20 Crowd-Pleasing Halloween Potluck Foods

How does a potluck dinner work?

The potluck or ‘bring-a-dish’ dinner has become very popular in the United States. A potluck dinner is a great way to get together as a family, or with a group of friends, without one person having to bear the cost of feeding the hordes. For a potluck meal, everyone brings a course or a dish. With a bit of communication and pre-planning, you can arrange a dinner party that is fun, abundant, and doesn’t break the bank!

Tips for a successful Halloween potluck menu

If you are hosting a potluck dinner, it is your responsibility to ensure that everything runs smoothly and that there is a nice balance of dishes.

• Set a theme for the meal. Do you want the dishes to all be Halloween-themed, or do you want to go for a foodie theme? For example, Italian or South-East Asian flavors.
• Is it going to be a sit-down dinner or finger foods?
• Put people on certain types of dishes. For example – meat, fish, veg, salad, carbs. That way, you don’t have three guests arrive with their version of a potato bake.
• Find out from your guests whether they will need to make final touches to their dishes before serving. Ask them if they will require any special equipment or utensils or perhaps need the oven to warm something up.

Best Halloween potluck food ideas

1. Monster cookies

If you are on dessert duty, whip up a batch of your favorite cookies and pop some of these candy eyeballs on them for a spooky sweet!

2. Mummy-wrapped brie

Grab a roll of puff pastry and a wheel of camembert. Wrap your camembert in the puff pastry. Brush the pastry with beaten egg. Slice the remaining puff pastry into strips and decorate the top of the pastry-covered camembert wheel mummy-style. Pop into the oven (400 °F) for 10 minutes. Brush with egg wash again and bake for a further 10-15 minutes or until golden brown. Decorate with some apple and raisin eyes. Now, your mummy-wrapped brie is ready to serve!

3. Roast pumpkin nachos

Here’s a Halloween spin on one of the best party foods ever. Substitute oven-baked cubes of pumpkin or butternut squash for the corn on a platter of nachos. Spice up the pumpkin with a sprinkle of chili flakes, ground coriander, and ground cumin. Save on prep time with these ready diced butternut cubes.

4. Mushroom eye-balls

For an eye-catching canapé, put together mushroom and mozzarella eyeballs! Chop the stems off a punnet of button mushrooms and place them on an oven tray. Fry up diced bacon and finely chopped onions. Add some fresh thyme, crushed garlic, and a pinch of salt and pepper. Place a spoonful of this mixture into each mushroom cap. Bake for seven to nine minutes at 400 °F. Place a mozzarella ball on the mushroom and bake for an additional four to five minutes, or until the cheese is soft but not melted. To create the eyeball effect, pop an olive slice onto the soft cheese.

5. Bloody mozzarella sticks

Pretty much anything served with a ketchup dip can look quite ghoulish. Stock up on these frozen mozzarella sticks to have at the ready when it’s suddenly your turn to turn up with snacks.

6. Spidery guacamole

Spider webs are a quick way to turn just about any potluck contribution into a Halloween party food. Pipe a mayonnaise spider web onto your guacamole dip.

7. Spider web pizzas

Use string cheese to shape a cheesy web onto pizzas.

8. Pumpkin pie

For a Halloween-themed dinner, a pumpkin pie is always a good idea!

9. Vegetable soup

Nothing says autumn quite like a roasted fall vegetable soup. Just check with your host about whether they have enough bowls. Better yet, save them the washing up and bring disposable Halloween-themed party cups to serve the soup in!

10. Halloween brownies

This may be the ultimate Halloween dessert. Bake a batch of your best brownies and top with all the sweets. You can use M&Ms, mini mallows, crumbled pretzels, candy corn, and/or butterscotch chips. Let your imagination run wild!

11. Roast pumpkin salad

Guests often tend to bring carb-heavy dishes to a potluck. Breathe fresh air into proceedings with a light salad. Sticking to the pumpkin theme: Roast pumpkin cubes with olive oil, salt, cumin, coriander, and cinnamon. Toss these roasted cubes into a salad of arugula and baby spinach leaves. Add a couple of roasted cherry tomatoes for zing and color and crumbled feta for creaminess.

12. Butternut Tabbouleh

Another delicious salad idea: Toss cooked bulgur wheat, roasted butternut, one finely chopped shallot, 1/4 cup cranberries, one cup chopped fresh mint, and 1/2 cup chopped coriander together in a bowl. Dress with olive oil and fresh lemon juice.

13. Cheerio Treats

Add pumpkin cheerios to your melted marshmallows to make a pumpkin-flavored spin on Rice Krispy treats. Sprinkle with pumpkin spice and orange sanding sugar for extra festiveness.

14. Pumpkin and feta phyllo cups

The perfect pumpkin-themed appetizer for a Halloween party! Cut phyllo pastry into six by six-inch squares. Layer two to three squares on top of each other with a brush of olive oil. Place in a muffin pan to shape and bake for ten to fifteen minutes until lightly golden. Fill these cups with roast pumpkin, feta, and a drizzle of pesto.

15. Halloween-theme cookies

For a Halloween-themed teatime treat, try these pumpkin spice cookies or these Halloween Oreos.

16. Witch hat cupcakes

Use black, purple, or chocolate-dipped ice cream sugar cones to decorate cupcakes to look like witch hats.

17. Jalapeno popper mummies

Wrap your jalapeno poppers in strips of puff pastry to make them look like little mummies.

18. Ghoulish potato skins

Decorate these potato skins to look like ghosts with a smear of cream cheese.

19. Halloween sandwiches

Use Halloween cookie cutters to cut spooky shapes out of your sandwiches.

20. Halloween finger Viennas

Wrap Vienna sausages in buns and make a few lines with a knife to look like the creases on a finger, then add a triangle of red pepper as a fingernail, or cut the sausage in the shape of a nail.

Preparation is key

Whether it’s the Fourth of July, Halloween, or Thanksgiving, it always helps to be prepared. The number of gatherings and dinner parties usually goes up a notch around these festive occasions! If you know a special holiday is coming up, stock up on some yummy, easy snacks.

Halloween potluck foods near me

Order your Halloween potluck foods from trusted grocery stores in your area. Stock up on your Halloween party supplies, fresh foods, and convenience foods without having to cruise the aisles. An Instacart shopper will select your items and get them ready for you. Choose convenient, contactless delivery or pick-up within two hours of placing your order.

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