By Wendy

With Halloween at the end of the month, it’s time to start stocking up on Halloween candy to give the kids that come by the house. With all the different candies out there to choose from, how do you find the healthiest options? Here are 5 healthy Halloween treat alternatives:

1- LÄRABAR bars: these bars have a delicious blend of unsweetened fruits, nuts and spices. Each flavor contains no more than nine ingredients, so you know that they keep it simple. Apple Pie provides 1 full serving of fruit and 5 grams of fiber. Not too sweet, and spiced with cinnamon and raisins, Apple Pie also has almonds, walnuts and natural chewy goodness.

2- Organic Dark Chocolate Bug Bites: Each of these squares contains a fun and educational insect trading card. They have 70% cocoa content and is certified organic, vegan, gluten-free, and kosher. Another great thing about this chocolate is sourced from ethically traded cacao farms, which ensures fair trade, responsible labor practices and sustainable farming.

3- Unreal 54: similar to chocolate covered peanuts, these sweets delights contain no corn syrup, no partially hydrogenated oils, no artificial ingredients, no genetically modified organisms (GMOs), no preservatives, and a low glycemic index.

4- Surf Sweets Gummy Bears: I’m a huge fan of gummy bears, so it’s great to find a healthier version of these sweet little gummy bears. Surf Sweets Gummy Bears are made with organic fruit juice and organic sweeteners. Also contains 100% vitamin C per serving. No corn syrups of GMOs.

5- Equal Exchange Organic & Fairly Traded Dark Chocolate Minis: Equal Exchange minis are made with cacao from the farmer co-operatives CONACADO, in the Dominican Republic, and CACVRA, in Peru, and the fairly traded organic sugar comes from co-operatives in Paraguay.  These delicious, bite-sized Fair Trade chocolates are the way to go! Made of 555% cocoa content, they are also vegan, soy- and gluten-free.

So stock up on some of these delicious treats! And if you don’t happen to give them all away on Halloween, they make great treats for lunch boxes and mid-day pick me ups. What’s your favorite treat?

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Wendy Yu is a digital marketing professional living in New York City. When she’s not using the power of social media to share ideas on how to be more environmentally friendly, she is exploring the city, trying local foods, and learning more about how she can reduce her carbon footprint.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of Green Halloween® or our partners.

by Corey

Parents are becoming more and more savvy about how conventional candy companies work: Make the “treat” with the least amount of effort and sell it for the most money. Using real, wholesome, ethically sourced or even safe ingredients are not necessarily part of the deal.

Luckily, there are now many awesome options available. Healthy (and healthier), ethically sourced and sustainably grown Halloween treats are becoming easier and easier to find. Even super market chains, major online retailers and big box stores have jumped on the bandwagon, making these items more accessible to families no matter where they live.

But it can be confusing to negotiate the web of certifications and labels that some treat brands boast. Are they really meaningful? Or just “green-washing”? This list will (hopefully) make the process of buying healthier Halloween treats (and party fare) more simple.

Just look for as many as possible of the following:

• Non-GMO (preferably Non-GMO Project Verified)
• Organic (Certified is best)
• Locally grown/produced
• No high fructose corn syrup (HFCS)
• No Palm-oil
• No artificial colors, flavors or preservatives (i.e. Real, whole foods – If your first-grader can pronounce all of the ingredients, you are probably in luck.)
• Fair Trade
• Minimally processed
• For chocolate – Rainforest Alliance Certified and/or shade grown

In addition, you may want to consider giving away goodies or serving foods that are peanut-free, gluten-free, dairy free and/or egg free. These are some of the most common food allergens. And with 1 in 13 kids suffering from food allergies*, limiting highly allergic foods is one way to ensure that Halloween is safe and fun for everyone.

*Source, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Green Halloween® is a nationwide non-profit initiative started by mother-daughter team Corey Colwell-Lipson and Lynn Colwell. In 2010, Green Halloween became a program of EcoMom® Alliance and has events in cities across the U.S.

Trick or treat? Both! With scary foods and treats galore.

