Halloween is a time when bakery creativity runs as wild as a werewolf, and this year is no different.
It’s been all sweet and sinister at bakeries, with NPD teams witchcrafting the likes of creepy cakes, blood-curdling brownies, dastardly doughnuts, and more. Cauldron loads of chocolate have been utilised along with some choice seasonal flavours, but it’s the spooky decorations that are really making hearts skip a beat.
Check out our round-up of the bakery innovations looking to be a fright of fancy for consumers during Halloween celebrations:
Halloween Selection Box, Cake or Death
The Exeter-based vegan brownie specialist has continued its pipeline of limited-edition seasonal NPD with some Halloween-themed launches. These include the Halloween Selection Box (rsp: £23) containing five heart-stopping bakes: a Mummy Cake Pop, a Spooky Egg, a Frankencookie, a Biscoff Cookie Dough Pie, and a Turtle Brownie.
Also available in a box of six (£23), the gluten-free Turtle Brownies follow Cake and Death’s classic plant-based chocolate brownie recipe topped with house-made caramel rippled ganache, toasted pecans, and a sprinkle of sea salt.
Other limited-edition goodies include Pumpkin Cinnamon Brownies (£23, box of six), which are cinnamon spiced and each topped with a menacing gingerbread pumpkin. Lastly, there’s the Halloween Graveyard Slab (£24), a signature fudgy brownie stuffed with cookies and cream biscuits, decorated with spooky sweets such as creepy eyes, pumpkins, skulls, tombstones, and gummy worms, plus a biscuit crumb.
S’mores Cake, Cutter & Squidge
London-based brand Cutter & Squidge has unveiled an assortment for Halloween that is “all treat and no trick”. Included is an indulgent S’mores Cake (rsp: £30.99). This comprises a rich chocolate cake with fluffy marshmallow filling, all smothered in creamy chocolate ganache and finished with golden chocolate crumble. To stay close to traditional American s’mores recipe, the cake comes with three duo-packs of graham crackers.
Like the creepy collection above, there’s also a Graveyard Brownie Slab (£22.99) – this time topped with hand-crafted dark and white chocolate headstones and skulls. Round out the line-up are Eyeball Truffle Brownies (£11.99, box of five), bite-sized balls of fudgy brownie dipped in ghoulish green-coloured white chocolate, sprinkled in crunchy green biscuit crumb, and completed with sugar eyes.
Scary Eye Doughnut, Delice de France
Bakery supplier Delice de France has a terrifying trio of limited-edition sweet treats including a literally eye-catching doughnut that is new for 2025.
The Scary Eye Doughnut is filled with tangy forest berry jam, topped with black icing and drizzled with an eerie pink glaze, before a decorative candy eyeball is placed in the centre. Meanwhile, the wholesale business has brought back two customers favourites from last year: the Halloween Muffin and the Halloween Doughnut – both chocolate and orange flavoured.
Having sold out its seasonal stock in 2024, Delice de France is increasing the cases it’s making available to customers by 25%.
Cakes and cupcakes, The Hummingbird Bakery
London-based The Hummingbird Bakery is looking to raise spirits at Halloween with its twisted sweet bakes. New launches this year include the Bleeding Beauty Heart Cake (rsp: £40) which has two layers of red velvet sponge masked in cream cheese frosting and topped with isomalt ‘glass shards’ and blood splatter made of red food colouring.
There are also the Blinkening Cake, a vanilla sponge layer cake covered in green frosting and sugar paste eyeballs, as well as the Sprinklevania Cake, comprised of chocolate sponge layers dressed up in bright orange frosting with a storm of black and orange sprinkles showcasing a hand-stenciled bat motif. Both cakes are priced at £55 for six-inch and £79 for eight-inch versions.
For consumers wanting individual treats to share out, the Hummingbird ‘zombakers’ have created a range of chocolate, vanilla and red velvet cupcakes topped with white cream cheese frosting and various gruesome decorations including spiders, ghosts, bats, mummies, bones, and monsters. A selection box of six costs £25 and is also available as gluten-free or vegan.
Jack-O-Apple Slice, Little Dessert Shop
The national retail chain has introduced three new limited-edition creations to its menu designed in line with ongoing social media trends, with a ghoulish twist.
The Jack-O-Apple Slice (rsp: £7.95) is an apple pie sponge layered with spiced buttercream, served with green apple custard and topped with a ghostly or pumpkin chocolate treat.
Then there’s two mousse-filled chocolate shell options, each served on a bed of Oreo crumb (£7.95). The Pumpkin Smash is chocolate orange flavoured while the Ghost Smash has a milk chocolate mousse centre.
Halloween cakes, Lola’s Cupcakes
Another London-based brand that rolls out the sweet treat NPD for each seasonal celebration is Lola’s Cupcakes. Its own range of spooky looking cakes and cupcakes are available to pre-order online for home delivery between 15 October to 2 November.
The Black Ribbons & Ruffles Cake (rsp: £46) is a mini tall cake in a choice of vanilla, double chocolate, red velvet, or lemon sponge, decorated with glossy black icing and black bows. The Halloween Nationwide Cake – pictured above (small £30, medium £47.50) – has layers of sponge, buttercream, and raspberry compote, finished with green and purple buttercream, sugar ghosts and bats, and a blanket of vibrant sprinkles.
The Halloween Cupcakes from Lola’s are either chocolate or vanilla sponges covered in buttercream swirls of eerie shades, topped with candy eyes, chocolate ghosts, sugar bats, and edible spider webs. They come in boxes of six (£23.50) or boxes of 12 mini cupcakes (£27).
Dough Bites and Gingerbread House, M&S
The high street retailer is inviting customers to sink their fangs into its new Spooky Kookie Dough Bites (rsp: £3), which have a soft brownie and biscuit crumb centre studded with candy-coated milk chocolate nibs, enveloped in creamy milk and white chocolate.
For a Halloween twist on the Christmas tradition, there’s the Build Your Own Chocolate Haunted House (£7) which comes complete with chocolate biscuits, icing tubes in white, green and purple, plus fruity jelly sweets to add some final flourishes.
Party Rings Trick or Treat Minis, Fox’s Burton’s Companies
Having unveiled the first-ever new shape for the Party Rings range earlier this year, Fox’s Burton’s Companies (FBC) is now launching an inaugural Halloween edition. The Treat or Treat Minis are bite-sized iced biscuits in shapes including bats, cats, and pumpkins.
The NPD builds on the strong performance of the Party Rings’ Minis range, which is now worth £14m [NIQ data, 52w/e 28 December 2024], growing at +4% versus year average, and outperforming the overall mini’s segment.
A ten-pack of mini bags (rsp: £2.10) are available at Asda, Tesco, and Sainsburys as well as multiple discounters.
Eclairs and yum yums, The Delicious Dessert Company
The Bakkavor-owned sweet treat brand has brewed up new limited-edition specials for Halloween including Spooktacular Yum Yums and Choc ‘n’ Orange Escares.
The yum yums are topped with green vanilla fondant hand-finished with chocolate curls, and are available from 29 October to 2 November at Tesco stores across the UK.
The eclairs, meanwhile, were launched on 6 October and are filled with rich chocolate mouse and covered in orange flavoured fondant and a chocolate drizzle. These were joined by the returning Millionaire’s Eclairs, back by popular demand and replacing the Zingy Lemon variety that emerged in the Spring.
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