Prepare yourself for Howling Hallowe’en – and have a party!

When the children have finished “trick or treating” and to satisfy the twinkle of devilishness residing in all of us, why not host a Hallowe’en party? Have a spooky, scary time, but most of all have loads of fun!

Hallowe’en, also known as All Hallows’ Eve or All Souls’ Night, began in Britain hundreds of years ago and is celebrated on 31st October. This date falls exactly between the Autumnal Equinox and Winter Solstice and was once believed to be a “very potent time for magic and communion with spirits”. Traditionally therefore it has been celebrated by children dressing up as witches and sorcerers and the night has been synonymous with black cats, bats, ghosts and other “spooky” things.

“Trick or Treat” was originally a tradition where adults would go door-to-door asking for donations of money or food to prepare for their New Year’s feast and those that didn’t give would be cursed. Somehow, over the years, New Year’s turned into Halloween!

Where does the pumpkin come in? Well, lanterns that were carved out of pumpkins were used to provide light. The name Jack-O-Lantern comes from an old Irish tale. Jack was a man who could enter neither Heaven nor Hell and was condemned to wander through the night with only a candle in a pumpkin for light – so goes the legend.

Here are some useful tips for a Hallowe’en party:

• Address invitations “uncostumed guests need not enter our gate”.

• Invite guests by telephone complete with eerie sounding background music.

• Award prizes for costumes – mystery books are a great choice.

• Provide a fortune teller (or do this yourself, think of fortunes ahead of time).

• Play a murder mystery game, available at most games stores.

• Do a reading of the frightening poem The Raven, by Edgar Allan Poe.

• Greet guests on your lawn decorated with tombstones created by covering  cereal boxes with white butcher paper, write guests names above the RIP and  provide eerie epitaphs to make them shiver.

• Organise a “scary treasure hunt” by torch light.

• Give scary names to the menu items, such as Devilishly Good Eggs and write them on name cards to set the mood.

• Freeze cranberry juice in plastic gloves (wash and rinse gloves first to remove any residue). When juice is frozen solid, carefully cut off gloves with scissors and float the hands in a punch bowl.

Serve stew from a “witch’s cauldron” and garnish with a spider web of sour cream or squeezable cheese. To make circles out of sour cream pour into a  plastic bag and snip one corner. Squeeze out three or four circles. Drag a knife through the sour cream from the innermost circle to the outermost and repeat until the spider’s web is formed. Similarly, squeeze three or four chocolate circles onto dessert plates, drag a toothpick from the center of the plate outward through the chocolate circles, again forming a spider’s web. Then place a piece of cake on the web.