The One Dish That Takes Christina Ricci Back to the ‘Casper’ Set 30 Years Later: ‘I Ate It Every Single Day’

What can stay with an actor 30 years after making a movie? For Christina Ricci, looking back on Casper brings up a behind-the-scenes memory audiences would never know from watching the 1995 film. Rather than a particular scene or supernatural moment, something from her everyday routine during production became permanently linked to the experience. Decades later, that connection is still strong enough to take her right back.

Ricci reflected on the movie while discussing her long connection to spooky entertainment and Halloween. Roles in Casper, The Addams Family and Sleepy Hollow have made her especially familiar to fans of darker seasonal favorites. Interestingly, though, Ricci said she did not become particularly enthusiastic about celebrating Halloween herself until she had children and began experiencing the holiday through them.

These days, Halloween at Ricci’s home involves costumes, decorating, jack-o’-lanterns and trick-or-treating around the neighborhood. Her family has its own seasonal movie traditions, too, although they often watch Coco rather than one of her films. But when Ricci looked back at what she remembers about actually making Casper, one surprisingly ordinary part of life on set stood out. So what was she having so often that she still associates it with the movie 30 years later?

The Dish That Takes Her Straight Back to ‘Casper’

The answer is albondigas soup. Ricci recalled that the craft service worker on the Casper set made the soup fresh, and she loved it enough to eat it every single day during filming. Three decades later, that routine has stayed firmly attached to her memories of making the movie, giving a simple dish an unexpectedly lasting place in her Casper story.

That association also highlights how different an actor’s memories of a movie can be from the audience’s. Viewers may remember the friendly ghosts, the story or Ricci’s performance as Kat Harvey. Ricci, meanwhile, also remembers what daily life was like while the cameras were not rolling. Eating the same freshly prepared soup over and over became part of the rhythm of working on the film.

In fact, Ricci acknowledged that making a movie can feel very different from watching the finished product. For fans, returning to Casper means revisiting what made it onto the screen. For her, it can mean remembering the routines surrounding production, including the food she ate day after day. And as it turns out, Casper is not the only movie Ricci connects with a food she still remembers years later.

Another Food Memory Goes Back Even Further

Long before albondigas soup became connected to Casper, another food had already become attached to one of Ricci’s earliest movie memories. She said Reese’s Pieces became a big part of her family after she saw them featured in the first movie she ever watched. The candy stuck with her, too, eventually becoming her personal favorite.

That first movie was E.T., famously associated with Reese’s Pieces. Years later, Ricci’s childhood connection with the candy came full circle through her involvement with the Reese’s Halloween Council. She joined other Halloween personalities in evaluating contenders for America’s best trick-or-treating street, considering factors including decorations, candy, neighborhood participation and walkability.

Yet Ricci said she is not generally a huge candy person, making the lasting Reese’s Pieces connection even more specific. Halloween itself followed a similar path: she said she did not care much about celebrating it until becoming a mother, but costumes, decorating and trick-or-treating are now part of her family’s traditions. So why did something as simple as a candy and a bowl of soup remain so closely tied to her movie memories?

Thirty Years Later, the Smallest Details Still Stand Out

Part of the answer may be in the difference between experiencing a movie and simply watching one. Casper has had three decades to become a nostalgic favorite for audiences, but Ricci remembers an entire world around the finished film that viewers never saw. The daily routines of being on set became part of that experience, allowing an ordinary meal to carry memories alongside the movie itself.

Her stories about Casper and E.T. show that connection from two different sides. Reese’s Pieces remind her of an early experience watching a movie, while albondigas soup takes her back to being the person working on one. Neither food was meant to become a major marker in her life, yet both became attached to particular moments strongly enough to remain memorable years later.

That is what makes Ricci’s Casper recollection such a personal piece of the movie’s history. Fans can return to the 1995 film and remember its ghosts, characters and story, while Ricci carries a memory that existed outside the frame. Thirty years later, a freshly made bowl of albondigas soup can still take her back to the set, where she loved it enough to eat it every single day.