top. Place the two large eyes on top and push them in a bit so they look like they’re poking out – you may need to arrange the spaghetti so that it goes across where you are putting the eyes much like the mummy wrapping would.
Flayed Skin Face
This started off its life as a pirate skull as I needed a skull base on which to make my flayed skin face. I simply bought 1/2 a kilo of shaved ham and arranged it on top of the skull and added some eyeballs and voila that was the simplest and easiest dish!
- 500grams/1 pound shaved ham
- A plastic skull
- 2 eyeballs (I found chocolate eyeballs but you could also use large, stuffed olives)
1. Arrange shaved ham in layers on top of the skull leaving the teeth exposed and pushing down indentations for eye sockets. Place eyeballs in sockets.
Creepy Crawly Cake
This started off it’s life as Chocolate and Zucchini cake as it was part of the monthly column I was writing for Webchild. I found these fabulous creepy crawlies at Aldi (a place I find some surprisingly good stuff) and there were centipedes, rats and snakes in the mix. I could have done a regular chocolate cake but I knew that it would be even more gruesome with the green bits of zucchini in it. It called for the addition of chocolate to be sprinkled on top but I knew that the green Wilton Candy Chocolate Melts that Barbara sent me would be even better and make it look even mould like! Barbara is my American mum and an absolutely lovely blogger who sent me an awesome package of goodies including these melts. She tells me that I’m just like her daughter (my twin sister 
) who loves Wicked, Halloween and Harry Potter!
1. Preheat the oven to 160c/325F and line a square tin with baking paper. Sift the flours, cocoa, cinnamon, bi carb and baking powder into a large bowl and set aside.
2. In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time until combined.
3. Alternately add the sifted dry ingredients and then the milk in 2-3 lots until combined. Do not overmix. Add in grated zucchini.
Gotta love Halloween, the time when you want your food to look mouldy!
4. Pour into the lined cake tin and sprinkle chocolate chips on top. Bake for 40 minutes and check for doneness by inserting a skewer in the centre.
Sour Cream Frosting from Nigella Lawson
- 75g unsalted butter
- 175g best quality dark chocolate, broken into small pieces
- 300g icing sugar
- 1 tablespoon golden syrup
- 125ml sour cream
1. Melt the chocolate and butter. While the chocolate and butter are cooling a little, sieve the icing sugar into another bowl. Or, easier still, put the icing sugar into the food processor and blitz.
2. Add the golden syrup to the cooled chocolate mixture, followed by the sour cream and vanilla and then when all this is combined whisk in the sieved icing sugar. Or just pour this mixture down the funnel of the food processor on to the icing sugar, with the motor running.
3. When you’ve done, you may need to add a little boiling water – say a teaspoon or so – or indeed some more icing sugar: it depends on whether you need the icing to be runnier or thicker; or indeed it may be right as it is. It should be liquid enough to coat easily, but thick enough not to drip off.
To decorate
1. Spread sour cream frosting on top of cold cake. Make it nice and thick. Then top with “dirt” chocolate biscuit crumbs. Arrange creepy crawlies so that they look like they’re burying out of the dirt.
Slimy Witch’s Cauldron Pudding
Notquite as gruesome or unappealing as it sounds, this is simply a white chocolate custard pudding using the green white chocolate candy melts that Barbara sent me. Of course you could use white chocolate and green food colouring which is just as easy. Just know that serving this in mini cauldrons is quite necessary for the whole effect!
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 1 cup cream
- 1 cup milk
- 3/4 cup green coloured chocolate (or white chocolate and some green food colouring)
- 3 egg yolks, beaten
1. In a small saucepan, place sugar, chocolate, cream and milk and heat until almost boiling. Then add beaten egg yolks and keep whisking until chocolate has melted. Reduce the heat to low medium and ensure that the mixture is not boiling. Whisk in egg yolks and keep whisking until mixture has thickened to a custard consistency. Place cling wrap directly on top of custard and cool. Serve in cauldrons (haha obviously!).
Bat Bon Bons
Makes 12 BonBons
I made these as I was sent some boxes of Rondnoirs for the Tobie Puttock Dinner of Discovery. As soon as I saw them I knew I wanted to incorporate them into my party. Little did I realise that Mr NQN was a huge fan of these and ate my whole supply so they sent me some more which I promptly hid (near the cleaning products – somewhere where I knoq he never ventures!). They’re fiddly though and tying them up in the branches using invisible thread is a tad tedious and if I were to do it again, I’d perhaps glue them to a Halloween background.
- 12 Ferrero Rondnoirs (or similar wrapped truffles)
- Black cellophane (or dark blue, which was the closest I could find)
- 2 pegs
- Black yarn
- Invisible thread or fishing wire
- Branches, the knobblier the better
1. Unwrap the cellophane. It usually comes folded in rectangles. Keep them in the rectangular shape but you want a connected double layer of cellophane. Place the Rondnoir in the centre and fold the cellophane around it as shown so that you end up with two “wings” and a ball in the centre. Secure each twist with a peg.
