Witchy Kitchen

Category: baking and desserts

  • Bible Cake with Goat Cheese Eyes

    Bible Cake with Goat Cheese Eyes

    Drag Me to Hell (2009), co-written and directed by Sam Raimi, has a lot to say about shame. Though it’s a wacky, quick-paced supernatural film with just the right amount of camp, the subject matter is particularly heavy: you can try to outrun your shame, but sooner or later it’s going to catch up with you.

    Christine (Alison Lohman) is a loan officer, trying to shed both her southern accent and her sweet nature, in order to get a promotion. She denies an elderly Romani woman a loan, who curses her to be tormented for three days before being dragged to hell. But it’s not the denial of the loan that triggers the curse, it’s Christine calling security and embarrassing the proud woman who has knelt begging at her feet. “You shame me!” She exclaims.

    And over the course of the next three days, every insecurity Christine has been running from rears its ugly head. She struggles at her job, as she’s just not able to be as ruthless as her coworker, making those “tough decisions.” She fails to impress the family of her boyfriend Clay (Justin Long), who think she is too low class and not good enough for him.

    And there’s a lot of shame around food. There’s a reading of this movie that it’s about bulimia, and there is a lot to support that. Christine stares longingly into a bakery but denies herself, later to turn to ice cream in her distress. There are a couple of references for her growing up a “fat girl” whereas she is not anymore. So many of the gruesome events of the three days involve various disgusting things going into her mouth.

    And then there’s the cake. When Christine goes to meet Clay’s family for the first time, she’s eager to make a good impression and brings a humble dish to dinner. “It’s a harvest cake,” she explains, to Clay’s bemused upperclass parents, something she would make on the farm where she grew up. When they serve it, she envisions an eyeball staring at her, and she chokes when she tries to eat it.

    This cake is such a perfect summation of Christine’s insecurities, around food, around class, around judgement, around shame. I went looking for a cake to make in a small town cookbook I inherited from my grandmother, Our First Hundred Years of Cooking (1883-1983) from the Methodist Church of Mount Holly, North Carolina. It did not disappoint. Adapted from a recipe of Mrs. Hettie Clinton Nixon’s, this is a recipe for Bible Cake, made with ingredients from the good book, with all the fruits and nuts of Christine’s harvest cake and the added benefit of scripture (useful in seances!). A goat features in the film’s seance as well, so to decorate I made little goat cheese eyeballs, watching you from every which way.

    Bible Cake with Goat Cheese Eyes

    For the cake

    • 1/2 cup butter, Judges 5:25
    • 1 cup sugar, Jeremiah 6:20
    • 3 eggs, Isaiah 10:14
    • 1 3/4 cups flour, I Kings 4:22
    • 1/2 teaspoon salt, Leviticus 2:13
    • 1 teaspoon baking powder, I Corinthians, 5:6
    • spices (I used 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg, and the seeds of 3 cardamom pods), I Kings 10:2
    • 1/2 cup water, Genesis 24:11
    • 1/2 tablespoon honey, Exodus 16:31
    • 1 cup each chopped raisins and dried figs, I Samuel 25:18
    • 1/2 cup chopped walnuts, Genesis 43:11
    • powdered sugar to garnish

    Heat oven to 375, and grease a 9 inch round cake pan.

    Cream together butter and sugar. Add in the 3 eggs. Separately, whisk together flour, salt, baking powder, and spices.

    Mix together water and honey, add it to the wet mixture and mix well. Stir the dry mixture into the web mixture until just combined. Fold in raisins, figs, and nuts, and transfer to the cake pan.

    Bake for approximately 45 minutes until cooked through and golden. Turn out onto a cake plate. Allow to cool and sprinkle with powdered sugar.

