Have you ever thought of turning a plate of gratinated polenta into a carved pumpkin lookalike? It’s a very simple way to make our children smile and to turn a regular dinner into a Halloween-themed dinner. 🙂

I had the idea last year.
To be honest, I’ve never been a big fan of Halloween. I grew up with the “pretty masks” of Carnival; back then (we’re talking about the ’70s, not the prehistoric times!) kids dressed up as fairies, ladies, Zorro, or cowboys and went around town asking, “do you have anything for the pretty masks?”. Trick or treat didn’t exist, but we had our Italian version. We knew about a holiday called Halloween through the Peanuts comic strips, we wondered what kind of celebration it was, but knew it was typically American, so we didn’t think much about it.

Then at some point, I started to see Halloween being celebrated here too, but I was no longer a child and never took much interest in it; in fact, it seemed quite ridiculous or out of place that a traditional holiday, full of stories and legends not our own, could be transplanted to other countries.

The fact is that when my daughter was attending her first year of kindergarten, we found ourselves having to “deal with” this event. For the first time, we bought a witch’s hat, a bat mask, themed confetti, and we too (I say “we” because my husband was, and still is, even more opposed to this holiday, but even he had to succumb!) immersed ourselves in this world for the love of our children. Ahh, such sentimentality!

So, that’s how it went. When the children were little, we took them to the little parties organized for the afternoon of October 31st, and they, and we with them, were happy. Last year, we skipped the parties, also because the Halloween afternoon coincided with one of their regular afternoon commitments (specifically karate), so to please them, my husband and I invented something just for us, as a family.

I did this: since their gym time was in the late afternoon and their return home coincided more or less with dinner time, I was able to set up the Halloween-themed dinner and a little home party, working undisturbed! I scattered some decorations on the table, like the classic pumpkin, skull, and bat-shaped confetti, hung fake cobwebs from the chandelier, prepared some candles, and poured blood orange juice into the glasses. Meanwhile, my husband, the music expert of the family, did something wonderful: he curated a themed playlist (a mix including two titles I now remember, Michael Jackson’s Thriller and the very old Dracula Cha Cha Cha by Bruno Martino 😁) that turned out to be crucial for the success of the party.

When my husband went to pick them up from the gym, I popped the carved pumpkin-like polenta into the oven, so when they got home, the scene was all set: as I heard them climbing the stairs, I turned off the lights and turned on the music and candles. When they came into the house, they were speechless! It’s wonderful to see children’s reactions when they’re surprised! And it’s wonderful to hear them say, “how nice, a Halloween party just for us!”.

So, this is the story of how our Halloween evening went last year. The menu, in the end, was the least important thing because the overall atmosphere did everything by itself, but even a plate of gratinated polenta in a smiling pumpkin shape, eaten by candlelight, had its charm!

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Here are more of my scary recipes 😃🎃👻💀👇