Have an up-coming Halloween party and don’t know what to make to feed your guests?  No worries!  Here are five scary foods and treats that are sure to monster rock the house down!

Scary Pear Heads:

Using Pears as your main ingredient makes for a fun and spooky treat!

Ingredients

Directions

1. Remove the stem from the pears. Using a wooden skewer, make a hole in the stem end of each pear. Insert a lollipop stick in each hole.
2. In a double boiler or a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water, melt white chocolate. Let stand until cool. Dip the pears in the chocolate, turning to coat. Stand the pears up in a piece of foam or oasis. Let stand until set, about 40 minutes.
3. In a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water, melt the semisweet chocolate. Let cool for 5 minutes. Fit a small pastry bag with a #4 tip, and fill with melted semisweet chocolate. Pipe chocolate onto pears to create facial features. Let stand until set, about 10 minute

Be sure to use chocolate with Fair Trade on the label!  For more fun recipes like this, check out Martha Stewart online!

Swamp Juice:

This spooky drink will creep out any party goer...in a delicious way!

Ingredients

• FOR 8 SERVINGS:
• 1/2 cup small tapioca pearls (found in the baking aisle of most grocery stores)
• 100% natural food coloring
• 4 tablespoons organic sugar

• 8 organic gummy worms
• Seltzer water
• All natural lemonade
• 8 organic gummy worms

Instructions

1. MAKE THE EGGS: Bring 6 cups of water to a boil and add the tapioca pearls. Reduce the heat slightly and boil the pearls, stirring occasionally, for 20 to 25 minutes.
2. COLOR THE EGGS: Divide the pearls, with the remaining water, between two bowls. Add 4 drops of food coloring (we used 3 drops of yellow and 1 drop of green in one bowl, and 4 drops of blue in the other) and 2 tablespoons of sugar to each bowl. Stir the mixtures, then allow them to sit uncovered for 20 to 25 minutes. Drain and rinse the pearls with cold water.
3. ASSEMBLE THE DRINK: Spoon 2 tablespoons of pearls into each glass and drop in a gummy fish. Fill the glasses with seltzer water, then add a splash of lemonade. Place a gummy worm around a spoon as shown.

Be sure to get use one of our fun sponsors for your gummy candy at Surf Sweets!  For more fun Halloween recipes similar to this one, check out Disney Family Fun!

Pizza Mummies:

Little mummies for mommy and her little kids too!

 

 

Ingredients (choose organic whenever possible)

• English muffins
• Pizza sauce
• Black olives

• Scallions
• Red or green pepper
• Cheese sticks or slices

Instructions

1. Heat the oven to 350º F. For each mummy, spread a tablespoon of pizza sauce onto half of an English muffin (toast it first, if you like).
2. Set olive slices in place for eyes and add round slices of green onion or bits of red or green pepper for pupils.
3. Lay strips of cheese (we used a pulled-apart cheese stick) across the muffin for the mummy?s wrappings.
4. Bake for about 10 minutes or until the cheese is melted and the muffin is toasty.

Be sure to use English Muffins that are whole grain and gluten free!

For more fun Halloween recipes similar to this one, check out Disney Family Fun!

Swamp Creatures:

Oooooey, Goooey Swamp Creatures that taste good!

 

Ingredients

• All natural/organic Macaroni and cheese
• Sautéed spinach

• Olive slices

Instructions

1. Mix up a batch of macaroni and cheese, then spoon it into greased muffin cups and bake until firm, about 25 minutes.
2. Let the creatures rest for about 10 minutes, then gently remove them from the tins. Place them upside down on a swamp of sautéed spinach and add olive slice eyes.

Be sure to use whole grain, gluten free pasta for the macaroni!

For more fun Halloween recipes similar to this one, check out Disney Family Fun!

Slivered Scream Beans:

Healthy and Scary at the same time!

