A hint of warm Mexican flavors like cayenne, cinnamon, and vanilla add depth (but not too much spice!) to this black-on-black cake with buttercream icing from Stephanie Suen that will make Halloween dinner at home feel supernatural. The cute meringue ghosts lining the edge of the cake are worth making on their own. School-aged kids can help pipe the meringue and add chocolate eyes while minis can turn add ingredients to the stand mixer.

We love these wacky little packages as a school Halloween party idea you and your little can whip up together. Erin Jang of The Indigo Bunting added sprinkles to Rice Krispie treats and slipped them into self-sealing cello bags. See who can make the silliest face when adding mismatched googly eyes to each treat bag.

Are you hosting a Halloween get-together this year? Try this take on a Dirt Cake from Darcy Miller, author of "Celebrate Everything," by turning it into a dessert bar where minis can make theirs as creepy as they dare with gummy worms, candy bones, sugar skulls, or eyeballs.

The black tahini in these slice-and-bake Black and White Halvah Cookies makes them sophisticated enough for parents to enjoy while the black sanding sugar adds sweetness for minis. Set up a station for kids to knead the dough to create the marbled look or dip the cookie edges into the black sugar.

A fall cheese platter inspired Erica Chan Coffman of Honestly WTF to make this outrageously abundant candy charcuterie platewith a mix of nostalgic candy and bizarre new varieties: think chocolate frogs and gummy bug tape.

After a trip to your local pick-your-own farm, turn your extra fruit into a sweet after-school treat with this simple Apple Chip recipe from Food52 that pairs cinnamon for ginger, allspice, or even cardamom with apples cut on a mandoline slicer. Kids can help arrange the slices on baking sheets before they head into the oven.

Broken cookies dotted with devilish candy eyes turn your go-to brownie recipe into a mob of chocolate monsters. We love that you don’t have to overthink the decoration–this is a Halloween food idea that kids can help with by stirring, pouring, or pressing the cookies into the still-warm chocolate brownies.

Sure, this is a shortcut- but a reminder that not all Halloween treats need to be homemade, so if baking isn’t your thing, skip a few steps and order Halloween cookies from a pro. Ask your local bakery about their Halloween cookies, like these from Arlo’s Cookies. Or make decorating cookies part of the main event with a cookie decorating kit that comes with sugar cookies and icing ready for you mini Matisse.