    For the goat cheese eyes

    • 2 ounces goat cheese, room temperature.
    • 1 cup+ powdered sugar
    • pinch of salt
    • dried fruit for decorating (I used cranberries, blueberries, and raisins)

    Whip together goat cheese, powdered sugar and salt. Cool in the fridge for an hour or so, stirring occasionally, until set up and moldable. Add powdered sugar if necessary to get a firm texture. Powder your hands with powdered sugar (and again periodically) and form teaspoon-sized balls, rolling gently, and press a dried fruit into each one. Chill until ready to use, then adorn the cake.

    First published on Nightmare on Film Street.

  • Crypt Keeper Crunch

    The wacky horror anthology Tales from the Crypt premiered on HBO on June 10, 1989 and entertained audiences with its tawdry tales until 1996. Based on the EC comic from the 1950s, it teeters between humor and horror, often with a morbid twist. I have semi-fond memories of being a little teenage babysitter watching alone in the dark after the kids went to bed…and letting it thoroughly crack me up and creep me out!

    Each episode begins with a journey through the Crypt Keeper’s haunted mansion, winding through hallways down to the catacombs. Here we meet the cackling corpse himself popping out of a coffin. The Crypt Keeper’s pun-filled quips are the framework for each scary tale.

    If you’re a Tales from the Crypt fan, then you know it’s a specHACKular popcorn-munching program, so popcorn is the base of this freaky fun recipe. Peanutty caramel corn is both Halloweeny and carnival food (as there are several carnival episodes). This particular one’s a little SALTY too, like the wisecracking Crypt Keeper – and the MORGUE the merrier! It’s studded with darling little pretzel bones.

    Crypt Keeper Crunch

    For the popcorn
    1 bag minimally flavored popcorn (the least salt and butter you can find)
    ½ cup roasted peanuts
    ½ cup honey
    ¼ cup sugar
    1 teaspoon salt
    ½ cup peanut butter

    Prepare a cookie sheet lined with parchment. Pop the popcorn and pour into a large bowl, being careful to not transfer any unpopped kernels. Sprinkle with peanuts.

    In a small saucepan, heat honey, sugar and salt until sugar is completely melted and mixture is foamy and just begins to darken in color. Remove from heat and stir in the peanut butter, stirring until smooth. Pour over popcorn and toss lightly to coat. Spread over parchment and cool.

    For the pretzel bones
    20 pretzel sticks
    80 mini marshmallows
    6 ounces white chocolate chips

    Prepare a cookie sheet lined with parchment. Gently slice each pretzel stick in two, and stick mini marshmallows on the ends. In a bowl, microwave white chocolate chips at 30-second intervals, stirring in between, until melted, about 1 minute and a half.

    Dip each “bone” into the white chocolate, turning with forks, shaking off the excess, and placing on the parchment. If the white chocolate becomes too hard, zap and stir and continue. Place bones in the fridge for 10 minutes to solidify.

    Break up the peanutty caramel corn into a large bowl and gently toss with the bones. SCAREf them up for your next FRIGHTfest!

    Until the next time, boils and ghouls, pleasant screams.

    First published on Nightmare on Film Street.

  • Ectolime Curd and Stay Puft Fluff

    Ectolime Curd and Stay Puft Fluff

    Ghostbusters-inspired Ectolime Curd and Stay Puft Fluff are good enough to get you believing in UFOs, astral projections, mental telepathy, ESP, clairvoyance, spirit photography, telekinetic movement, full trance mediums, the Loch Ness monster and the theory of Atlantis.

    There are tons of uses for these sweet goos; on the Fiction Kitchen podcast I talked about using this marshmallow fluff and lime curd to make s’mores and keylime pie gram cracker thumbprint cookies, but that’s just one idea. Eventually I’d love to make a marshmallow popsicles with ectolime curd filling inspired by Andrew Heath’s pop art popsicles!

