The witching hour is soon to be upon us… I expect all you lovely Halloweenies are prepared and ready…
Halloween is the evening before the Christian holy days of All Hallows‘ Day (also known as All Saints’ or Hallowmas) on 1 November and All Souls’ Day on 2 November, thus giving the holiday on 31 October the full name of All Hallows‘ Eve (the evening before All Hallows‘ Day).
Halloween symbols are not made up or random… Black cats, spiders, and bats are all Halloween symbols because of their spooky history and ties to Wiccans. All three were thought to be the familiars of witches in the middle ages, and are often associated with bad luck.
Bats are also connected to Halloween by the ancient Samhain ritual of building a bonfire, which drove away insects and attracted bats.
Halloween is also the most important day for devil worshippers…However, for most people, Halloween is a fun time of dressing up, creating elaborate costumes and decorations, visiting haunted houses, taking kids trick-or-treating, and of course eating candy. It has become a heavily commercialized holiday second only to Christmas in terms of the number of people who celebrate and participate in it.
But many fundamentalist Christians, believe that there is a dark and sinister side to the Oct. 31 festivities when the boundaries between the living and the dead are blurred.
Did you know?
Candy Corn was originally known as chicken feed as corn was and is still also fed to chooks… They even used to have a picture of a rooster on the original box.
Halloween Food…Chilli con Carne and jacket potatoes are good for a chilly evening and easy to do but if you fancy a change I have some lovely recipes for Sweet Potatoes.
I like something a little different… This recipe is a nice treat… A recipe that was given to me by a friend who used goat’s cheese… I use feta or ricotta if I can’t get goats cheese…
Sweet Potato with goat’s cheese, honey, and roasted grapes.
Ingredients:
• 4 sweet potatoes
• 2 cups of red seedless grapes
• 1 tsp of coconut or olive oil
• ¼ tsp salt and freshly ground pepper
• 4 ounces of goats cheese, feta/ricotta
• Cinnamon and nutmeg to taste
• 2 tbsp of honey plus additional to drizzle if required
For 4 potatoes take 2 cups of small seedless grapes and put on a baking tray drizzle with oil and a season with salt and pepper then roast them at 350F for about 20 mins or until the skins just start to burst… Do check them as ovens vary and they can tend to burn…
Remove from the oven and leave to cool then take your cooled sweet potato and gently remove the flesh… the skins are not as hardy as a normal potato are they? So my advice is to leave some of the potato attached to the skin or you may struggle to fill them.
In a bowl mash the potato with 3 oz of the goat’s cheese, honey, a pinch of cinnamon and nutmeg, to taste then put the potato back in the skins and crumble some more goats cheese on top …To serve: add the grapes and drizzle more honey if desired…
Enjoy!
Other sweet potato fillings:
How about a baked sweet potato filled with cooked black beans, corn, sweet peppers topped with sour cream with some lime rind stirred through or sprinkled on the top and some chopped coriander.
Or the Thai way our sweet potatoes here are a bright purple we do get the orange but many are purple a really beautiful colour… Baked and topped with Thai Peanut sauce they are heavenly…
Ingredients:
- 1 cup fresh dry roasted peanuts (unsalted)
- 1/3 cup water
- 2 cloves garlic very finely chopped or minced
- 1/2 tsp dark soy sauce
- 2 tsp. sesame oil
- 1 to 2 tbsp. brown sugar (to taste)
- 2 to 2 1/2 tbsp. fish sauce (for vegetarians: substitute 2 1/2 to 3 tbsp. regular soy sauce)
- 1/2 tsp. tamarind paste (or 2 tbsp. lime juice)
- 1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper (or 1/2 tsp Thai red chilli paste more or less to taste)
- 1/3 cup coconut milk
Let’s Cook!
Place all ingredients in a blender or food processor. Blend until the sauce is smooth. If you prefer a runnier peanut sauce, add a little more water or coconut milk.
Taste.... adding more fish sauce (or soy sauce) if not salty enough, or more red curry or cayenne if not spicy enough. If too salty, add a squeeze of fresh lime juice. If you’d prefer it sweeter, add a little more sugar.
This sauce tends to thicken as it sits–just add a little water or coconut milk to thin it out, as needed. Otherwise, it stores well if kept covered in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.
Add to your baked sweet potato and top with chopped red onion, green onions and coriander and some crispy fried garlic…yummy if you love Thai flavours.
Enjoy!
Now, who doesn’t love cute little fur babies…These two belong to Tori and she has shared an adorable image of them all dressed up in their Halloween outfits…Lillie and Logan, you look so cute…Thank you Tori xxx
All Hallows night is tonight( Thursday) but whether you are celebrating tonight or at the weekend have fun!
All your decorations are probably up by now and costumes made or hired…Just maybe some last-minute bits and pieces to do…
Just in case you haven’t decided on a Halloween special drink then this one may be the one for you…It is an awesome tipple… a Spicy Mexican Michelada which is similar to a Bloody Mary ( my fave) but made with beer and clam juice…
Doesn’t that look drinkable I am not a beer drinker but I may give this one a go …
I hope you have enjoyed these Fang-Tastic Pumpkin posts…
I am off to check out the Micheladas…Laters xxx
Oops…nearly came off my broomstick…Hic xxx
Thank you once again for reading this post I hope you all have a creative week ahead xx
Retired? No one told me! 