Halloween Baking Championship Season 4

Complete season breakdown

Every episode and bake

Season four delivers six episodes of paired briefs, including webbed desserts, yam bakes, oversized pastries, Halloween wedding cakes, circus flavors, and nightmare cakes. The guide captures both heats in every episode and adds one original mini bundt adaptation inspired by the season's pumpkin-patch challenge.

1. Episode 1 · Hidden creatures and reveals

   Hidden Halloween Horrors

   Sep 24, 2018

   Both rounds hide something unsettling: creatures are trapped in edible webs, then a melting shell must expose a Halloween object beneath it.

   • Preliminary heat

     Spider-web dessert with trapped creature

     Create a dessert covered by an edible spider web and show an assigned creature trapped within the design.

   • Main heat

     Melting-shell reveal dessert

     Enclose a creepy edible Halloween item beneath a shell that melts away to reveal the object inside.

   Episode source 1Episode source 2

2. Episode 2 · Fall produce and scary movies

   Fall Forward Desserts

   Oct 1, 2018

   Yams become visual horror-movie cliches before miniature bundt cakes are transformed into a coordinated edible pumpkin patch.

   • Preliminary heat

     Scary-movie yam dessert

     Make a yam-based dessert, other than pie, that evokes an assigned scary-movie cliche.

   • Main heat

     Mini bundt pumpkin patch

     Use flavored miniature bundt cakes to build an edible pumpkin patch and add an edible scarecrow to the scene.

   Make our home version →Episode source 1Episode source 2

3. Episode 3 · Monster-sized pastry

   Monster Mania

   Oct 8, 2018

   A collaborative pate a choux monster tests coordination, while the individual round enlarges familiar pastries into monster-scale themed desserts.

   • Preliminary heat

     Pate a choux monster

     Work as a group to make separate pate a choux body parts that assemble into one large three-dimensional edible monster.

   • Main heat

     Monster-sized themed dessert

     Scale up an assigned dessert type, such as a cupcake, pie, cream puff, or doughnut, and combine it with a separate monster theme.

   Episode source 1Episode source 2

4. Episode 4 · Halloween wedding

   Hallowedding

   Oct 15, 2018

   Monster bridal-shower petit fours precede full wedding cakes designed for unusual supernatural couples.

   • Preliminary heat

     Petit horrors

     Make 12 petit fours for a Halloween bridal shower and style them around an assigned monster-bride theme.

   • Main heat

     Monster-couple wedding cake

     Create a wedding cake for an assigned pair of Halloween characters and flavor it with a required floral ingredient.

   Episode source 1Episode source 2

5. Episode 5 · Tarot and creepy clowns

   Circus of Dread

   Oct 22, 2018

   Tarot cards determine both a visual theme and a fruit or spice flavor, then named circus clowns inspire more elaborate character desserts.

   • Preliminary heat

     Tarot-card dessert

     Create a dessert joining an assigned tarot-card subject with a required flavor such as blood orange, fig, passion fruit, or clove.

   • Main heat

     Creepy clown dessert

     Build a dessert around an assigned circus clown and the character's signature act or mishap.

   Episode source 1Episode source 2

6. Episode 6 · Skulls and nightmares

   Cranium Epicurean

   Oct 29, 2018

   The finale moves from sculpted skull desserts to large cakes that dramatize familiar nightmares with an atmospheric smoke effect.

   • Preliminary heat

     Skull dessert

     Bring a skull to life as a fully edible dessert.

   • Main heat

     Nightmare cake

     Make a championship cake based on an assigned nightmare, such as falling, being chased, or a visit from the dead, and include a smoke effect.

   Episode source 1Episode source 2

Inspired by the briefs

Bake it at home

These are original Baking Show Guide adaptations for a home kitchen. They are inspired by the challenge briefs, not the contestants' recipes or an official recipe from the show.

Inspired by Episode 2

Mini Pumpkin-Patch Bundts

Pairs of moist spice mini bundts are joined into round pumpkins, glazed orange, and finished with pretzel stems for an edible autumn patch.

Time

58 min

Makes

6 assembled mini pumpkins

Level

Moderate

▶View ingredients and method

Ingredients

• 180 g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon fine salt
• 150 g light brown sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 180 g pumpkin puree
• 100 ml neutral oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 220 g icing sugar
• 3 tablespoons orange juice
• Orange gel food coloring
• 6 short pretzel sticks
• Green fondant or green chewy sweets, for leaves

Method

1. Heat the oven to 180 C, or 160 C fan. Grease a 12-hole mini bundt pan thoroughly, dust it with flour, and tap out the excess.
2. Whisk the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon, ginger, and salt in a bowl.
3. In a second bowl, whisk the brown sugar, eggs, pumpkin, oil, and vanilla until smooth. Fold in the dry mixture just until combined.
4. Divide the batter among the 12 cavities and bake for 16 to 18 minutes, until a skewer comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a rack and cool completely.
5. Trim the flat side of each cake level. Pair the cakes and join each pair at the flat sides with a little icing sugar mixed with a few drops of water.
6. Mix the remaining icing sugar with the orange juice and enough coloring to make a thick orange glaze. Spoon it over each assembled pumpkin and let it follow the bundt ridges.
7. Insert a pretzel stem into each center and shape small leaves from green fondant or chewy sweets. Leave the glaze to set before arranging the pumpkins together.

This is an original Baking Show Guide home adaptation, not an official show recipe or a contestant recipe.

If one mini bundt pan must be reused, wash, grease, and flour it again before baking the second batch.

Chill the cakes for 15 minutes before glazing if the joined halves feel unstable.

Open the full recipe →

Episode guide sources

Challenge details verified 2026-07-14. foodnetwork.com, en.wikipedia.org.

Season result

The winner stays hidden until you choose to reveal it.

See every Halloween Baking Championshipwinner, season by season →

Full cast

Everyone recorded for Season 4, listed alphabetically without result spoilers.

Season fact sources

en.wikipedia.org, en.wikipedia.org.