    Ectolime Curd

    Adapted from Ina Garten
    • 1 cup (2 sticks) butter
    • 1 1/2 cups sugar
    • zest and juice of 2 limes
    • 4 eggs
    • 2 drops green, 1 drop yellow food coloring (optional)
    • 1/8 tsp salt
    • Cream the butter, then beat in the sugar and lime zest. Add the eggs one by one, then the lime juice and salt.
    Pour into a saucepan and cook over low heat, stirring, until thickened (15 minutes or so). Remove from heat and cool completely. Save in the fridge in an airtight container.

    Stay Puft Fluff

    From The Kitchn – this makes a TON, if I make again will do half
    • 1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons water
    • 3/4 cup sugar
    • 3/4 cup light corn syrup
    • 3 egg whites
    • 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar (if you, like me, forgot you were out, can omit)
    • pinch salt
    • 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
    Warm water, sugar and corn syrup in a saucepan over medium high heat until mixture reaches 240°. Meanwhile, beat egg whites until foamy, then add cream of tartar and salt and beat to soft peaks. When sugar mixture is heated, remove from heat and let rest 20 seconds. Slowly stream into the egg mixture while beating on high. Beat for 7-8 minutes until room temperature. Add in vanilla and beat until stiff peaks form. Save in the fridge in an airtight container.

    I love making and using fruit curds. See some other variations with:

    Recipe for Fiction Kitchen Episode 43: Ghostbusters in which Carrie and Diana talk about the new movie and all that came before. Get ready for Ecto Cooler, twinkies, sad wonton soup, Cheezits, flying sandwiches, refrigerator portals, and wacky party food. We ain’t afraid of no ghost!


  • Amaretto Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

    Amaretto Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

    Like many I fell into the seductive trap of HBO’s Sharp Objects (2018), the miniseries adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s 2006 novel. Created by Marti Noxon (who I would follow anywhere since Buffy) and directed by Jean-Marc Vallée, the series perfectly captures a small town underbelly, mommy issues, rollerskating, addiction, and murder mysteries, and Amy Adams’s performance as Camille is painful and exquisite. 

    However, it’s Patricia Clarkson’s Adora that inspried this dish. She’s an elegant and cruel Southern Gothic anti-goddess, sipping amaretto sours and crushing souls out on the veranda. Like Adora, this Calhoun Day pineapple upside-down cake is classic and old-fashioned. It’s marinated and swirled with lovely amaretto, and dotted with luscious maraschinos – “Mama, couldn’t you just take a bite out of her?” “Like a plump, juicy cherry.” 

    Amaretto Pineapple Upside-Down Cake


    For the topping

    • 1 cup amaretto
    • 9 pineapple slices
    • 4 ounces butter, melted
    • 1/2 cup brown sugar
    • maraschino cherries
    Marinate pineapple slices in amaretto for several hours, preferably overnight. Prepare a 9×9 square pan, and spread the bottom with melted butter and brown sugar. Arrange pineapple slices evenly, with maraschinos in all the spaces. Reserve remaining amaretto/pineapple juice mixture.

    For the cake

    • 8 tablespoons butter, softened
    • 1 cup sugar
    • 7 ounces almond paste
    • 3 eggs
    • 1 teaspoon vanilla
    • 1 3/4 cup flour
    • 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
    • 1 teaspoon salt
    • Reserved amaretto/pineapple mixture, cooked and reduced to a thick syrup
    Preheat oven to 350° Cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Crumble in the almond paste (try to get it as fine as possible) and mix in well. Mix in eggs, and vanilla. Whisk together flour, baking powder and salt, and add to the wet mixture with a spatula. Combine, being careful not to overmix. Gently spread the batter over the pineapples and cherries in the baking pan. Gently swirl in the amaretto/pineapple syrup (I don’t know if this made much of a difference but I was feeling like Adora and being a little extra). Bake for 30 minutes, then cover with foil and bake 15 minutes more, until a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out clean. Cool slightly, loosen with a knife, and use a large plate or tray to invert. Cool a bit more before serving.

    (I referenced several recipes that all look delicious, including this, this and this to come up with this almondy, boozy, and gorgeously caramelized mishmash).  

