We at Green Halloween are dedicated to helping you have a healthy Halloween. That means candy free of GMOs and high-fructose corn syrup? But we still want you to be able to indulge with your own homemade Twix bars!

Shortbread Layer

3/4 cup butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9 x 9-inch pan and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, beat together the butter, powdered sugar, vanilla, and salt until the mixture looks like a coarse sand.

Mix in the flour until the dough comes together.

Press the dough evenly into the prepared pan and bake for 20 minutes, or until the surface of the shortbread looks completely dry. Cool in pan for 15 minutes.

To Assemble

10 ounces soft caramels
6 ounces semi-sweet or milk chocolate, chopped

First, bake off your shortbread and let them cool.

In a microwave-safe bowl, microwave the caramel candies until completely melted and smooth, about 1 to 1 1/2 minutes. Using an offset spatula, spread the caramel evenly over the shortbread layer. Allow to cool for 15 minutes to set.

Transfer shortbread to a cutting board and cut into nine, 1-inch wide pieces. Then, cut each piece in half, creating eighteen 1-inch wide and 4 1/2-inch long candy bars.

In another microwave-safe bowl, melt the chopped chocolate for 15 seconds at a time, stirring between each interval, until smooth. Dip each candy bar into the chocolate, remove any excess chocolate, and set on wax paper to set completely, about 1 hour.

Store in an airtight container at room temperature. The candy bars keep for several days.

This FabulousPasta recipe is from  Kristin Rosenau of Pastry Affair via Food 52

2012 Green Halloween® Blogfest

Halloween is fast approaching, and we here at Green America are doing our best to support a Green Halloween® – one that is healthy for you, your families, and our planet. Since we know that you care about kids, families and the planet, we’d like to invite you to participate in our Green Halloween® Blogfest that will be taking place from Wednesday October 24^th to October 31^st. We hope that our invitation inspires you to share your own ideas about having a Halloween that is both fun and healthy.

For this BlogFest we would like to put a spotlight on the health concerns that have grown around traditional treats that are handed out on Halloween. Halloween is big on fun, but unfortunately, it is also big on unhealthy traditions. Many moms and dads worry about the impact of this holiday on the health of their kids and the planet. There is growing awareness and concern for the connections between children with diabetes, food allergies, and obesity and the presence of processed ingredients, hidden sugars, synthetic chemicals, and artificial colors in our food system.

On the flipside of this, it is easier than ever to find helpful information and make healthy choices. Green Halloween proudly advocates for this and supports a Halloween that is easy, affordable, fun and oh yes, healthy. Green Halloween encourages families to give out healthier treats and non-food “treasures” to trick-or-treaters, and luckily, there are now many awesome options available this Halloween. Green Halloween itself has partnered with these great organizations, whose missions support the Green Halloween goals of showing families that it is possible to keep the fun, while losing the unhealthy, un-Earth-friendly traditions.

We hope that you will join us and share your ideas on what a healthy Halloween means to you. Share with us your thoughts and tips on:

• How do you make Halloween healthier?
• Why is it important to think about health when celebrating Halloween?
• What the challenges are to making Halloween healthier and more Earth-friendly?
• What are your favorite ways to “Think outside the {conventional} candy box” and provide alternatives to traditional candy? Do you do treasures, have traditions like the “Switch-Witch”, or provide healthy alternatives?
• Your tips for managing the amount of the junk candy your children consume at Halloween?
• How has your environmental ethic or interest in health framed your celebration of Halloween?

It’s not about telling parents how they should celebrate – it’s about inspiring them to make choices that make sense to their families, their budgets and their schedules. And when many families make healthier and more sustainable choices for Halloween – taking even the smallest of steps – big impacts can be made for the short and long term.

Please join us in celebrating a Green Halloween.

To participate you can:

• Write your own post based on our questions. You are more than welcome to use GreenHalloween.org as a resource, clicking on the tags at the bottom of this post are a great place
  to start. We also recommend clicking on the links to our sponsors below as well. They perfectly exemplify what we are all about at Green Halloween and are a great inspiration.
• Update a past blog post that you have written that fits with this topic. (Now is a great time to remind people about your work and bring a new audience in on your tips and ideas)
• We can provide you with an original Green Halloween post for you to repost as is, or personalize yourself. (Just contact GreenHalloween@GreenAmerica.org for this)

Other Instructions

• Post a link to your blog post in the comments below, so we can read it and promote it.
• Green Halloween(R) is a registered trademark, so the first time it is mentioned in your post, please be sure to include the registration mark
• If you are on Twitter, share your post on there. Please include the Hashtag, #GreenHalloween
• Your Blogfest entry should mention that is a part of the 2012 Green Halloween® Blogfest, and link back to this original signup post so that people reading your post can find our other entries.
• We encourage you to check out each other’s blogs, comment, and provide feedback.
• Don’t be shy, any entry, no matter how big or small, is welcome to be a part of this.
• Have fun, write about what you believe, and read the work of others with similar interests.
• Connect to Green Halloween on Facebook and Twitter
• And please feel free to pass this on to other bloggers you think might be interested.

What’s in it for you?

• We will have a page on GreenHalloween.Org with links to all participating blogs
• We’ll do our best  to support your post with Tweets and via Facebook, and of course you’re welcome to post on our Green Halloween Facebook page
• If we receive media calls from anyone interested in hearing from bloggers, your name and blog will be added to the list (if you choose)
• Grow your profile, increase your network, and share your work with a new audience
• You’ll feel great having supported this effort to make a difference for parents and planet!