 

Ingredients

• 1 pound haricots verts
• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
• 1 tablespoon finely chopped peeled fresh ginger
• 1/2 Thai chile, thinly sliced
• Coarse salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons black sesame seeds (kalustyans.com)
• 1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

Directions

1. Prepare an ice bath. Bring a 4-quart pot of lightly salted water to a rolling boil. Add haricots verts, and blanch until vibrant green, about 5 minutes. Drain in a colander, and transfer to ice bath. Let stand until cool. Drain in colander, and thinly slice haricots verts on the bias.
2. Heat oil over medium-high heat in a large skillet. Add garlic, and cook until just golden, 1 minute. Add ginger and chile, and cook for 1 minute more. Add blanched haricots verts, and cook, tossing, until heated through. Season with salt. Add sesame seeds and lemon zest, and toss to combine.

For more fun recipes like this, check out Martha Stewart online!

Blogger Laurali Star can also be found on The Damsel in the Attic!

Green Halloween® is a nationwide non-profit initiative started by mother-daughter team Corey Colwell-Lipson and Lynn Colwell. In 2010, Green Halloween became a program of EcoMom® Alliance and has events in cities across the U.S.

 

 

 

Guest post

Halloween should be fun, right? Unfortunately, a scary reality is that one of the biggest nights for the chocolate industry supports a system that relies on forced child labor on many West African cocoa farms. But you can do something to help stop such practices and still enjoy Halloween.

This October, families, organizations, and businesses across the U.S. can help children forced to work on West African cocoa farms by participating in the 5th annual Reverse Trick-or-Treating campaign. By handing out organic, Fair Trade chocolates from Equal Exchange with attached informational cards when they go trick-or-treating, participants can bring critically important attention to the thousands of children who are trafficked and forced to work in horrible conditions on West African cocoa farms.

This year’s Reverse Trick-or-Treating program marks the 10^th anniversary of the September, 2001, signing of the Harkin-Engel Protocol that called for an end to the worst forms of child labor in the cocoa supply chains of the major chocolate companies. The campaign to raise awareness that there is a Fair Trade alternative to child labor was launched in 2007, two years after the deadline had passed for signatories to end the worst forms of child labor. Ten years after the protocol’s signing, most of its conditions have still not been met.

Equal Exchange knows there’s a better way to go and instead sources its Fair Trade and organic cocoa from farms in the Dominican Republic, Panama, Peru, and Ecuador. The vanilla from Madagascar and sugar from Paraguay for Equal Exchange’s chocolate are also certified Fair Trade and organic.

Contributed by: Kelsie Evans, Equal Exchange Chocolate Products Coordinator

by Corey

Send us your best “Spooky Face” and win!

We all know (and are hearing more each day) of the scary stories surrounding the precarious-state of our children’s health and the planet we all share.

Holidays are supposed to be about making memories and having F-U-N, but unfortunately, the issues that impact our families and planet during the other 364 days of the year bleed over into this holiday, too:

Heavy metals in masks and face paints, mood-altering artificial colors, childhood obesity, diabetes and food allergy epidemics, genetically modified “Frankenfoods,” hormone disrupting costumes, child-slavery in the coco industry, single-use decor traveling half way across the planet just to end up in a landfill (where there really is no “away” in “throw-away”). The list goes on and on.

Scary.

And while Green Halloween is all about inspiring families and communities via positive messages, we agree that these spooky truths are indeed important to be aware of.

But that doesn’t mean the F-U-N has to go down the drain.

NO way!

So to highlight the reasons why it’s good for people and planet to celebrate healthy and Earth-friendly traditions, but to make sure that fear doesn’t get the best of us (this time, we’re having F-U-N with F-E-A-R), we’re hosting a brand new “Scary Face” Contest.

Just e-mail us a photo image (no larger than 72 dpi) or link to a photo with your (or your child’s) best “scary face” and tell us what you/your family/your child thinks is scary about an UN-Healthy/Green Halloween.

