Halloween Popcorn

Hey, if Christmas can stretch 3-4 months ahead of time, I can be looking ahead to Halloween season now, right?

While I’ll leave the actual Halloween festivities til the month of, I’ll be sharing some fun Halloween treats in the next little while.

This Halloween popcorn is a grander version of one of my favourite popcorn recipes: Fruity Glazed Popcorn.

This has been one of my favorite snacks since I was a little kid, and I’d often make a big batch to sell from my front lawn in the summers. (The Pineapple and Lime flavours were my FAVOURITE back then, and were a big hit with customers!)

So much fun - and it’s an easy recipe - just more repetitive than the original.

Planning a Halloween party, or even just a Hocus Pocus movie night? Whip up a batch of this sweet treat, and enjoy!

Note: we have a hard time NOT plowing through a batch of this in one sitting, so just... know that a bit of self control may be required, LOL.

Ingredients

This easy Halloween treat requires only a few basic ingredients to make:

Popcorn

You can pop your popcorn fresh (which is what I recommend), or use pre-popped popcorn.

If using premade popcorn, try to use something fresh, without added butter or salt.

I like to use popcorn kernels that makes big, puffy popcorn for this one, as it looks, tastes, AND feels better when eating. It’s all about the ratios!

I recommend using the "gourmet mushroom" variety of popcorn kernels. These make the more round / globe / "brain" type of popcorn, and is best for glazed or caramel popcorn in general.

Alternatively, you can try the "Gourmet Yellow" variety of popcorn, which is commonly used for movie theatre style popcorn.

Everything Else

Butter
Light corn syrup,
Granulated sugar, divided
Orange Jello
Lime Jello
Grape Jello
Orange, green, and purple food coloring, optional
Candy Eyeballs, optional

Note: For the food colouring, I prefer to use gel food coloring, as the color is FAR more intense than what you get with regular food coloring.

Specifically, I recommend Americolor (what I used when I was in the USA), or ChefMaster (Which is the option more readily available here!).

Equipment

This recipe only requires some very basic kitchen stuff to make:

One LARGE pot
A large mixing bowl
One medium pot
Baking sheet(s) and parchment paper
Heat resistant spatula

As far as popping the popcorn goes, you can use what ever kind of popcorn popper you like. We use one of the dome / bowl type poppers now, but used to use a regular air popper. It’s all good.

How to Make Halloween Popcorn

Full recipe follows at the end of the post, this is a pictorial walk through with additional notes and tips

Prep Time!

Before getting started, pop your popcorn - you’ll want to have 24 cups of popcorn.

I like to transfer the popcorn from the bowl it’s popped into, into a large pot for interim storage - this also lets me get rid of unpopped kernels left in the bottom of the original bowl.

A couple of notes on that:

1 - You will use 1 pan for each of the 3 colours. That can be 2 or 3 separate pans, or 1 pan with the work spaced out.

That is to say, you can make one colour all the way though, let it cool, and transfer it to the large pot before starting the next, if you would like breaks between each batch.

Personally, I use 2 pans. I’ll get the first two batches done - one at a time - and by the time the second batch is done, the first batch is cool enough to transfer. I’ll reuse the 1st cookie sheet for the 3rd batch of popcorn.

This also allows me to reuse the large pot (that I hold the 24 cups of popcorn in) for mixing the finished popcorn in.

I will have 2 finished batches on pans, and transfer the remaining 8 cups of unglazed popcorn to the large mixing bowl. Then, the first batch of finished and cooled glazed popcorn can go into the pot.

2 - Be sure you’re using parchment, not wax paper. You are going to be making a hot, sticky mess ... and it’s one that will melt the wax.

Make Your Glazed Popcorn

Measure 8 cups of popped popcorn into a large bowl, set aside.

Measure ¼ cup butter and ¼ cup corn syrup together in a heavy bottomed, medium saucepan. Add ¾ cup Granulated sugar and the pack of orange Jello, stir to combine.

Bring to a boil over medium heat or medium high heat, then turn down to low and allow to simmer for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat.

Carefully pour Jello mixture over the measured popcorn – mixture is HOT NASTY LAVA, so it’ll burn you if you’re not careful. Mix well.

Spread popcorn out on a parchment lined cookie sheet, and allow to cool to room temperature.

Repeat with Lime Jello:

Note: For crunchier popcorn, bake each batch for 10 minutes at 350F, after being spread out on the baking sheet.

Personally, I like the slight softness it keeps without being baked!

Variations

While we love this recipe as-is, and usually don’t bother dressing it up, there are a few ways you can adjust this to suit your tastes and needs.

Change the Flavors

The nice thing about how potent the gel food colouring is, is that you’ve got a fair amount of room for swapping out flavours.

Berry Blue Jello can easily be dyed purple - or black, for that matter.

Yellow Jello flavours can be dyed any colour you want.

Even red Jello flavours can usually be dyed orange or purple.

There are SO many cool flavours of Jello available these days, even if they’re not always found in stores. A few fun ones to try:

Mango Jello
Watermelon Jello
Strawberry Banana Jello
Apricot Jello
Island Pineapple Jello
Peach Jello

Change the Colours

On that note, you can also change the colours to suit your special occasion party decor. Maybe you want just orange and green, or orange and black.

Maybe you want to go with a “candy corn” theme, and do up a yellow glaze, an orange glaze, and plain popcorn?

You do you!

Add Stuff

On that note - you can add actual Candy Corn into that candy corn popcorn.

... or any number of other Halloween candy possibilities, for that. Try almost any of your favorite Halloween candies - Skittles, gummies, Dots, and Jujubes are my favorites for making a popcorn snack mix.

Personally, I’m not a fan of mixing chocolate candies in, but some are. Reese's Pieces are a good way to troll people with it

Candy Eyes are a fun option - I like to adhere them to the still-warm (sticky!) popcorn, so I can face the “googly eyes” out. Monster Halloween Popcorn!

On a more simple level, try scattering halloween sprinkles over the still-sticky popcorn.

Drizzle It!

After mixing the popcorn flavours, try melting some Black Candy Melts and drizzling it over the lot of it.

Halloween Popcorn Balls

Popcorn balls can be formed from still-sticky popcorn, with or without added “stuff”.

I recommend lightly spraying your hands with cooking spray before forming them.

Serve them on a plate, in a bowl... or in cellophane bags as a halloween popcorn gift!

More Halloween Ideas

If you're still considering ideas for gluten free Halloween recipes and such, be sure to check out my:

Bacon Wrapped Mummy Meatloaf
Bloody Eyeball Halloween Punch
Deviled Eggs, Halloween Style!
Gluten-Free Black Velvet Cupcakes
Gluten Free Mummy Jalapeno Poppers
Gluten-Free Mummy Dogs
Halloween Pavlova
Halloween Shooters
How to Carve a Pumpkin Like a Pro

Share the Love!

Before you chow down, be sure to take some pics of your handiwork! If you Instagram it, be sure to tag me - @BeyondFlourBlog - or post it to My Facebook Page - so I can cheer you on!

Also, be sure to subscribe to my free email newsletter, so you never miss out on any of my nonsense. Well, the published nonsense, anyway!

Finally, if you love this recipe, please consider leaving a star rating and a comment!