Somewhere between the bread and the cheeses in your local supermarket is a section that reappears each September in ever-greater size. Call it Invasion of the Shelf Snatchers. It’s decorated with black cats and pumpkins, an occasional witch, and filled with ghoulish spins on everyday products – from Marks & Spencer’s “petrified garlic bread” to Morrisons’ “toxic frog chocolate”. I’m assured these are edible. This year Aldi is stocking not one but two variations on creepy crumpets, while Asda (sorry… “Asdaaargh!”) has launched a line of “Spookilicious Fairy Cakes”. Sainsbury’s has gone one further, introducing a “Monstrous Count Dogula Chocolate Cake”.
As a child of the Nineties, I’ll confess that this has thrown me. Back then, the most you expected from Halloween in Britain was a themed episode of Sabrina the Teenage Witch and the vague suggestion of going trick-or-treating. Then your mum would “get a headache” and a sad bag of Swizzels Rainbow Drops in front of the TV would be your only treat. Halloween sweets, meanwhile, meant plain old multi-packs of Haribo – not Aldi’s Red Leicester with a Chili Cheese Witches Cauldron. So, what happened?