2. Cut a piece of yarn and tie each twist and remove the pegs. Now adjust the cellophane so that it is more bat wing like. I realise that sounds rather vague but it can be done with some playing around and the more you do it, the easier it will be. Cut out a scallop shape at the bottom of the “wings”. Place in a bowl or if you can find them, on branches suspended with fishing wire.
Butterbeer
I based this recipe from Alexandra from Chefspiration who made Butterbeer to commemorate the new Harry Potter movie. I wasn’t able to find butterscotch syrup so I bought a vanilla syrup and used apricot nectar to give it the right colour.
- 3 parts Soda water
- a dash of vanilla syrup
- 1 part apricot nectar
1. Mix all parts together and serve cold preferably in beer tankards.
So tell me Dear Reader, what did you do this Halloween? Do you celeberate it?
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72 Comments | Add your own
oh my goodness your party looked AMAZING! LOL.. i love the little cupcake brains, with some of it eaten. Congrats on hosting such a magnificently ghoulish party… I only wish I could attend!
wow how creative !! i like all your creations
I made Brain Cupcakes and Finger Cookies for Halloween too! Except I didn’t use green food colouring for my fingers. I thought it looked pretty creepy enough without. And my brain cupcakes were chocolate instead.
Looks fun, and I’m sure it went off without a hitch… I want to see you in your DTD costume!!
Sounds amazingly wonderfully grisly and creative – but most of the pictures aren’t coming up for some reason! Good job though – your parties sound awesome.
just stunning, Lorraine… great.
You are so creative!! The Flayed Skin Face looks quite frightful.
And I’m loving the cauldrons!
Everything looks so good. The props are amazing, not to mention that goulishly delicious food that you had on offer.
Fantastic, I am coming next year!! LOL!!
This is amazing! I’m usually a grinch around Halloween time but this is inspiring me to host a party next year…
Need to see the costume for both you and Mr NQN!!
great ideas (and glad to see the photos which weren’t showing when I first clicked on the link all excited to see how your party went) – love the sound of the green chocolate melts for ghoulish gruesomeness – your table looks suitably scary
miss creative! this is the best halloween entry i’ve ever seen!!!!! I dont know how you come up with these ideas as they look realisticly scary.
Skin face looks so scary i dont think i can look at ham the same way again <3 <3 <3
You are the best – that is so spooktacular! I think the bat chocolate is as far as I could go, all the other food is too scary to contemplate.
everything looks amazing Lorraine – well done!
I was hoping to see a picture of you in your queen of hearts outfit i think it’s something you’d suit completely hehe
mmy fav are the mummy hot dogs – but preferably with a veggie delight hot dog haha
An amazing party NQN! The mummy is soooo scary too love the props and food =)
Wow! So creative! I love everything, and the bat bon bons are pretty genius! Looks like it was a freakishly fun evening!
I am already looking forward to your post for next Halloween!
Great food ideas as always – I love the idea of the Rodnoir bats! And I’m very glad to see those cute cauldrons made an appearance again.
Now all I need to do is to figure out how to get myself to Sydney next Halloween…
Ghoul, you rock! Some of the pics of your dishes actually gave me a little ‘rumbly tumbly’ so they had your intended effect- i.e. ‘squeamishness!’I had no time to even think about H’ween- perhaps next year! I did, however, bake an homage to my favorite foodie blogger in the form of ANZAC biccies! My whole family loved them and I had to part with one of my precious jars of Lyle’s so my sister could bake them at home. She wants to bake a batch to share with her co-workers. I told her they were inspired by YOU! So, you are semi-famous (infamous?) in Arkansas! Woohoo! I am glad you had fun at the party. We didn’t have even one trick-or-treater at my daughter’s house, which was a good thing since we hadn’t a piece of candy in the house and I don’t think they would have appreciated an unwrapped ANZAC biscuit…
Amaz
How fantastic! All your preparations are just great. Now you have me thinking about throwing a party.
Haha. You rock babes. Classic
Yes, please show us your costume! The party looks great
Un.be.lieveable. WOW!
oh that party food looks amazing!! Hope you all had a great night
That looks amazing, well done! Your friends are lucky to be hosted by you…. can we all come next year??
Ooooh this is just fabulous Lorraine!! Well done!! What’s on the cards for next year? hehehe
All the food looks fab!!! So did you play any ghoulish games or was it just good old fashioned eating and mingling?
You really love your Halloween Lorraine, dontcha?
I made your brain cupcakes last Saturday for a halloween party and it didn’t actually turn out as brains.. more like guts but they still looked as gross as ever!
OMG never seen anything like it..this looks awesome,love the cupcakes with the jam filling…
Very cool party! Everything looks fantastic =D.
This is so awesome! I think my favorite is the candy bats – so simple but so cute!
