Sinister Saturday – Haunted Manor Pumpkin Bread (cake fail?)

Happy Sinister Saturday! Today, we attempted to bake pumpkin bread using a Nordic Ware Haunted Manor pan.

Nordic Ware pans are amazing. The Haunted Skull cakelet pan is my favorite.

The Haunted Manor pan will set you back $25-30, depending where you buy it and when.

This might be a purchase to save for after Halloween or a Black Friday sale for a nice discount. Highly encourage everyone to buy Skull pan. It’s super useful for a ton of different recipes.

I started with a box of Libby’s Pumpkin Bread.

As I said before, I’m not into baking. I mean, I’d love it if I wasnt so damn bad at it!😅

I’ve been successfully using Libby’s Pumpkin bread for years. The recipe is super easy, four eggs, a cup of water, half cup of oil and mix well.

So fast, so easy, a child could do this. After baking for an hour, it looked like I might pull it off.

30 mins later, reality crushed my weekend dream of making Haunted Manor pumpkin bread. The cake broke into several pieces with the top half not all agreeing to come out of the pan.

But my dreams of great baking are often nightmares.

I eventually gave up and dug it out, resulting in the above picture. It seems a Haunted Manor pan may be too advanced for my baking skills!🤣

While the Haunted Manor cake visual was complete failure, it tasted fantastic! Just like always. That’s why I love this pumpkin bread mix from Libby’s.

I used some leftover batter to make pumpkin muffins instead.

Pumpkin muffins save the day!

Happy Halloween! Be safe out there!

Addendum:

This cake pan is NIGHTMARE to clean!

Sinister Saturdays – Best Era for Horror Films

Horror films have captivated audiences since before Universal’s wild heyday of Horror during the 1930s. Each era has had great scary films and some so good, they spawned sequels and created franchises. Jaws, a 1975 horror adventure from a new young director Steven Spielberg gave birth to the summer blockbuster! In fact, thanks to horror, some amazing technical achievements have been discoverd, like new camera and lighting tricks and, make-up, and special fx. Horror films are truly the backbone of Hollywood.

I personally have been a horror film fan for over 40 years and I pride myself on having seen a majority of scary films and always look forward to those I’ve havent found yet. But there’s just one thing I haven’t been able to figure out, and that’s which era had the best horror. Was it Universal’s monster era or the SciFi greatness of the 50s, or how about the great slasher films of the 80s? It’s so hard to choose! Help me out!

Sinister Saturdays – Scariest classic Universal monster

Lately, I’ve been rewatching a lot old classic horror movies and the Universal monster movies are still my faves. Fans of the 1930s viewed the supernatural fantasy as an escape from the daily misery, living through the depression. The films may seem tame or not as scary or sophisticated as the films of today, but for some movie goers, the stories were based on popular cultural myths and legends, while others had never heard of these creatures at all. Swamp creatures and the reanimated dead were the super scary, particularly to those who were extremely religious.

I tried to figure out which monster I thought was scariest but I’m on the fence. Help me determine which monster is the scariest.

Sinister Saturdays – Best classic 70s horror movie smackdown

Recently, I posted my choices as the scariest horror scenes in movies. What you all may know was just how hard making that list was. There were a slew of great horror films to come out of the 70s generation and choosing which had the scariest scene was kinda agonizing. I kept questioning which movies I thought were the best, which had the best story and characters, which seemed most popular with movie goers, and which was my personal favorite.

So, in the spirt of the election year, help me determine which is the best.

31 Days of Halloween 2022

Happy October! After starting late this Halloween season, I’m now ready to post the schedule of this year’s 31 Days of Halloween Celebration. The theme this October is dystopian Halloween. With the doomsday clock ticking down, it’s probably way past time to think about how humankind plans to survive the apocalypse, in particular, how we’ll preserve our traditions and holidays, like Halloween.

Part of the month, we’ll have some fun with the dystopian Halloween-horror theme, but I have decided to mix in some good old-fashion Halloween traditional themes as well, cuz, I just love talking about those Halloween memories.

Have a safe and happy Halloween season!

31 Days of Halloween Schedule

Monday Macabre
Mondays are always dedicated to Haiku, but every Monday in October we’ll explore a dystopian Halloween.

Tuesday Terror
Every Tuesday, I’ll share my favorite scary movies that I believe make great Halloween season viewing.

Wicked Art Wednesdays
Every Wednesday, I’ll share some spooktacular Halloween art with an apocalyptic twist. I might even post some my own original Halloween pencil stencil art.

Throwback Thursdays
Preservation of Halloween traditions is important for several reasons. Every Thursday, let’s explore the origins of some Halloween traditions and muse over whether these traditions might survive the apocalypse.

