Recipes Featured in this Article
- Martha Stewart's Halloween Spiderweb Cookies
- Apple Cider Cookies
- Mini Mummy Pies
- Matcha Monster Fudge
- Chocolate Macarons
- Apple Pie-Rogies
- Salted Almond Butter Cups
- Cake Pops
- Frankenstein Cereal Treats
- Halloween Boo-Berry Mummy Pies
- Cannoli Graveyard
- Pumpkin Marshmallow Sheet Cake
- Adam Richman's Apple Pie Hamantaschen
- Ultimate Rice Krispie Treats
- Sweet Dracula Doughnuts
- Mini Pumpkin Ginger Cheesecakes with Pecan Brittle and Maple Cream
- Meringue Bones
- Pumpkin Spice 'Ghoulmen'
- Halloween Explosion Cake
- Coffee Cake with Pumpkin-White Chocolate Glaze
- Warm Mini Apple Pie Empanadas
- Chocolate Mummy Cookies
- Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
- 'Crispy Scream' Doughnuts
- Halloween Hand Pies
- Martha Stewart's Apple-Bourbon Potpies
- Zombie Brain Cupcakes
- Triple Chocolate Brownie Fingers
- Coconut-Banana Ghost Pops
- Brown Butter Rice Cereal Treats
- Sandra Lee's Hot Chocolate Candy Bar Cupcakes
- Frankenstein Cheesecakes
- Crème-Filled Chocolate Cupcakes
- Halloween Cake Pop Eyeballs
- Pumpkin Doughnut Holes
- Siri's Mini Apple Tarts with Salted Caramel Sauce
- 'Light Up' Chocolate Brownie Pumpkins
- Sandra Lee's Halloween Magic Candy Brownies
- Easy-As-Pie Pumpkin Bars
- Spooky Spider Raspberry Tarts
- Apple Butter Thumbprint Cookies
- Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Layer Cake with Halloween Candy
- Sticky Spider Web Cupcakes
- Pumpkin Bars
- Salted Caramel Apple Dump Cake
- Little Monster Macarons
- Spider Web Cupcakes
- Frankenstein Cupcakes
- Rice Cereal Treat Brains
- Homemade Butterfingers
- Chocolate Candy Bar Cake
- Ghoulish Gang Doughnuts
- Joy Bauer's Apple Fritters
- Werewolf Paws Cookies
- Glittery Candy Apples
- Skittles Slushies
- Giant M&M Cookies
- Peanut Butter M&M's Cookie Dough Truffles
Candy gets all the attention on Halloween, but this festive holiday offers so much more than chocolate bars, gummies and hard candies. While we’d never skip out on trick-or-treating, some of our favorite Halloween moments revolve around the parties that follow. The joy of Halloween is that it’s a holiday the whole family can get involved in. Kids and adults alike get to show off their creativity, watch scary movies and embrace the unofficial start to fall with a Halloween treat in hand.
Of course, no party is complete with dessert. While you could just set out bowls of candy, there are so many exciting options to up the ante. Halloween is all about a sugar rush, so broaden your horizons to cakes, pies and doughnuts to deck out your spread. To get in the spirit of the season, we’ve rounded up 55 of our favorite Halloween treats that are equal parts spooky and sweet.
Make use of leftover Halloween candy by transforming it into a totally new treat — or better yet, use it to decorate dessert. For fun, kid-friendly options, decorate a batch of doughnuts, cookies and hand pies to look like ghosts, ghouls and mummies. While spooky season tends to lean heavily into the classic Halloween characters, we’d be remiss not to mention all elevated desserts that parade through this special time of year. Seasonal additions like squash-baked desserts, a hint of pumpkin spice and drizzles of caramel are always welcome at any Halloween bash.
Spiderweb cookies are almost a requirement on Halloween. The not-so-tangled web is created by frosting each cookie with white royal icing, adding a thin spiral of black frosting and pulling a skewer from the center of the cookie out to several points on the edge.
Make the most of the season’s apple bounty by baking a batch of these autumnal cookies. To really bring the fall theme home, there’s an apple cider reduction mixed into the batter, a cinnamon sugar topping and a drizzle of vanilla frosting for good measure.
A handful of store-bought ingredients come together to make these family-friendly hand pies. Pie dough is rolled out and filled with jam before getting topped with more strips of dough to mimic mummy wraps. Once they’re baked, finish the pies off with candy eyes.
