Guests couldn’t resist the party hats made from a variety of possible edibles. Photo courtesy of Mark Morrow, All Rights Reserved.

With the onslaught of graduation parties within the next few months, people are now scouring for party ideas more than ever.
Since I had the opportunity to just throw one of my own, I can offer some helpful tips that will save time, aggravation, and money.

Graduation Party Hats

These hats can be made with a variety of pre-made cookies, candies, and Fruit Roll Ups. You – the maker decides which is the easiest and most cost effective.

You’ll Need:
Chocolate-covered graham cracker squares
Choice of cap bottoms:
Mini brownies – premade as in mini brownies snacks or you can make your own brownie mix and use a mini muffin pan.
Mini muffin liners (if making own brownies)
OR  Peanut butter cups OR Round Chocolate Cookies – The choice is yours.
Choice of Tassel Tops:
Black or red string licorice OR Fruit Roll Ups (any color)
Candy buttons OR mini M & M’s OR other small round candies
Choice of frosting that hardens quickly:
Royal recipe, or my plain 10x frosting recipe: 1 cup 10x sugar, a tsp. of vanilla and enough water(add tbsp at a time) to make a very thick frosting. Mix well until smooth. Cover if not using right away or it will harden quickly.
To seal tassel top:
You can either add chocolate flavoring/cocoa to darken a bit of frosting to the side (1/8 cup) OR  melt choc. chips, melts, Kisses, or plain bar – you’ll need no more than 8-10 kisses for 40.

Before going into the directions, let me go over the most inexpensive options and my own mishaps during the process:

Expense

Making your own mini brownies will save about $6 per 50-60 versus store bought Debbie’s brand which run about $3 for 18. If you choose the bakery as your premade maker – the price goes up alarmingly.

The fruit roll ups are easier to find versus the string licorice, but if buying a small amount in bulk, the price is comparable. The tassels/ cookies/chocolate can be found at the dollar store. The frosting is a no-brainer. The least amount of products, the less expense.

Mishaps

If you decide to make your own brownie hat bottoms, you should use muffin liners or grease pans aggressively and slightly overcook the brownies for firmness. I unfortunately made 50 mini brownies in a new Teflon-coated Wilton pan – greased them and cooked them slightly over the time (19 min) and the muffins still crumbled and lost shape to the point they were unusable for the hats.

They were however, tasty and my family welcomed them as something to munch on while I had to rebake another batch in liners and then when they cooled, I peeled the paper off. This worked perfectly.

Directions:

Turn the brownie upside down (bottom upward) and add a small dot of frosting. Top it with the graham square. Cut a few pieces of licorice (long enough to hang over hat edge from center) or cut the same length in a narrow piece of fruit sheet. Make 2-3 slices down the sheet to make “strings”. Melt a small amount of chocolate in the microwave or in a warmer. Add a dot of melted chocolate to the top middle of the graham cookie, then add either licorice or the cut fruit sheet to the top. Add another small dot of melted chocolate on top of the strips and put a candy dot on top of the chocolate.

Quick candy scrolls made from Smarties, paper and black string. Image courtesy of Debbie Morrow, All Rights Reserved.

Smarties Graduation Scrolls

You’ll need:
Smarties or other rolled candy packs
White computer paper
Black string or yarn
Scissors and clear tape

Directions: Place the candy roll on top of the paper and mark off length straight down sheet (can fit 2-3 per width of computer paper). Fold paper as seen in photo. Cut at folds, roll strip to learn approx. length needed to wrap around a roll and use that as a guide to cut the rest of strips. Wrap strips around candy rolls, tape and tie approx. 4″ of black string or yarn around scroll.

Congrats to all the Grads!