    Recipe for Fiction Kitchen Episode 65: Nightbooks & Sharp Objects in which Carrie and Diana discuss the JA White middle grade novel and the HBO miniseries. Spooky modern Sheherazade and midwest gothic folktale with pumpkin pie, oatmeal cookies, kousa mahshi, pineapple upside down cake, ham after ham, all washed down with vodka and amaretto sours.

  • Violet Beauregarde-inspired Three Course Dinner

    #FFDahlicious is a month for tasty eats inspired by Roald Dahl hosted by Katarina @ Pretty Cake Machine. Check the hashtag or the link up for lots of Dahl-inspired dishes.

    Violet Beauregarde, the gum-smacking, slang-slinging, disobedient daughter of a car salesman, is the second child to meet her demise in Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory, but not before enjoying a lovely three course meal in the form of gum. 

    Before she’s rolled away to be juiced, she enjoys tomato soup, roast beef with a baked potato, and then the cause of her downfall: blueberry pie. 

    Without Willy Wonka’s assistance, I was unable to create this gum exactly as it was described (probably a good thing), but I did create the meal that inspired it! This tomato soup was completely simple, yet fabulous thanks to the slow roasted tomatoes, it had become my go-to recipe. The roast beef was nicely cooked with a red wine gravy. And the blueberry pies were miniature with an almond crust, a sweet bite at the end of a lovely meal. Don’t feel bad for Violet, all in all it’s not a bad way to go.

    Violet Beauregarde’s Three Course Dinner


    Tomato Soup

    • 2 pounds roma tomatoes, cut into thick slices
    • 1 head garlic
    • 1/2 an onion, sliced
    • olive oil, salt & pepper
    • 5 cups chicken broth (homemade and flavorful if possible, I made mine from the bones of an Arabic style roast chicken)
    • cream to garnish
    Heat oven to 350°. Toss tomatoes with a good amount of olive oil, salt and pepper, and spread in a single layer on a baking sheet (or two if you don’t have a very large one). In another baking dish, toss the onions with olive oil, salt and pepper. Cut the top off a head of garlic and wrap it in foil, drizzled with a little olive oil. Put everything in the oven. Bake, flipping the tomatoes every half hour and stirring the onions once in awhile, until tomatoes are cooked and caramelizing and onion is golden (tomatoes will take about an hour and a half, onions probably only a half hour – check and make sure not to burn). Leave garlic in until roasted and soft, an hour to an hour and a half. Puree tomatoes, onions, and garlic in a blender with a little chicken broth, then pour into a pot. Stir in the rest of the chicken broth, adjusting seasoning if necessary, and gently heat, slowly simmering for 15 minutes or so. Serve hot with a little cream for garnish.

    Roast Beef

    I shall direct you to Simply Recipes, whose detailed method I followed pretty much exactly, including making the red wine gravy.

    (Mini) Blueberry Pie (with almond crust)

    For the crust
    • 2 cups almond flour
    • 2 tablespoons butter
    • 1 egg
    • good pinch salt
    Blitz together almond flour and butter in a food processor, then blitz in egg and salt. Press into a prepared mini muffin tin and bake (before filling) at 350° for 8 minutes. For the filling I made this lightly sweetened, still very tart. You can increase the amount of honey to 1/2 cup if you’d like.
    • 1 pint blueberries
    • 1/4 cup honey
    • pinch salt
    • 1 tablespoon cornstarch
    In a small saucepan, heat half the blueberries with honey and salt. Mix cornstarch in 1/4 cup of water and add to the saucepan, stirring until blueberries are broken down and mixture is thick. Remove from heat, and stir remaining blueberries into the mixture. Spoon into the crusts in the mini muffin tin and bake at 350° for 20 minutes. Cool in the muffin tin before removing.

    Recipe for Fiction Kitchen Episode 21: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in which Carrie and Diana talk the book and movies, including awful and/or bland children, mint sugar grass production techniques, wistful buttercup sipping, questionable treatment of animals and small humans, a little chocolate and a lot of vegetables.