We’ll pick our 5 favorites (funniest, spookiest, cutest, most creative and best overall) to WIN one of the great, green prize packs below:

Prize #1

• Revolution Foods™ Organic Snack Packs! Reusable paper lunchbox for kids filled with samples of Grammy Sammys, Jammy Sammys, Mashups and Yo’ Drops, Tattoos and stickers for kids, and coupons for mom. Value – $8-10
• Good for You Girls: Complete Skin Care Starter Kit. Value – $19.99

Prize #2

• Today I Ate A Rainbow kits.  Kit contains: An interactive chart that uses colorful magnets to track daily consumption of a rainbow of fruits & veggies, a color coded shopping list and a children’s book called The Rainbow Bunch. Value -$25
• LiveGreene orange Vapur anti-bottles. Value – $9

Prize #3

• Natural Luxe Shainsware recycled bracelet for kids. Value – $9
• Eli’s Earth Bars; 6 bars. Value -$15.54

Prize #4

• Green Party Goods. Box of 144 straws of your choice and a package of Stripe Napkins. Value – $21
• 1 set of three Preserve Jr. Toothbrushes. Value -$10

Prize #5 (Top prize for Best Overall)

• Eat Cleaner; 1 Pack of 6 Eat Cleaner Wipes and a Bottle of Fruit and Veg Wash Concentrate with a reusable produce Bag. Value -$10
• $15 EcoMom gift certificates via email (Can be used at the EcoMom Green Halloween store or for anything on EcoMom)
• Revolution Foods™ Organic Snack Packs! Reusable paper lunchbox for kids filled with samples of Grammy Sammys, Jammy Sammys, Mashups and Yo’ Drops, Tattoos and stickers for kids, and coupons for mom. Value – $8-10
• Today I Ate A Rainbow kits.  Kit contains: An interactive chart that uses colorful magnets to track daily consumption of a rainbow of fruits & veggies, a color coded shopping list and a children’s book called The Rainbow Bunch. Value – $25
• Natural Luxe; Shainsware recycled bracelet for kids. Value -$9
• Eli’s Earth Bars; 6 bars. Value – $15.54
• EcoPartyTime: Halloween 8 feet felt banner, $35.95 value, and a surprise costume make up kit for kids, $11.95-$19.95 value
• thredUP 1 box. Browse thousands of boxes of pre-loved kids Halloween costumes, clothes, toys or books listed by other moms across the country.  Giveaway includes a promo code that can be used for one box & shipping. Value – $15.95

For more ways to win gifts & goodies from our green partners, click here.

Giveaway rules:

• Beginning 12:01am PST on 10/11/11, send your best “scary face” and submit your opinion on what you believe is most scary about an un-healthy/green Halloween. Include your name, your child’s name (if applicable), your child’s age, city/state, e-mail address and phone number. Subject of the e-mail must be: SCARY FACE.
• Entries e-mailed to: info AT GreenHalloween.org (we are typing our e-mail like this to avoid spam, please use @ sign)
• 3 entries per person allowed.
• Photos must be received no later than11:59pm PST on November 5, 2011
• Photos must be sent by e-mail (attachment, embedded into the body of e-mail or as a link) to: info AT GreenHalloween.org.
• Photos sent as attachment or in body of e-mail must NOT be larger than72 dpi.
• Only legal guardians and parents over the age of 18, living in the continental US, may submit photos. Photos become the property of Green Halloween and may be used via our social media network – on Facebook, Twitter, our blog, etc. Entry into the contest is your “signature” that the requirements above have been met.
• We are not responsible for photos that do not arrive.
• Winner will be contacted via e-mail no later than November 30th, 2011 and will be announced on Facebook/GreenHalloween and on Twitter @GreenHalloween.
• Winner’s name, phone number and e-mail address will be provided to prize partners, who will mail product separately.
• Green Halloween and partners are not responsible for winning announcement that doesn’t make it through to the winner, lost or damaged prizes.
• Prize partners may send prizes of equivalent value and/or gift certificates for free product in lieu of actual gifts.
• Shipping of prizes to continental US only; gift certificates/codes do not include free shipping of items.
• If you have questions about products, please contact the product companies directly.
• Winners chose, based on categories above, by the Green Halloween team.