What I love about Halloween is the opportunity that it presents for you to pair food in ways that you wouldn’t usually. Chocolate cupcakes and jelly eyeballs, cheesy pastry twists with capsicum fingernails, biscuits and dinosaurs… orange jelly and worms.
This isn’t the first time I’ve used these little squishy worms in preparation for Halloween – the ones I used in this recipe were left over from when I made worms in mud cupcakes. I figured rather than waste them, I should utilise them in some ghoulish way.
So Wormy Jelly was born!
These are a healthier alternative for Halloween treats. They’re not really the type of treat that you can give to kids at your door, but we don’t get them in my area anyway – these jellies are great for Halloween parties where your guests are captive in your house! They’re also super quick to prepare – you can make them and they’ll be set within an hour!
Wormy jelly
You’ll need:
- 400ml orange juice (about 6 oranges)
- 1 tablespoon gelatine
- 1 packet worm lollies
Makes four child-sized servings.
Juice your oranges and stir the gelatine into them. Pour into glasses (or plastic cups), plop some worms in there and refrigerate for 40 minutes. Try and leave some of the worms sticking out of the mixture so that they don’t all settle to the bottom…this way it looks like they’re burrowing too!
Take them out of the fridge when they’re ready to be eaten – give kids spoons and tell them there are worms swimming about in the jelly that they’ve got to find!
Because gelatine sets the liquid so quickly, you shouldn’t need to worry about the worms soaking up the orange juice and getting bloated. The worms will get a little bit fatter, but only enough to make them soft when kids are digging for them.
If your oranges are a little tart, add a teaspoon or so of sugar to the mixture, but don’t overload it. These treats are as healthy an option as I’m offering for Halloween, so I wouldn’t recommend putting too much sugar in!
One thought on “Wormy jelly and healthy Halloween”