  • A Horror Cocktail Menu for the Creepiest Christmas Party

    A Horror Cocktail Menu for the Creepiest Christmas Party

    It’s the Christmas season, and our days are merry and bright…but our nights are cold and dark, and there’s enough Christmas horror that the holiday can almost be a second Halloween. If you like a little creepy in your Christmas, here’s a festive and simple cocktail menu inspired by seasonal horror films. These recipes are enough for a small gathering but can easily be doubled to share with all your fiends and family.

    First up, drinks! I have a special place in my little black heart for 1984’s Gremlins, as it was the first horror movie I ever saw as a child. The Christmastime creature-feature gave me nightmares, and it was years before I realized that it is actually very funny and not the most terrifying movie ever made. That’s not to say it’s not terrifying; imagine being attacked by manic murderous cackling gremlins in your own kitchen. If you remember that scene, you’ll know why this is a green drink made in a blender! It’s green tea and bourbon sweetened by a Chinese five spice simple syrup that evokes the Chinatown antique shop that little mogwai Gizmo came from and bonus, it smells like Christmas. Just don’t serve your guests after midnight.

    Spiced Gremlin (Cocktail)

    • 2 cups strong green tea
    • 1/2 cup sugar
    • 1/2 cup water
    • 1 teaspoon Chinese five spice powder
    • 1/2 cup bourbon
    • green food coloring
    • green maraschino cherries for garnish
    Freeze the green tea in ice cube trays. To make the simple syrup (you’ll end up with extra, but you can use it for other cocktails or tea), heat sugar and water in a small sauce pan on medium high, not stirring, until the sugar is completely melted. Remove from heat and stir in the Chinese five spice powder. Cool completely. Combine green tea, 1/4 cup of the spiced simple syrup, bourbon, and several drops of green food coloring. Blend and serve, garnished with green maraschino cherries.

    Next up is a savory snack. 2015’s Krampus is the story of a dysfunctional family holiday gathering turned dark by the demon from European folklore, and though a fairly recent film, is already a modern Christmas horror classic. There are some great food scenes, whether a tracking shot through the kitchen of the German grandmother’s copious Christmas baking, or the epic gingerbread battle. This appetizer comes from the dinner – every black humor family film needs a dinner scene – that the mom, Sarah (Toni Collette) has prepared. If you’re a fancy fussy host like Sarah and would take comments like “It looks like Martha Stewart threw up in here” as a compliment, but don’t have a week to cure gravlax, then these smoked salmon toasts with lemon dill sour cream, pickled red onion, and crispy capers are perfect. If you’re less fussy, just go with macaroni and cheese and hotdogs.

    Krampus Smoked Salmon Toasts

    • 1 small red onion, thinly sliced
    • red wine vinegar
    • 12 ounces pumpernickel bread, the little party size or else sliced into 2 inch squares
    • 1/2 cup sour cream
    • zest of one lemon
    • 4 sprigs dill, finely chopped
    • 1 tablespoon capers
    • olive oil
    • 4 ounces smoked salmon, sliced
    Combine red onion and enough red wine vinegar to cover and set aside for at least an hour. Heat the oven to 350° and place bread slices in a single layer on baking sheets. Brush with olive oil and bake for 15 minutes until toasty. Cool. Stir together sour cream, lemon, and dill. In a small frying pan, heat a tablespoon or so of olive oil and fry capers until just turning golden, and drain on a paper towel. Assemble the toasts: smear each square of pumpernickel with a spoonful of the sour cream mixture, top with a curled slice of smoked salmon, and garnish with a couple of slices of red onion and a sprinkle of crispy capers.