Homemade candy is always a conversation starter. This version is made with just a few ingredients to create a matcha-infused fudge. While they’re great on their own, we love adding candy eyes to make them befitting for Halloween.
While mastering the art of macaronage may seem daunting, persistence and practice lead to mastery. This recipe is filled with tips and tricks to ensure picture-perfect macarons every time. Macarons can take on a variety of flavors, but we think dark chocolate works particularly well for Halloween.
As far as dumplings go, making pierogi is definitely one of the easier techniques to master — no crimping necessary. Instead of a duo of potatoes and cheese, the pillowy dough is wrapped around a sweet, gooey filling made with apples, brown sugar and warming spices. The end result is the ideal balance of crust to filling.
This sweet treat takes all the joy of peanut butter cups and swaps in almond butter for an unexpected bite. With a dusting of flaky salt, they’re an elevated treat that’ll keep the crowd coming back for more.
Cake pops are the perfect pass-around party treat. They’re easy to make, completely customizable and you don’t have to worry about a mess when slicing and serving. If you have leftover cake scraps, this is the perfect time to use them; otherwise bake your cake of choice or better yet, use store-bought and start rolling.
These no-bake Frankenstein-themed rice cereal treats are easy enough for kids to get involved. They’re also ideal for when you want to make dessert in advance, as you can make them up to three days before serving. To get that classic Frankenstein look, make sure to have green food coloring, melted chocolate and candy eyes on hand for decorating.
Mummy pies don’t have to be relegated to dessert! These festive treats are a fun way to kick off Halloween for breakfast and work just as well as an afternoon snack. While we’re partial to blueberry jam for the riff on the name alone, you can use any flavor you have on hand.
Dips aren’t just for savory snacks. Here, cannolis are deconstructed into an easy-to-eat dessert dip. To make it, layer cannoli cream in a dish and top with ground wafer cookies before garnishing with gummy worms.
Marshmallows are generally eaten twice a year — during summer smashed between s’mores or on Thanksgiving scattered atop sweet potatoes.This seasonal inspired recipe gives them a whole new life for Halloween. A tender pumpkin-flavored sheet cake gets topped with a pillow of toasted marshmallow frosting.
Though these cookies are traditionally made for the Jewish masquerade holiday of Purim, they can easily be enjoyed during the fall season. Spiced chopped apples are tucked into a buttery pastry and formed into triangles before baking. To cut down on time, you can also use store-bought pie crusts.
The secret behind these next-level treats is a childhood favorite: jarred Marshmallow Fluff. In addition to regular and mini marshmallows, the nostalgic spread keeps the treats moist and amps up their toasty, buttery flavor. After the treats rest for a bit, cut them into squares and put them on a skewer or popsicle stick for an easy-to-eat handheld treat.
This is a Halloween treat you’ll really want to sink your teeth into. Store-bought chocolate-covered doughnuts are sliced open and decorated with marshmallows and candy corn to create a Dracula’s mouth. Don’t skip out on the red buttercream for an even more dramatic flair!
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Mini Pumpkin Ginger Cheesecakes with Pecan Brittle and Maple Cream
Pumpkin pie and cheesecake come together in this autumnal dessert mashup. Our favorite part? They’re individually portioned so there’s no sharing required.
These sweet and crunchy meringue bones are sure to have the whole room talking on Halloween night. They're a great gluten-free option for guests and so simple to make. Use them to decorate cupcakes, cake, sweet dips and anything else you can think of.
If gingerbread men are sugar, spice and everything nice, these pumpkin spice ghoulmen are sugar, spice and spooky. With just a hint of pumpkin spice, these adorably ghoulish cookies are the perfect Halloween treat.
Halloween is all about celebrating tricks and treats and this cake is the literal definition of both. While it looks like a showstopper on the outside, the real joy is slicing into the cake to reveal a cascade of candy. To make this cake lower lift, use boxed cake mix to pull it together quickly.
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Coffee Cake with Pumpkin-White Chocolate Glaze
This fall twist on coffee cake doubles down on the seasonal squash and features it in both the cake batter and the sweet white chocolate glaze. For even more autumnal appeal, sprinkle toasted pumpkin seeds, white chocolate chips or a combination of the two on top of the glaze.
