Roasted Fingers and Toes

Tomorrow is Halloween and here's my last installment of Halloween-inspired food. This is a really fun, but gross, idea for Halloween. Not that the bloody version of my Ghoulish Goat Cheese Torte wasn't gross enough, these just look like disgusting fingers and toes and the idea of eating them, is just not appetizing. I promise you though, they are devilishly delicious. Previously, I'd been working on a recipe for my Deviled Bat Wings but reluctantly, I had to scrap the idea for Halloween. I'd made them twice and both times I had trouble getting good pictures of them but most importantly, the flavor just wasn't what I wanted them to be for Halloween. I couldn't get them to be spicy 'enough' for some reason. Luckily, I've learned that sometimes things don't work out as planned and it's usually for a good reason. One good reason, was that I had time to make this cool fingerling potato recipe instead and another is that the Deviled Bat Wing dish, oddly enough, will become a Christmas dish thanks to my husband's cool suggestion. XO!

Although, Halloween is coming to a close and you won't see any more of my disgusting Halloween food ideas, Fall is in full swing. I'm looking forward to making soups and stews and countless comforting recipes now that the weather has finally cooled down out here in sunny California. Autumn has officially begun with a bit of rain (slight bit) this week and I've finally broke out my sweaters. So stay tuned for more comforting fall foods and have a Happy and Safe HALLOWEEN!

Roasted Fingers and Toes

Serves: 6 side dish;12 appetizer

2 lbs Fingerling potatoes
1/2 cup prepared pesto
1/4 cup almonds, sliced or halved
salt and pepper
Parmesan cheese, grated

Pesto Aioli
3/4 cup mayonnaise
3 T prepared pesto
1 clove garlic, finely minced
        or 
Pesto Sour Cream

3/4 cup sour cream
3 T prepared pesto
1 clove garlic, finely minced
     

Preparation:
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
Wash and trim potatoes. With a paring knife, cut approximately 1/2 inch down one end of each fingerling potato.(See pictures below) Again, using the paring knife, notch out the 1/2 inch cut to make a space for the almond slice or almond half (fingernail). Place all notched out potatoes in a medium-sized bowl. 

Mix prepared pesto with notched potatoes. Salt and pepper to taste and set aside and let set for 30-60 minutes at room temperature, stirring occasionally.


Prepare the Pesto Aioli or Pesto Sour Cream for dipping sauce or if you'd prefer, break out some plain ol' ketchup.  :) Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Assemble the fingernails:
Slide almond slices or halves into notched potatoes. It'll be messy but don't worry if you can't slide them into the notch easily, let them sit on the potato while they cook. The pesto will help them stick to the potato. The important thing is that the almonds cook with the potatoes to brown and darken and look ugly. Place fingers and toes onto a parchment lined cookie sheet in a single layer. 


Roast at 425 degrees for 20-25 minutes. 

Note: Once the potatoes are cooked, you'll be able to easily slide the almond into the soft potato to secure the "almond nail" to the potato.

Generously grate Parmesan Cheese over potatoes and additional salt and pepper to taste and serve.

Ghoulish Goat Cheese Torte

This recipe is one from my "Mom's Book". I've adapted it just a little, the original recipe called for sun-dried tomatoes and pesto, but I prefer roasted red bell pepper puree to the tomatoes.  I've made this countless times over the years and each time for non-Halloween events. Normally, I use a medium sized bowl to form the torte, so that the finished appetizer looks like a dome. In fact, I got the idea to make this torte into a brain by accident a few years ago when I made this torte for a potluck Superbowl party. Rather than waiting to add the red bell pepper puree to the torte when I arrived at the party, I mistakenly layered the bell pepper puree to the inverted torte before I left the house. On the way over, the puree had started to bleed down the edges of the plastic wrapped goat cheese and began to look a lot like a ghoulish brain. By the time I got to the party it looked hideous. I think everyone was afraid to eat it and who could blame them, it wasn't Halloween so the ugly appetizer was not appreciated. Sometimes the missteps lead to better pathways...fast forward to this year, while on my weekly 99cents Only Store run, I see these Brain Molds for a buck. Ding! Ding!...I'm gonna make that ugly ass torte and its going to look fabulous as a brain! This time on purpose! And not only is it going to look festive and ghoulish, it's quite frankly and most importantly, amazingly delicious!

I made this torte twice in a week because I wasn't that happy with the photos and then I ended up liking them both. So you'll see this torte brain two ways, one with the puree added to the brain mold prior to the first cheese layer, which creates a creepy bloody brain and one without the puree which will give you the white brain pictured above. Enjoy being creative and playing around with this delicious appetizer! My husband had a great idea after I'd made the second torte, he suggested adding olives to the front of the brain to mimic eyeballs. I'll definitely try that next year. Happy Halloween!

