We all know that Halloween is about being scared, cringing, things that go bump in the night, and in addition to fearing for one’s life (that’s part of the fun, right?), a general feeling of uneasiness followed by nausea (usually, but not always, caused by consuming too much candy).

That pretty much sums up my Saturday. You see my Honey and I had planned a fantastic Halloween party for our kids. We have three and the two eldest were allowed to invite three friends each for a party & sleepover. That’s eight kids plus our little puddin’.

Everything was on track until Thursday when my Honey learned he was being sent on a last minute business trip. Normally this wouldn’t be a huge deal. Would I love an extra set of hands while wrangling that many youngsters? Yes - Would I be in over my head? No… except this wasn’t our normal kid party.

You see, my darling husband LOVES to cook and this interest has amazingly rubbed off on our offspring. I on the other hand detest cooking. Let’s be clear here - love to EAT, hate to COOK.

Wonderful and patient man that he is, he had promised to throw a Chef’s Halloween Party for them. And the cookbook of choice that these budding Rachael Rays would be using…the Shrek Cookbook.

A week ahead of time while Mama was still traveling; he sat down with them to plan the party. After much debate, they chose the following menu:

Swamp Weed and Fly Larvae
Mini Eyeball Pizzas
Ogre Shakes
Frogspawn Jelly

Realizing that he was leaving me severely out of my element, Hubby stocked up on the recipe ingredients before he left and, much like a coach before the big game, gave me a pep talk including his game plan and tips for cooking success:

1. Study the recipes ahead of time (this alleviates surprises)
2. Plan your timing so that everything is ready to eat at the appropriate time
3. Set up an assembly line
4. Plan ahead of time those parts the kids will participate in (obviously they will NOT be dicing veggies)
5. Make sure each kid brings old clothes to cook in - just incase
6. Get silly, have fun, and don’t worry if it gets a little messy (easy for him to say as HE wouldn’t be the one on cleaning up!)

I took his advice and studied the recipes deciding that we would start with the swamp weed and fly larvae, move on to the frogspawn jelly (so it had time to solidify in the fridge), then the mini eyeball pizzas, and finish up with the ogre shakes. I also talked Honey into making the pizza dough ahead of time and decided to use canned sauce instead of starting from scratch.

So Saturday arrived, everyone changed into old clothes, and scrambled into the kitchen to start cooking. I chopped the veggies for the swamp weed (a.k.a. guacamole) and the kids took turns smushing, smashing, and mixing them together. Then they helped add the fly larvae (a.k.a. hummus) ingredients to the food processor and scoop everything out in to party bowls. They got messy, the guac didn’t taste quite right, and one kid ended up with avocado caked in her hair, but they had fun.

This was a great place to start (Honey’s suggestion) because it gave them something to snack on (besides the mountain of Halloween candy) right away and the recipe names inspired tons of disgusting conversation… gotta love being a kid!

Next they helped mix the lemon Jell-O for the frogspawn jelly and each got one passion fruit to scoop the seeds out of. You seriously need to see this dish when it’s finished it looks disgusting and exactly like frog eggs - they loved it!

Two down and we moved on to the pizza. This was where the fear set in for me. In the past I’ve been notorious for charring pizza crust past the point of salvation. I get distracted by something more interesting and forget that I’ve put it in the oven… until the smoke detector goes off.

The pizza assembly was a pretty simple process. The dough was already in mini-sized crusts, which just needed to be put on a cookie sheet. Each kid got a turn at saucing, cheesing, and adding the Cyclops eyeball (a.k.a. olive) to their own pizza. Thank GOD for Honey’s suggestion of old clothes - the kids were covered in sauce by the time we finished. Apparently eight kids saucing at once was over ambitious. At least I got them reigned in before a food fight broke out.

Then the pizzas went in the oven (the most nerve wracking part). The kids were discussing trick-or-treating and bragging about their costumes but I couldn’t concentrate on their conversation. I really wanted these pizzas to come out right and obsessively checked on them until the oven timer went off. I took them out right away, fearful of my charred past, and in the end they were a bit doughy. The kids didn’t complain though and I was relieved that a call to the fire department wasn’t needed.

While they ate, I got things prepped for the ogre shakes. I’ll just say this about the shakes - the kids came out sticky, the kitchen was a disaster area, everyone was slightly nauseous from all that sugar (I blame the Halloween candy), and they were grinning from ear to ear.

Everything worked out. I oversaw the cooking of five dishes and it worked!! Yes fear, unease, and nausea were involved but loss of limb and spontaneous combustion were not. That’s a win in my book.

After they’d eaten their fill everyone washed up and changed into clean clothes. Then they sat down to watch It’s The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown and Shrek 2 (while munching on frogspawn) and I took a break to bounce around the blogosphere.

The evening ended with an activity that was much more up my alley - eight kids in sleeping bags and ghost stories in front of the fire…