All of the flavors of apple pie come together in these hand-held empanadas. Store-bought pie dough makes this dessert easy to put together, but you can swap in homemade if you’d like. While they’re great as is, a little drizzle of caramel sauce makes these treats totally irresistible.
When it comes to decorating these mummy cookies, messiness is the name of the game, making them a great treat to involve the kiddos in decorating. Use a fork to drizzle the frosting back and forth like mummy wrappings and finish them off with candy eyes.
Pumpkin spice goes beyond coffee shop lattes with this festive fall cookie. Here, the spice mixture is incorporated into chocolate chip cookies, which become soft and cakey once baked. While we recommend cooling the cookies before serving, we wouldn’t blame you for sneaking one straight from the oven.
Nothing beats fresh out of the fryer doughnuts. While a regular round is always a hit, these cut-out doughnuts are perfect for Halloween, thanks to their screaming faces. Dip each one in a classic glaze to make them extra ghostly.
This sweet treat takes the term hand pie literally — they’re actually shaped like hands! Unlike traditional hand pies, these are oozing with filling for a Halloween-worthy effect. Use raspberry or strawberry jam to mimic the look of blood.
Pot pies turn sweet with this recipe from Martha Stewart. Spiced stewed apples spiked with bourbon are topped with a layer of store-bought puff pastry that turns crispy and golden once baked. While not required, we’d encourage you to serve this one with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
These zombie brain cupcakes manage to be creepy, cute and delicious all at once. In other words, they're perfect for Halloween. To make them, pipe squiggles of green buttercream onto cupcakes and add drops of strawberry syrup.
Chocolate lovers, this one’s for you. This is one of those desserts that looks elegant, but is sneaky-easy to pull together. Here, basic brownies are dressed up with a simple chocolate glaze and piped whipped chocolate ganache.
Chocolate-covered bananas get the Halloween treatment with this recipe. Instead of melted dark chocolate, dip the bananas in white chocolate and cover with a coating of shredded coconut. Finish these ghostly pops by drawing faces on the bananas with melted chocolate.
While rice cereal treats are nearly perfect as is, this recipe takes them to a whole other level. Browned butter adds a deeply caramel, nutty flavor to the beloved dessert and it only takes a few more minutes to make.
These candy bar cupcakes take inspiration from another fall favorite drink — hot chocolate! The cupcakes are made with chocolate milk for an even richer chocolate flavor. After baking, top them with orange and chocolate frosting and decorate with your candy bars of choice.
This just may be one of the most creative Halloween sweets we’ve ever come across. No-bake cheesecake filling is dyed green with food coloring and poured into jars that are lined with a crumbled cookie mixture. Once the cheesecake sets, flip the jars over and decorate the exterior with a marker to look like Frankenstein.
We love recreating grocery store favorites at home, such as these copycat Hostess cupcakes. With a crème filling, chocolate ganache and silky chocolate sponge, you might never go back to the original. And, they happen to be vegan.
We can’t lie — a plate of these creepy cake pops just might give your Halloween party a fright. Chocolate cake is formed into balls and dipped in melted white chocolate to form the cake pops. Thanks to some clever decorating, they transform from sweet treat into bloodshot eyes.
There are a few things that make these doughnut holes stand out from their fried counterparts. First, they’re baked, which is not only easier to execute but better for you. Second, they’re made with real pumpkin purée and warming spices to deliver our favorite fall flavors in one bite.
Individual desserts are always a hit when it comes to hosting bring parties. These elevated Halloween treats bring all the flavors of apple pie into premade mini pie crusts. Finish each one off with a drizzle of salted caramel to capture the flavor of fall.
Bring the Jack-O’-lanterns inside with this decorative dessert. Stamped out brownies are dipped in melted orange-tinted chocolate and decorated to look just like carved pumpkins. And yes, they actually light up!
Boxed brownie mix becomes a whole new dessert with Sandra Lee’s recipe. Piled on the rich brownie base is a combination of creamy frosting, chocolate candy bars, caramel popcorn, candy corn, chocolate chips and so much more. They’re decadent, delicious and a total crowd-pleaser.
These bars deliver all the joy of a pumpkin pie with half the effort. The dough does double duty as both crust and crumble topping, while the filling comes together quickly with just three ingredients. Cut them into bars and make a mile-high tower that friends can easily grab from for your Halloween spread.
