A Party of Spooky Doom

There ought to be a rule that Halloween is not allowed to fall on a Wednesday. And if it must be Wednesday, Advising Day should be on November 1^st. If you have to throw your Halloween bash on All Hallows Eve… erm, Eve, then you might as well wait for the weekend anyway. Maybe I'm just bitter because I have a late night class on Tuesday and I have no MWF classes so all of my Wednesdays are blissfully free.

I can't party on Halloween, or even the night before, but damned if I'm missing out on the party planning fun to be had. I don't know yet what my costume will be (Gender-confused Lumberjack? Random Hufflepuff #34? Zombie? Lumberjack Zombie?), I don't know what music I'll play, but I do know the food. Besides the requisite candy, there must be creepy punch, there must be cutesy cookies, and there must be pizza.

It is possible to go too far with the creepy factor in Halloween food. Peeled eyeball soup sounds perfectly appetizing on paper (if you know that the eyeballs are really tomatoes), but put it in front of a guest and you're likely to get looks of nausea. Nothing's worse than serving something absolutely gruesome only to have to eat it all yourself when your guests refuse it point blank.

Thursday (pre-party) I'll post on the food prep. Expect last minute changes, disasters, and tears, but that's always the way with a party. If I didn't try something adventurous and risky, I wouldn't have the will to try at all. Saturday (post-party) I'll post on how everything turned out, further disasters and recoveries, and full recipes for everything that was ultimately on the menu. For now I leave you with my provisional menu and wish you happy haunting on the morrow.

Menu of Spooky Doom:

Blood Punch – Probably cranberry juice, grenadine, ginger ale, maybe pomegranate juice. Served in a giant jar inside a carved pumpkin.

Spider Cookies – Chocolate sprinkle coated sugar cookies with pretzel legs and candy or icing eyes.

Witch Hat Rice Krispy Treats – Rice crispy balls topped with frosting coated ice cream cones. Possibly Twizzlers for hair?

Finger Food – Baby carrots with cheese fingernails. Black Olive Ranch dip?

Build-your-own Pizzas – Dueling toaster ovens (we have two here in Calvert that fit a 9 inch pizza pan), possibly pizza bagel bases if I run out of $$, toppings in kitschy Halloween shapes: mushroom skulls, green pepper snakes, pepperoni Jack-o-lantern, onion bats, etc.