Halloween is the first major holiday after fall begins, so it is often a good way to kick off harvest, butternut squash soup, and chili, putting on sweaters and boots, and enjoying more family time indoors. However, Halloween isn’t the healthiest holiday. Much of it involves candy and other tasty treats that aren’t the best thing for your body (or your teeth!). Luckily, it is entirely possible to celebrate this fun holiday with family and friends and not add to your waistline.
In this blog, Functional Medicine Los Angeles, a provider of functional medicine in Studio City will give you some different ways to have a healthy Halloween. It will discuss avoiding candy temptations, using the holiday to increase your physical fitness, and really focusing on complete wellness.
Healthy Halloween Treats
Let’s start with the different Halloween treats you are going to make. The big problem here is that a lot of treats involve caramel, chocolate, peanut butter, and all sorts of other ingredients that don’t make for the healthiest snacks. It is possible to incorporate some of these yummy elements, but still keep the treats healthy. This is done by making fruit or vegetables one of your main components. Look at all the different ways our functional medicine Los Angeles experts gathered to make delicious Halloween treats by using fruit, vegetables, and some other healthy snacks:
1. Tangerine pumpkins
– The first option is to make some tangerine pumpkins. These actually use only fruit and a little bit of celery. You are going to take tangerines and remove the skin entirely, but keep the tangerine itself intact.
Once the skin is removed, simply cut a small piece of celery to put on top of the tangerine, and you have yourself a little fruit pumpkin that aids with functional medicine digestion in Los Angeles.
2. White chocolate ghosts
– These ghosts can be made in two different ways; with strawberries or with bananas. For the bananas, they work best when you purchase small bananas and cut them in half.
The end of each banana piece becomes the ‘head’ of the ghost. Make sure you remove the banana peel of course. With strawberries, just rinse them and remove the stem. Take your fruit piece and dip it into the melted white chocolate until it is completely covered. Set it on a piece of parchment paper and use any type of candy decoration for the ghost’s eyes.
Wait for the chocolate to harden or put the tray into the fridge to speed up the process.
3. Pretzel and cheese witch broomsticks
– This is a really fun snack to serve at a Halloween party. They are healthy, easy to make, and kid-approved. All you need are long pretzel sticks and Mozzarella string cheese.
Cut the string cheese into about 4-5 pieces, then cut into each one so you can flare them out to make the end of the brooms. Press the pretzel stick into the cheese as the broom handle, and you have yourself some witch broomsticks.
4. Mozzarella fingers
– Another snack you can make with mozzarella cheese is a mozzarella finger. Just take a cheese stick and cut it into 2 or 3 pieces, depending on how long you want the fingers to be. Cut a rounded tip as a finger, then cut some shallow lines in it for the knuckles. Cut any fruit you like into fingernails, then press them into the top of the cheese.
Honey or peanut butter works well at making it stick.
5. Candy corn fruit cups
– This is one of the healthiest Halloween treats on the list. All you need are small clear cups, orange fruit, yellow fruit, and reduced-fat whipped topping. Put the orange fruit on the bottom, followed by the yellow fruit, followed by the whipped topping. It makes it look like candy corn.
Should you desire further assistance in crafting nutritious homemade snacks, it’s advisable to seek consultation with our functional medicine Burbank. Our team can offer personalized nutritional guidance and wellness recommendations tailored to your specific needs.