    Finally we’re going sweeter, and a lot darker, with this treat inspired by the 1974 slasher Black Christmas. As one of the very first slasher films, it follows a deranged killer stalking a group of sorority girls, and is so creepy and unsettling that you’ll definitely need to stress-eat chocolate after viewing. So for that, we have these lovely truffles that are a bite-sized version of traditional English Christmas pudding. They are made from crumbled fruit cake, and are a little boozy, drizzled in dark chocolate and decorated with pretty green pistachios and dried cranberries.

    Black Christmas Pudding Truffles

    • 1 pound store-bought fruit cake
    • 3 ounces dark chocolate chips, divided
    • 2 tablespoons sherry, brandy, or rum
    • 1 1/2 cups dark chocolate chips, divided
    • chopped pistachios and dried cranberries for garnish
    Break the fruit cake into pieces into a food processor, and pulse a few times. Microwave 1/2 cup of the dark chocolate chips in 30 second increments, stirring in between, until completely melted. Add to the food processor along with the sherry, brandy, or rum, and combine, but don’t over mix. On a parchment-lined baking sheet, roll heaping teaspoons of the fruit cake mixture into balls. The mixture will be very sticky, so to make this easier, every few balls coat your hands in a thin layer of vegetable oil, and don’t worry too much about the shape at this point as you’ll be able to correct it later. Put the baking sheet in the fridge for 30 minutes to set. Once set, you can roll the balls again to get them rounder. Heat the remaining cup of dark chocolate chips in 30 second increments, stirring, until melted. Put the melted chocolate in a piping bag or ziploc with the corner cut off, and pipe over the balls. Garnish with pistachios and cranberries.

    Merry Christmas!

    First published on Nightmare on Film Street.

  • Myers Lemon Pumpkin Pie

    Myers Lemon Pumpkin Pie

    ‘Tis the season! We’ve decked the halls with cobwebs and pumpkins, and are so ready for the final confrontation between Laurie Strode and Michael Myers in 2018’s Halloween, directed by David Gordon Green.

    John Carpenter’s original Halloween film (1978), is iconic. We get the fearsome, stalky villain that launched a thousand slashers, the original Scream Queen, goddess Jamie Lee Curtis, and the spooky synth soundtrack that became a genuine classic. The film is almost beyond reproach. Almost.

    The one problem…it doesn’t feel like Halloween at all! The houses are barely decorated, and a few half-hearted trick-or-treaters do not a proper Halloween make. Most of the lack of seasonal feel comes from the fact that though it’s set in the Midwest in October, it was filmed in Southern California in May. The film crew struggled to find pumpkins, used artificial fall leaves on streets lined with fully green trees, and every once in a while you even get a glimpse of a palm.

    Here’s hoping the new film is every bit as scary and trope-y as the first, but pumped up with pumpkin spice! To honor the original, we’re making a pumpkin pie – the official pie of Illinois (which also happens to include our fictional town of Haddonfield) – marbled with California citrus. And not just any citrus: Myers, I mean Meyer, lemons. Meyer lemons are sweeter and less sharp than your basic lemons, but they aren’t quite in season – so if you have trouble finding them, using a mixture of lemon and orange works as well. The pie has a very snappy gingersnap crust, which is unfussy and compliments the filling well. There’s also a ribbon of pomegranate molasses flowing through, a quite autumnal ingredient with a gorgeous color that I never miss a chance to use. It works particularly well here to evoke blood. Slice with a BIG SHARP KNIFE and serve!

    Myers Lemon Pumpkin Pie

    For the crust

    • 9 ounces gingersnap cookies
    • 3 tablespoons butter, melted

    Heat oven to 350°. In a food processor, blitz the cookies to crumbs, then add melted butter and pulse several times to combine. Press into a greased 9 inch glass pie plate, using the heel of your hand to flatten and gently spread it up the sides of the plate, and toast in the oven for 10 minutes until golden. Cool slightly before filling.