Friday Fright Nightcaps
Ghosts aren’t the only ones who like to get sheet-faced on Halloween. Check back every Friday for Halloween season-inspired cocktails.

Sinister Saturdays
In the past few years, Sinister Saturdays have always been dedicated to food and Halloween recipes. The problem was, besides my being the worst cook in America, people are simply reluctant to let you share their recipes online, even if you give them complete credit and link back to their website. So, in the true spirit of Sinister Saturdays, we’re just going to let the demons loose that day and see what they come up with.

Poe Sundays
This year’s tribute to the master of macabre, Edgar Allan Poe, will feature my thoughts on the best Poe adaptations on film.

4^th Annual Halloween Haiku Challenge 2022
#Halloweenhaikuchallenge

Share your most original or scariest visual Halloween Haiku photos during October for a chance to win some prizes.

More details about the haiku contest will be announced on October 18^th.

Join in the fun, and follow me @Halloweenhorrorhaiku on Instagram and @Halloweenkristy on Twitter

Sinister Saturdays: Half-Zombie Cocktail

Sinister Saturdays have kinda become a hodge podge of recipes for Halloween cocktails and food, random thoughts, and angry mini-meltdowns that I mark ‘private’ the next day to spare myself any humiliation over my privileged tantrums. Lucky for you, tonight is a recipe in celebration of our theme: Zombie Spring.

I call it the Half-Zombie, cuz it’s missing like half the ingredients of a Zombie cocktail.

Half-Zombie cocktail in Tonga Hut 2017 commenrative glass

Ingredients:
2-3 oz dark rum
2 oz pineapple juice
1 oz cranberry juice
1/2 oz lemon juice
1/2 oz lime juice
1/2 oz pomegrante grenadine
Dash of ginger ale

Optional Garnish: Mint, fresh fruit slices, pineapple, strawberry, lime, etc.

If there was anything truly sinister about this Saturday, it’s that I’m too damn lazy to go to the store to buy ingredients to make a decent Zombie. I apparently haven’t recovered from 2020.

I’ll admit this ended up on the sweet side, but sinister and sweet are what us Halloween lovers live for! Cheers!

Sinister Saturday: Mummy Pizza Heads

We’re back with another great kid-friendly recipe for working parents on Halloween night.
The only sad thing about Halloween is how fast the day goes by. You’re working, cleaning, doing errands, running around getting the costumes together, trick-or-treating starts at sundown, but wait, the kids are hungry… Now, you could let them eat candy for dinner, that’s what a proper witch would do…or you could be a somewhat responsible parent and actually make a meal, behold the ancient power of Mummy Pizza Heads!

INGREDIENTS:

Pillsbury Grand Flaky Layer Biscuits
1 Mozzarella slice
1 tbsp of Pizza sauce
Choose your own pizza toppings

INSTRUCTIONS:

Start by following the baking instructions of Bake Pillsbury Grand Flaky Layer Biscuits but only bake on cookie sheet or pizza pan for half the time (about 8 mins)
Remove from oven and add mozzarella cheese slice, pepperoni slices (or desired pizza toppings), and1 spoonful of pizza sauce on the top of the biscuits
Put pan back in the oven and cook for the remainder of time or until biscuits are golden brown
Garnish with olives for eyes and face

Throw in a nice garden salad and call it a night. This recipe is super easy, super fast, and super fun for kids to make and to eat. If your kids are older, you can call them Bloody Mummy Pizza Heads and yes, the ingredients are premade cuz that’s how we roll around here. If you’re not cool with that, go ahead, knock yourself out and make something from scratch, be sure to send us the recipe. For the rest of us, we got more time for trick-or-treating!

Happy Halloween!

Sinister Saturday: Krampus Approved Christmas Coal Recipe

Earlier this week, I went out Halloween shopping, looking for a few items needed to complete my decorations. Unfortunately, Halloween has already been replaced in the stores by Christmas! What crap is this. Wait your turn, Christmas!

Now, I’m no hater. I’m just pissy and sad the Halloween season is half over. I suppose it’s only fair, I mean, Christmas-loving folks are just trying to get happy like us Halloween fans were trying to do back in July. So, in the spirit of community, I’m willing to compromise, with the help, and permission, from the The Necro-Nom-Nom-Nomicon, I’m by sharing a fangtastic recipe that brings both Christmas and Halloween together with Krampus Approved Christmas Coal. Krampus might not be the sweetest creature stirring but this black-as-night dessert is sinfully spookilicious!

For ingredients list and recipe, please visit www.eatthedead.com

If Christmas insists on encroaching on Halloween’s turf during October, well, then, we’re just gonna have to make the holidays all dreary and fright. How do you feel about it? Let me know in the comments or tag me on social media @HalloweenHaiku9

Have yourself a scary little Christmas and a Happy Halloween!