These sweet treats offer something for kids and adults alike. Store-bought puff pastry transforms into delicious desserts that are filled with raspberry jam and a topping of fresh raspberries. For the kids, decorate them with sprinkle-studded chocolate spiders.
Apple butter replaces the usual jam in these cozy thumbprint cookies. Made with buckwheat flour and chopped pecans, the cookies have a nutty flavor that pairs well with the sweet, creaminess of the apple butter.
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Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Layer Cake with Halloween Candy
Give your Halloween candy another life by using them as decorations on this showstopping cake. The cake is made with a pumpkin chocolate chip batter and is layered with chocolate ganache before getting coated in a cream cheese frosting. The exterior is up to you — use any leftover candy to cover the cake.
There’s no cooking required for these spidery treats. Top store-baked cupcakes with marshmallow creme to mirror the look of a web. To really bring the theme home, finish each cupcake off with an edible candy spider.
It’s almost a requirement to serve a pumpkin-inspired dessert on Halloween. These bars start with a plush cake spiced with cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg. Top them off with a layer of cream cheese frosting for a bit of tang.
While a dessert with the name ‘dump’ in it might not seem appetizing, this low-lift cake is consistently crowd-pleasing and terrifically easy to make with kids. Homemade apple pie filling is mixed into the batter before getting baked, resulting in an incredibly tender, moist cake. Finish it off with a drizzle of salted caramel.
Macarons have a sophisticated reputation for good reason. Instead of stressing over the delicate process, this recipe calls for buying store-bought versions. To make them your own, decorate the tops with food-safe markers to represent pumpkins, ghosts and ghouls.
These sweet and spooky cupcakes help set the scene for a festive Halloween party. The homemade cupcakes get topped with a smear of buttercream. Multi-colored food gel is used to decorate the frosted tops into spider webs.
These kid-friendly treats will be the talk of the Halloween party. The height comes from stacking two mini doughnuts on top of each other on the cupcake to create the look of Frankenstein’s head. With some green frosting and candy, these spooky cupcakes come to life.
A little red icing goes a long way in transforming rice rice treats from regular squares into bloody brains. Once the rice cereal mixture is combined, shape the treats into balls with an indent down the middle to look like a brain. After the “brains” cool, decorate them with stripes of icing.
Make use of leftover candy corn by making…more candy! These homemade butterfingers will keep you delighted long after Halloween is over. With only three ingredients, they couldn’t be easier to make.
Candy isn’t just for trick-or-treating. For this cake, Milky Way bars are melted with butter and mixed into the cake batter. The result is a chewy cake with a hint of chocolate flavor that gets coated in a blanket of chocolate frosting.
Store-bought doughnuts offer the perfect blank canvas for these Halloween-inspired treats. Thanks to an assortment of candy and frosting, the doughnuts can be decorated to appear like a spooky cast of characters. From witches and ghost to crows and spider, let the kids get creative with this recipe.
These aren’t your regular apple fritters. Rings of apple are dunked into pancake batter before getting griddled to perfection. Coat them with a cinnamon sugar glaze to take these fritters firmly into dessert territory.
Martha Stewart’s vanilla Madeleine cookies are a great base for a number of flavors. Here, they’re covered in chocolate frosting and adorned with sliced almonds to look like werewolf paws. Madeleine batter can be refrigerated for up to two days, but the cookies are best eaten freshly made.
As if candy apples weren’t already exciting as is, this recipe transforms the sweet treat into the ultimate showstopper. To get an array of different colors, melt Jolly Ranchers before twirling the apples in the candy mixture. For extra pizazz, add a dusting of edible glitter.
These easy-to-make slushies make use of extra Halloween hard candy. Start by separating the candy by flavor, then make into a syrup along with water and sugar. After cooling, blend the Skittles syrup with ice and lemon juice for an unexpected treat.
There are few things as uniquely satisfying as sinking your teeth into a soft-in-the-center, chewy-around-the-edges cookie. These are studded with a combination of M&M’s and chopped chocolate. While their large size feels celebratory, it also yields a thicker, softer cookie. Win-win!
Let’s be honest — eating the cookie dough is everyone’s favorite part of making cookies. Thanks to omitting the eggs, this recipe allows you to do just that. The dough is rolled into balls and dipped into melted chocolate before getting decorated.