    For the pumpkin mixture

    • 1 15 ounce can pumpkin puree
    • 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
    • 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
    • 1 teaspoon salt
    • 1/2 stick butter, melted
    • 3 eggs, beaten
    • 2 teaspoons vanilla
    • 1/2 cup heavy cream
    • 1/4 cup flour

    Using a hand mixer or whisk, blend together pumpkin puree, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, butter, eggs, vanilla, and heavy cream. Sift flour into the mixture and blend until combined.

    For the citrus cream cheese

    • 6 ounces cream cheese, softened
    • 2 teaspoons Meyer lemon zest (or a combination of lemon and orange zest)
    • 2 teaspoons Meyer lemon juice (or a combination of lemon and orange juice)
    • 1/4 cup sugar
    • 3 tablespoons heavy cream

    Using a hand mixture, blend all ingredients.

    To assemble

    • 2 tablespoons pomegranate molasses (you can purchase this at a Middle Eastern grocer, or make it yourself by boiling down pomegranate juice to about a third of its volume and cooling)

    Pour pumpkin mixture into pie crust. Spoon cream cheese mixture over top and use a knife to marble it into the mixture. Drizzle pomegranate molasses on top and give it a last swirl with the knife before putting in the oven, at 350° for 50 minutes until just set.

    Allow to cool at least 3 hours and even better, overnight, before serving.

    First published on Nightmare on Film Street.

  • Chocolate Meringues with Chantilly Cream

    Chocolate Meringues with Chantilly Cream

    Joanne Harris’s 1999 novel Chocolat is the story of Vianne Rocher, who comes with her small daughter Anouk to French village of Lansquenet-sous-Tannes to open a chocolate shop right at the beginning of Lent. The book is rich, and sweet, and deliciously full of witchcraft, my favorite instance of which is Vianne actually scrying in melted chocolate!

    Delectable food descriptions are woven throughout the book, and it’s obvious the author has a love of food. She even has a cookbook, cowritten with Fran Warde: My French Kitchen: A Book of 120 Treasured Recipes, which I snapped up shortly after reading the novel, and these meringues come right from its pages.



    Illustration by Morgann Daniels

    Meringues are light, fluffy…almost like the farts of an angel. No really! “Pets d’ange” is what the French call them – although doesn’t it sounds prettier in French? Vianne and Josephine share some in Chocolat at the counter of La Celeste Praline chocolate shop, but they are extremely simple to make at home, just 3 ingredients.

    Chocolate Meringues with Chantilly Cream

    From My French Kitchen: A Book of 120 Treasured Recipes by Joanne Harris and Fran Warde

    For the meringues

    • 3 egg whites
    • 3/4 cup powdered sugar
    • 1/4 cup cocoa

    Heat oven to 275° and line a baking sheet with wax paper.

    Whip the egg whites until soft peaks form, then add sugar and whip until stiff peaks form. Gently fold in the cocoa with a spatula. Using 2 spoons, make 12 dollops evenly spaced on the baking sheet, and bake for 2 hours. Turn the oven off and leave for another 12.

    For the Chantilly cream

    • 1 1/4 cups whipping cream
    • 1/4 cup powdered sugar
    • 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

    Whip ingredients together until soft peaks form. Serve dolloped on meringues, or make sandwiches.

    Recipe for Fiction Kitchen Episode 18: Chocolat in which Carrie and Diana discuss Joanne Harris’s novel Chocolat (which Carrie gobbled and Diana savored) as well as the 2000 movie – including witchcraft, the dark side of religion, fasting and feasting, a little history and lots and lots of chocolate.

    For another Chocolat-inspired recipe, nibble on these old-fashioned Rose Creams.

  • Walnut Brownie Altar Cakes

    Walnut Brownie Altar Cakes

    2018 supernatural horror film Hereditary, directed by Ari Aster and featuring Toni Collette, Milly Shapiro and Alex Wolfe, began by lulling me into the typical horror formula (I’ve seen a few ghost movies, ok?) and then took a gut-wrenching turn that shocked me to tears and left my body a twisted lump of tension for the rest of the film. The haunting performances, droning soundscape, unsettling dollhouse motif, and masterful building of absolute dread, all wrapped up in an uncomfortable family drama, is far and away the most horrific thing I’ve seen this year.

