Halloween Snack Mix with Peanut Butter Caramel
This Halloween snack mix balances crunchy, salty, and sweet with a peanut butter caramel coating that makes every handful taste like a party. Beware: once you summon this cauldron of sweet-and-salty magic, it tends to vanish!
🔍 Recipe At-A-Glance: Halloween Snack Mix
- ⏰ Prep Time: 15 minutes
- 🕰️ Cook Time: 10 minutes
- 👻 Flavor Profile: Sweet and salty-all your favorite flavors of Halloween in a single handful.
- 🎃 Good For: Halloween party snacks, creepy movie nights, and sweet after-school treats
- ↪️ Make Ahead: Can be stored in airtight containers at room temperature for a week (if it lasts that long!).
- 🧡 Difficulty: We've tested and retested the peanut butter caramel to make it as foolproof as possible-now any adult can make it!
"FABULOUS!!! We had to hide it in the garage until the rest of family arrived or it would have been eaten. GREAT recipe."
- KATHY -
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🧡 Why You'll Love This Recipe
The inspiration for this monster munch mix comes from my favorite movie theater treat: buttered movie theater popcorn with Reese's Pieces. It is the absolute best combination of sweet and salty! So grab your cauldron, and let's get popping!
Here's why you'll love this recipe:
- Peanut Butter Caramel: Making caramel isn't as fussy as you might think-and I'll show you exactly how to do it!
- Party Portions: This recipe makes a big 'ole batch of Halloween popcorn mix, so there will be plenty to go around! Serve it up with some witches' brew punch for the kids, apple cider sangria for the grown-ups, and my Halloween sugar cookie recipe for everyone!
- Customizable: Mix in whatever candies or salty snacks you want to make your own custom snack mix.
🎃 The Ingredients You Need
- Popcorn: You want a plain popcorn here, because it is going to get coated in caramel! We went with air popped-you'll need between ⅓ cup and ½ cup of kernels. If you don't have an air popper, you can also use three bags of microwave popcorn in this party mix. Just choose the least buttery/flavored popcorn you can find!
- Pretzels: Any pretzel shape works, but we love the little pretzel twists because they have little nooks to catch bits of caramel.
- Candy corn and Reese's Pieces: The candy corn is a Halloween icon, and the Reese's Pieces bring in even more peanut butter flavor. But feel free to swap in your Halloween candy faves!
- Peanut butter: Creamy peanut butter is a must here-crunchy will give you a lumpy caramel!
Make sure to check the recipe card below for the full ingredients list, along with quantities and my expert tips and tricks.
🔁 Variations & Substitutions
- Monster munch: Swap in purple, green, or black candy melts. Replace the Reese's pieces with candy eyes or M&M's.
- Harvest popcorn mix: Replace the candy corn with candy pumpkins or a mix of the two.
- Make it nut-free: Leave out the peanuts and use this easy caramel popcorn recipe as your snack base instead. Try pumpkin seeds instead if you're missing the peanut crunch!
🍿 How to Make Halloween Snack Mix
Step 1: Mix the popcorn, peanuts, pretzels, and candies together. Spread everything onto two rimmed baking sheets.
Step 2: Melt the butter in a large saucepan, and stir in the honey and sugar.
Step 3: Let the caramel come to a boil over medium-high heat and let it bubble away for about 5 minutes. Don't stir-just tilt the pan back and forth to make sure it isn't burning.
Step 4: Take the caramel off the heat, and stir in the peanut butter, salt, and heavy cream to take this from regular caramel to peanut butter caramel.
Step 5: Quickly (but carefully!) drizzle the caramel over the popcorn and candies, and toss to coat.
Step 6: Drizzle with melted candy melts and shower with sprinkles for an extra-festive flair.
🙋🏻♀️ Halloween Snack Mix FAQs
We love a sweet and salty snack like this party mix, but we also make sure to include plenty of savory options in our Halloween party spreads-there's already plenty of sweetness going on! Some of our favorites include Halloween cheese boards, Halloween mini pizzas, and jalapeño popper mummies.
We get a lot of questions about why we tell you not to stir the caramel as it cooks. And we get it-intuition tells us that stirring will keep the caramel from burning. But sticking a spoon in as the caramel cooks can also cause sugar crystals to form, which leaves you with a grainy caramel. So instead of stirring, just swirl the pan from time to time until it is ready for the peanut butter and cream!
Leftovers can be stashed in an airtight container at room temperature for up to one week.
👩🏻🍳 My Expert Tips & Tricks
- Choose your caramel level: When it comes to the texture of the final mix, you have a bit of flexibility with this recipe. If you want it to be crunchy and crispy, you can cook the caramel coating a bit longer to the hard crack stage (about 300°F, or use the ole water glass trick). If you want it a bit fudgier, just cook it until the soft crack stage (about 280°F, or what this 5-minute cook time will get you to).
- Adults only: While kids can absolutely help choose what goes into your Halloween snack mix and stir together the dry ingredients, we recommend that they leave the caramel making to the adults. Caramel is hot and needs to be poured quickly before it hardens.
- Don't stir: Once the sugar has dissolved and the caramel has come to a boil, don't stir it. Instead, just swirl the pan to make sure the caramel isn't burning until it is time to stir in the peanut butter. That's how you get the smoothest, creamiest caramel.
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🎉 More Halloween Party Ideas
If you tried this Halloween snack mix or any other recipe on my blog, please leave a 🌟 star rating and let me know how it went in the comments!
📖 Recipe
Halloween Snack Mix
Ingredients
- 12 cups air-popped popcorn
- 3 cups mini-twist pretzels
- 1 cup roasted salted peanuts
- 1 cup candy corn
- 1 cup Reese's Pieces
- ¼ cup unsalted butter
- ¼ cup honey
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ cup creamy peanut butter
- 2 tablespoons heavy cream
- Orange candy melts and sprinkles optional, for garnish
Instructions
- Mix the popcorn, pretzels, peanuts, candy corn, and Reese's Pieces in a very large bowl and spread out onto two large rimmed baking pans.
- Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the honey and sugar and stir until smooth. Stop stirring, allow the mixture to come to a boil, and cook for about 5 minutes, tilting the pan occasionally to make sure there are no signs of burning. The mixture should smell caramelized and be a bit darkened in color. Remove from the heat and carefully stir in the peanut butter, salt, and heavy cream.
- Quickly drizzle the peanut butter caramel over the party mix on the sheet pans, then toss to coat with two large spoons. Drizzle with melted orange candy melts and sprinkle with sprinkles, if using. Let the party mix cool on the sheet pans, then transfer to bowls for serving, breaking up any large pieces if needed.
Video
Notes
- It is important not to stir the caramel as it boils and bubbles. Stirring can introduce sugar crystals, giving you a grainy caramel.
- As written, this recipe cooks the peanut butter caramel to the soft crack stage (280°F)-the coating stays a little creamy, and provides a nice texture contrast to the crunchy peanuts, pretzels, and candy.
- For a crunchier snack mix (more like traditional caramel corn), cook the caramel coating for a bit longer before adding the peanut butter, cream, and salt. You want to let the caramel get to the hard crack stage, which is when a candy thermometer reads 300°F (or when it forms brittle threads when a bit of caramel is dropped in a glass of cold water). The crunchier mix is a little easier to pack into cute baggies and distribute as gifts, but both ways work. Whatever bakes your cookie. Or caramels your corn.
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