As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post.
Take your kids’ lunches to the next level this year with these healthy Halloween lunch box ideas! They’re fun, colorful and flavorful and will fill their tummies with lots of nutrients (before they devour too much candy)!
Halloween Lunch Box Ideas for Kids
Let’s face it: we know our kids are going to eat the candies and cookies during the Halloween season. One of the easiest ways to support them is to offer them healthy balanced meals to fill them up first, while meeting their nutritional needs.
To do this, you’re going to want to make those lunch boxes even more exciting than normal. The good news is, with these fun Halloween lunch box ideas, it’s totally possible!
Carve fruit into scary creatures, add eyes to your sandwiches or fruit cups, and make lunch just as (if not more) exciting than those pouches of colorful candies. At the end of the day, it’s all about the balance!
Why We Love These Halloween Lunch Ideas
- Healthy: These ideas are made to support your child’s nutritional needs. The recipes were developed to offer fiber, protein, and healthy fats to support your little one’s digestive system, give them energy, and fuel their growing brains and bodies.
- So fun: Who doesn’t want to open their school lunch box and see a monster sandwich or clementine pumpkins? They’re so colorful and such a fun way to delight kids of all ages.
- Great for meal prep: These Halloween food ideas are all great to make ahead! Just fill up those bento boxes, pop them in the fridge, then send them to school in your kids’ lunch boxes. Easy!
HALLOWEEN LUNCH BOX TIPS
- To make an easy Halloween lunch, the keyword is easy. Adapt what you already make but take it to the next level by using cookie cutters, candy eyes, or sunflower seed teeth to transform ordinary foods into monsters and ghouls.
- Use toys and decorations. You definitely want to make sure your kids know not to eat the plastic spider rings or googly eyes, but these little accessories add fun without any extra sugar.
- Incorporate fresh fruit and veggies. Let’s offer as many nutrients as possible to mitigate the candy overload they’ll have on Halloween night. Offer colorful veggies, berries, cut melons, or fruit salad every day.
- Don’t forget the protein! The protein will help their bodies offset the sugar and sweets, so make sure to add meat, dairy, eggs, or plant-based protein in their lunch boxes.
Healthy Halloween Lunch Box Ideas
1. Frankenstein Wrap Bento Box
Use sliced veggies and broken tortilla chips to turn any wrap into Frankenstein’s monster! This one always gets a good reaction! To keep the eyes and mouth in place during transport, you may want to use small toothpicks or “glue” them on with hummus or cream cheese.
In this lunch box:
- Frankenstein wraps with turkey, cheese and mustard, topped with cucumber, carrot, cheese and olive eyes, a red pepper mouth and broken up tortilla chips for hair.
- Blueberry monster picks (we used these eyeball picks)
- Tangerine pumpkin
2. Boo Pasta Salad with Apple Monsters and Pumpkin Melons
Every part of this Halloween bento box fits the theme! I highly recommend getting alphabet cookie cutters because you can write any message using a thin slice of cheese. The same goes for Halloween cookie cutters. Keep a stash of seasonal cookie cutters around for a fun treat all year long.
In this lunch box:
- Halloween pasta salad: Rotini mixed with diced cucumber, cherry tomatoes, feta and black olives, tossed with a Mediterranean dressing. Use food letter cutters to cut out the letters “B-O-O” in a thin cheese slice.
- Apple monster
- Cantaloupe Jack O Lanterns using Halloween cooker cutter stamps
3. Monster Bagels and Halloween Trail Mix
There’s something so charming about this bagel monster! You just need an eye pick and my favorite part: the snaggled sunflower seed teeth. Send some Halloween trail mix made with pumpkin seeds, popcorn, candy corn, and more for a special sweet treat.
In this lunch box:
- Cream cheese monster bagels: Spread cream cheese (or desired filling) onto a bagel, poke in little eyeball picks and sunflower seed “teeth”
- Snap peas + hummus
- Halloween fruit kebabs with orange slices and blueberries (we used the little skewers found here)
- Halloween trail mix
4. Spider Crackers and Spooky Fruits & Veggies
This is one of my favorite easy Halloween lunch box ideas because it’s so simple! The crackers are filled with cream cheese, so they come together with minimal effort. Just add pretzels sticks for legs and some chocolate chips for eyes, and you’ll have a nice crispy treat with a bit of fat and protein.
The little ghosts made from sliced cucumber couldn’t be easier, and the strawberries with eyes are a creative way to get your kids to eat more fruit.
In this lunch box:
- Spider crackers made with cream cheese (can also use peanut butter if not required to be nut free), pretzel legs and mini chocolate chip eyes
- Strawberry monsters (poke these fun eye picks into whole strawberries) + blueberries
- Cucumber ghosts
5. Soup with Monster Skewers & Ghost Chips
Aren’t these little monster skewers so cute? They’re also so easy to make, and your kids will love showing them off to their friends. Soup will warm them up during this chilly time of the year, and the ghost tortilla chips are so yummy dipped in the soup.
This is another example of how having cookie cutters with different designs can add so much fun to your lunch boxes!
In this lunch box:
- Sweet Potato Coconut Soup
- Dried chickpeas
- Monster grape skewers + blackberries
- Ghost tortilla chips
To make ghost tortilla chips: Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Use ghost or halloween shaped cookies cutters to press firmly into a large tortilla to create shapes. Place them on a baking sheet. You can also use a toothpick to poke little eyes on the ghost tortillas as well. Spray them with olive oil or cooking spray and bake for 3-4 minutes or until crispy and lightly browned. Watch them carefully as they can burn easily.
6. Spider Pizzas and Veggie Skewers
Make a spider with black olives to turn any slice of pizza into something spooky and fun! The veggie skewers are so easy to eat on a stick, and the little mandarin orange jack-o-lantern is such a simple treat!
In this lunch box:
- Spider pizza: spread sauce onto English muffin, top with veggies if desired + cheese. Cut olives into the shape of a spider and stick to top of pizza
- Veggie star kabobs
- Clementine Jack O Lantern
More Healthy Halloween Snacks
Need a little more inspiration? You can turn pretty much any meals into Halloween lunches with eye picks, googly eyes, monster teeth, or markers. Try adding some of these items to your kids’ lunches to keep the Halloween spirit going!
- Make a string cheese ghost by drawing a ghost face onto the wrapper.
- Use a cookie cutter to make jack-o-lantern quesadillas.
- Use edible markers to draw faces onto sandwiches or slices of bread.
- Wrap hot dogs in crescent rolls and bake them to make little mummies.
- Cut our sweet potato crackers out with pumpkin cookie cutters for a scary treat!
Halloween Lunch Box Ideas
Like it? Save these ideas for later!
More Healthy Meal & Snack Ideas
- Halloween Fruit Tray Ideas
- Valentine’s Day Breakfast Ideas for Kids
- Christmas Lunch Box Ideas
- Cold Lunchbox Ideas
- Vegetarian Lunch Ideas for Kids
