Kid-friendly recipes and ideas for Halloween

Caramel apples, tomato soup with ghost toasts, spooky cupcakes.... Dim the lights and cue the haunting music while you and the kids create festive treats for Halloween.

Michelle Maltais (L.A. Times executive producer, Interactive Video) and I chat up kid-friendly recipe ideas from the L.A Times Test Kitchen in the video above. More than just treats, many of these ideas are great ways to get your kids involved in the kitchen. We also demonstrate the recipe for tomato soup with ghost toasts, a perfect dish to fortify your little monsters before they go trick-or-treating. You can find the recipe here.

RECIPES: Click here for 13 kid-friendly recipe ideas for Halloween

We’ve compiled an unlucky 13 recipes, both sweet and savory. Get creative with cookies, bake up a Dia de los Muertos-style cake, or brew a rich spiced hot chocolate to warm everyone up after a night of Halloweening. Continue reading below for our recipe for pumpkin-shaped quesadillas, and check out our recipe gallery for more ideas.

Pumpkin face quesadillasTotal time: 15 minutes

Servings: 4 quesadillas

8 flour tortillas

1/2 cup canned refried black beans

2 cups grated Cheddar cheese

1. Cut pumpkin shape out of each tortilla with 6-inch pumpkin-shaped cookie cutter.

2. Place 4 pumpkin-shaped tortillas on baking sheet. Spread 2 tablespoons refried beans on each cutout. Sprinkle with grated cheese. Top each with remaining pumpkin cutouts to make sandwich.

4. Using butter knife or bottle caps (if kids are helping), cut pumpkin eyes and mouth out of top of each quesadilla.

5. Bake at 300 degrees until cheese melts, 3 to 4 minutes.

Each serving: 526 calories; 725 mg sodium; 69 mg cholesterol; 25 grams fat; 52 grams carbohydrates; 22 grams protein; 4.44 grams fiber.