Any questions, requests for posts/photos/resources, or support are more than welcome. We are here to help! The best way to ask questions is: GreenHalloween@GreenAmerica.org

Lastly, We’d like to extend an invitation for you to join us for a #GreenHalloween Twitter Party on October 22 from 9-10pm EST. There will be plenty of inspirational ideas for those of you having trouble getting started on your post!

***
Green Halloween is a non-profit, grassroots community initiative to create healthier and more Earth-friendly holidays, starting with Halloween. It began in the Seattle area in 2007 with backers such as Whole Foods Market and was such a huge success that in 2008, the initiative expanded nation-wide. In cities across the country, volunteer coordinators are turning their city’s Halloween holiday
healthy and eco-friendly, but many are also raising money for their own, local nonprofit beneficiaries via the initiative. Green Halloween, as of 2012, is a program of Green America. Green Halloween is possible because of their partnerships with Honest Tea®, Lara Bar®, Stretch Island Fruit Co.^TM, Endangered Species Chocolate, Plum Kids, Unreal^TM, Applegate® , Cascadian Farm®, Surf Sweets®, Bitsy’s Brain Food^TM, Brainard’s Natural Remedies®, and Glee Gum^TM.

Green America is a not-for-profit membership organization founded in 1982. Our mission is to harness economic power—the strength of consumers, investors, businesses, and the marketplace— to create a socially just and environmentally sustainable society. We work for a world where all people have enough, where all communities are healthy and safe, and where the bounty of the Earth is preserved for all the generations to come.

Halloween is a really fun tradition and as all you Green Halloween fans know, it can celebrated in ways that are good for our bodies and for the earth! It’s so fun to get dressed up and live in a world of make believe for a day! The scary party might just be all the candy and junk food that most likely has made its way into your house. I think Halloween is the perfect time to show parents that when junk food is in the house it’s hard not to eat it…this is the same all year long…it just gets amplified on this day! If you keep all the candy and treats just pay attention to how much harder it is resist. It’s an excellent example of why healthy eating is so much easier if you don’t bring tempting junk food into the house!

Need ideas for getting the candy out of the house?  Here are 10:

1. Give your kids a chance to choose their favorite treats and give them one per day for a week.
2. Have a visit from the switch witch and trade the candy for a toy or maybe some money. There is even a book about the Switch Witch!  Or maybe a Candy Fairy can come for a visit!
3. Find out if a dentist in your area is taking candy in exchange for toys. There are many dentists that offer this buy back type of service! Halloween Candy Buy Back!
4. Send candy to soldiers…just Google that phrase and you’ll find quite a few sites with information such as Operation Gratitude.
5. Take some to nursing homes or women’s shelters.
6. Do some baking with some of those sweets and share with your neighbors.
7. Save some to decorate your Gingerbread houses at Christmas time!
8. Turn it into a science experiment.
9. Give some to the grandparents, grown up cousins that are “too old” to trick or treat, or to aunts and uncles that don’t have kids!
10. Take it to work!  If you work from home do one of the above or else you’ll probably find yourself “snacking” more often than you’d like!

So enjoy the festivities, have some sweets and then be sure to feed your families extra fruits and veggies to help your bodies process it all! Perhaps make these Rainbow Fruit sticks!

 
Happy Healthy Halloween!

Kia

Kia Robertson is a mom and the creator of the Today I Ate A Rainbow kit; a tool that helps parents establish healthy habits by setting the goal of eating a rainbow of fruits and vegetables every day. Kia is passionate about creating tools that help parents raise healthy kids!

(via flickr)

According to the National Confectioner’s Society, more than 40% of adults take candy from their own candy bowl. It’s also suspected that close to 90% of adults will take candy from their child’s candy stash. [i] Think about it. If there are 50 calories in a bite size piece of chocolate and you sneak a couple pieces here, one more piece there, and then a final two pieces later … that could really add up!

Of course you are concerned about your kids having a healthy Halloween, but don’t forget about your own needs, too. Instead of over indulging and instead of stressing out about the calories, try these five tips to avoid sneaking candy from the candy bowl.

1 – Don’t Pass Out {conventional} Candy, Share Healthful Snacks or Treasures

Green Halloween® was founded on the idea that Halloween can be healthy AND fun. While conventional candy around Halloween may be tough to avoid 100% of the time, you can do your part by forgoing the candy bowl at your house and instead filling a bowl with treats (and treasures) kids will love and you can feel good about noshing later such as Larabars, Cascadian Farm Granola Bars, Stretch Island Fruit Leather, Jammy Sammys and Glee Gum. Dozens of ideas can be found here.

2 – Wear a Complicated Costume

A costume that comes with gloves or long nails, for example, will make it hard to open those tricky candy wrappers. Do yourself a favor and dress up as a werewolf or a one armed-pirate for Halloween.

3 – Make a Low-Cal Dip and Keep Veggies Close By

When your kids bring home candy and you feel the urge to snack on it, choose to dip celery into a mango salsa dip or a slice of green pepper into a cilantro yogurt dip. Both of these homemade dips will last in the fridge for a few days, so there’s no reason not to whip up a couple batches of dip during Halloween time.

4 – Drink a Big Glass of Water

No, this isn’t just something people say. A recent study found that drinking two cups of water before a meal will make it easier to eat less and help you feel full longer. [ii] Before you set out to trick or treat, you should drink a full glass of water for the same benefit.

5 – Say “Trick, Treat, or Jumping Jacks”

There’s proof that exercise suppresses your appetite[iii]. When your doorbell rings or your little ones ring your neighbor’s doorbell, encourage the kids to get their blood flowing with jumping jacks.  You can do the same right alongside them.

Guest blogger Sara Lancaster writes about dips, sauces, and her featured dip festival, Dipstock, (happening right now in time for Halloween) over at her blog, Saucy Dipper.

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.