    Very light spoilers ahead…this recipe is tied into the plot of course but I won’t say too much…

    For most of this ghastly torture of a movie I was thinking there was no way I could do something as frivolous as a recipe, but then the third act turns so wacky and has an such an interesting thread of mythology that I was back in. The 13-year-old daughter Charlie, has a love of chocolate and a well-established nut allergy, so of course I wanted to include those in my recipe. It was the demon king Paimon though that inspired me to make these as altar cakes, smeared with ganache, a dark offering to his hellish excellency. His intricate sigil appears over and over in the film, so these are so marked with walnut buttercream. Hail Paimon! (Please accept these and stay away).

    Walnut Brownie Altar Cakes

    For the brownie cakes:
    Adapted from Taste of Home

    • 12 ounces semisweet chocolate chips
    • 1 cup butter (2 sticks)
    • 1 1/3 cups sugar
    • 4 eggs
    • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
    • 1 cup flour
    • 1 cup chopped walnuts

    Heat oven to 350°

    Melt the chocolate chips and butter together in the microwave, stir until smooth and allow to cool. Meanwhile, beat together sugar and eggs and stir in vanilla and the chocolate mixture. Mix in flour until just combined and stir in walnuts.

    Pour into lined muffin cups and bake for 20-25 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool, remove from liners, trim the tops flat if necessary and flip upside down to decorate.

    For the ganache

    • 1/2 cup heavy cream
    • 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

    Bring heavy cream to a boil and pour over chocolate chips, stir until smooth. Cool to room temp. Smear over tops of the cakes.

    For the walnut buttercream

    • 1 cup powdered sugar
    • 1/2 stick softened butter
    • 1 ounce walnuts
    • 1+ teaspoon milk

    Combine well all ingredients in a food processor. Transfer to a piping bag and scribble hell king sigils on your altar cakes. Offer and wait.

    Recipe for Fiction Kitchen Episode 60: VOLTRON & HEREDITARY in which Diana and Carrie discuss discuss robots in space and terrifying family dramas! Food goo, garlic knots, cake roll pops, Checkov’s walnut allergy and uncomfortable family dinners.

  • Jalebi

    Jalebi

    As the final course of our Ms Marvel menu, Jalebi seemed appropriate – it’s as stretchy and winding and polymorphous as her limbs, and a fun Pakistani street food besides. It’s basically a funnel cake, but after frying the dough is soaked in a cardamom rose syrup that takes it to the next level.

    I’ve eaten it many times before, sometimes fresh and sometimes from a shop, but this was my first time making them. I didn’t get them nicely coiled, but they are delightfully tangled and the cardamom rose flavor is just lovely.

    For the jalebi

    • 1 cup flour
    • 2 tablespoons corn flour
    • 1/2 cup yogurt
    • 1/2 cup water
    • pinch baking soda
    • food coloring (usually yellow or orange, but I used red)
    • oil for frying

    Heat several inches oil in a pot or wok. Mix ingredients well and put in a pastry bag. When the oil is hot, pipe into the hot oil in circles, starting with the outside going in. Fry until golden, and remove into a pan of sugar syrup (below).

    For the sugar syrup

    • 1/2 cup sugar
    • 1/3 cup water
    • seeds of 2 cardamom pods
    • 2 teaspoons rosewater

    In a wide pan, heat sugar and water until all sugar is melted, swirling occasionally to dissolve. Add cardamom pods and rosewater. Keep very warm but not boiling.

    Once the dough is in the syrup, let it sit 30 seconds or so on each side and remove to a plate. Cool and serve warm or room temperature.

    Check out the whole Ms Marvel Menu

    See more of the The Comic Vault’s Comic Kitchen

    Photo credit: Jonathan Hartzell