You’ve outdone even you, and that’s a lot.
it looks like a very fun party ^^
I think you’re the Queen of Halloween rather than the Queen of Hearts! I’m so impressed by your creativity – I would’ve never thought of making bats out of Rondnoirs and cellophane. Hope your Halloween party was a blast!
You’re so much fun! Everything looks fabulous, such creativity. Our Halloween party wasn’t even half as spooky as yours! I love the spirit of Halloween- I look forward to it every year.
What a perfectly hideous table of disgustingly fun food you’ve managed to create! I’m sure your guests were horrified and delighted! Thanks for the nice shout out. I would like to see you with your tiara on! xoxo
Mum
Standing ovation for the effort. Well done! It looks uber impressive!
It just gets better and better… I love all the gore/gross foods.. which I’m sure tasted DELISH!
WOW!!!!!
That’s fabulous……
Wow the attention to detail is amazing! Love it!
Though my boyfriend and I are not fans of scary movies…Sounds like you are!
A HUGE amount of effort, for a lot of things I’ve be looking at going “I’m sure it tastes great, but ew!” :p
that has to be one of the best halloween spreads I’ve ever seen! love the mouldy fingers
That looks incredible! What an awesome Halloween. I’m looking forward to seeing what you’ll do next year!
MAD!!! Crazy! COOL. Wicked! You’ve outdone yourself Lorraine
We want to see pics of the guests costumes!! Fabulous props and food NQN!
I always look forward to your halloween posts and this years was indeed worth the wait!
So did everyone finish all the food! It is all pretty creepy. I just need to make sure I am in Sydney during halloween and crash the party
You’ve just taken Halloween to a whole new level of wonderful/scary/spooky!!! Great job!
Hee! That’s the spookiest yet yummiest looking Halloween spread ever!
What a spread you had…gotta love those green fingers…we celebrated Halloween for the first time this year!!!
Oh WOW! You are one creative lady! It looks like an amazing party and you really went all out! Your guests must have been really impressed (or do they already expect it?!)
amazing. i’m just floored and astounded by the time and effort and creativity you put into making your party a smashing success. lady, you do good work.
oh my god lorraine, YOURE DISGUSTING!
hahaha but omg awesome ideas!
i would never have thought of those.
i’m now very excited about next halloween!
HAHAHA. though i think i wouldnt dare eat my own baking then. heh.
Wow, this is the best Halloween feast ever! Amazing!
Lorraine, your attention to detail is really fantastic! It’s a ghoulishly lovely spread, and I bet it was a fabulous party!
wow!! vat great halloween party!! soo creative!! wanna see you in halloween costume!! do put up some pics
cheers!!
OMG you are spookily AMAZING!
Hi….my eyes were all glued into your very festive and spooky party! Hope it’s ok to borrow one picture to show all my friends.
Magnificent! You do a fab Halloween. I don’t celebrate it, and this year was no exception, but it looks as though a good time was had by all at your place.
i love your website looks like it was a great party how on earth do you find the time to bake so much
Thanks again for a wonderful night NQN!! I love any excuse to dress up
Wow, how lucky your friends are to go to this party. You totally went all out, and it looks amazing!
SO fun and creative!! I’ve been waiting for this post seeing all the fantastic “previews” you’ve been showing. You really outdid yourself!
Wow! I was looking forward to your halloween creations
I did a halloween diorama at work http://www.friedchillies.com/index.php/articles/detail/a-halloween-toothsome-tale/ Check it out!
Also nice to see you tried to make Butterbeer
Too bad you couldn’t find butterscotch syrup though…
You’re so talented! And creative! Some of those are so realistic that I might not be able to eat them!
Wow, Lorraine! My husband was sitting over my shoulder looking at your site and he was totally impressed. Me, too! This is Halloween decorations to the max.
:O what about your costume! no pictures? darn. i think the bat chocolates were the cutest/most ingenious.
oh geez! I must really commend you on the presentation. Everything looks so real, it’s awesome!!!!!! I must get some tips off you next time
Thanks for all of your lovely comments everyone!
I had a ball and I hope you all had a gorgeously happy and gruesome Halloween! 
I’m already planning next year’s party-perhaps I need to go to Halloweener’s Anonymous? 
xxx
Liss, Ellen, Betty, Sally, Barbara and Nora I didn’t get any great pics of me in my costume sadly!
June, that’s fantastic! I’m so glad that you liked them, they’re fabbo aren’t they and woohoo being semi famous in Arkansas!
regarding your take on Butterbeer, I do recall Heston Blumenthal doing a similar version on one of his cookshows relating to tudor cuisine. I don’t have his exact recipe handy, but i’m sure you’llbe able to either trace it by googling it, or going onto one of his numerous websites. =)
your party looked like a ton of fun!! did u go trick or treating? what did u dress up as? =P i’ve always been a little sook when it comes to halloween and ghosts and stuff like that…>,<
This is pretty awesome! I’m hoping to do some things for this upcoming halloween!
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