Ghoulish Goat Cheese Torte
Makes ~3 cups


2- 8oz. Cream Cheese, room temperature
1- 4oz. Goat Cheese, room temperature
4 cloves garlic, finely minced
1/2 cup prepared pesto
1 cup roasted red bell peppers, pureed

In a medium sized bowl or food processor, combine room temperature cheeses and finely minced garlic and mix until incorporated. Set aside.

Place about 1 1/2 cups roasted red bell peppers into a mini food processor and puree. Set aside and refrigerate.

Assembly
note: use room temperature cheese mixture when assembling the torte. If chilled, bring to room temp before assembling.



1. Line the brain mold with plastic wrap.(For a non-Halloween appetizer, use a medium sized bowl instead.)

2. For the white brain (pictured above) layer about 1 1/4 cup of goat cheese mixture into the plastic lined brain mold. Use a spoon to smooth out the cheese. Fold the plastic wrap lightly over the cheese and with the back of your hand press down on the cheese to imprint the brain mold into the cheese.

3. Open the plastic wrap and next layer the 1/2 cup pesto and smooth out.

4. Spoon in the remaining cheese mixture in small amounts to carefully cover the pesto. Once a thick layer of spoonfuls cover the pesto begin to smooth out cheese, taking care not to mix in the pesto layer with the cheese. 

 
5. Fold over the plastic wrap to cover the cheeses and refrigerate for minimum 1 hour or overnight to cool and firm up the cheeses and pesto. 

6. Once chilled, firmly press the plastic covered torte with the back of your hand to further mold the brain. 

7. When read to plate the torte, make sure the torte is completely chilled. Do not attempt to unwrap and flip it onto a plate if it is at room temperature. Unwrap the plastic from the face up cheese layer and place your serving plate over the top of the mold. While holding the plate and the mold, flip over the two together so that the brain comes out of the mold and is now resting on the plate. Carefully remove the rest of the plastic wrap from the brain.

8. Spoon the roasted red bell pepper puree around the molded torte and serve with sliced baguettes or crackers. 

To make the Bloody version of the Ghoulish Goat Cheese Torte (above): Before adding the first cheese layer, add two tablespoons of bell pepper puree to the plastic lined brain mold. Then continue with assembly instructions at step 1.

Here are some other Halloween Inspired recipes to try:
Black Bean Hummus, "Beet"ing Hearts Salad, Candy Corn Sugar Cookies

Slice of Life

I wrote this last night...

It's my oldest son, Jackson's birthday today and I sit alone in a quiet, empty house. My husband took our boys on a Cub Scout camp out for the weekend. My boys were so excited to go that I didn't think that much about not being there to spend his birthday with him. Mainly, because we are having a party for him in a few weeks. At this moment, I do feel a tinge of guilt for not going on the camp out. But honestly, in the next moment, I am happy to have a little alone time to recharge from this hectic schedule I've had since school started. I've been having trouble sleeping for a few weeks now. I think I've averaged 4 hours a night this week alone and I'm exhausted. 
I plopped down on the couch to watch some TV and turned to Netflix to find something to watch. I decided to watch the old TV show, Lost. I'd never seen it. I watched part 2 of the pilot, one of the characters is an 8 month pregnant girl that hadn't felt her baby move since the plane crash two days prior. She was distressed that something was wrong. She accepted some food from the Korean man who'd collected sea urchins and offered it to the group. She took a reluctant bite of his offering. She jumped up; it appeared that she was getting sick over what she just ate. Instead, she screamed with excitement and grabbed the man's hand and forced him to feel her belly. "I can feel him! I can feel him, there's his foot!" she cried out in utter elation like she'd been reacquainted with a long lost friend...no, it was more than that...a long lost love. I started to cry along with her because it reminded me of when I experienced the same thing with my Jackson when I was about 6 1/2 months pregnant.
It was the Fourth of July and we had a large family get together. I had been on my feet all day cooking, cleaning, talking, having fun and doing all the things you do for parties. I love to entertain. Being July, it was warm that day too, but I enjoyed myself and hadn't really noticed that Jackson who normally moved a lot, hadn't moved. As the day wore on, I realized it even more that he still hadn't moved all day. I loved feeling him remind me of his presence each day and night so I felt the pain of his absence that day. While the family and my husband were lighting off fireworks, I went inside to lay down on the couch and prop my feet up. I was exhausted, but I wanted to lay down to see if I could coax Jackson into moving a little for me, once I was still and stretched out. My husband came in to check on me and I began to cry and told him that I hadn't felt Jackson all day. I was worried. After all the activity and company retreated, I fell fast asleep on the couch. I woke up a few hours later to active movement from Jackson. He was stretching and twisting and I was elated and felt tremendous joy and love for the little boy growing inside me, just like the pregnant girl in Lost.  

As a mother, the love you feel for your kids rivals some of the greatest love stories. One of my good friends, Becky, once told me after she had her first son, "I am so totally and completely in love with my son." At the time, I had no children of my own and didn't really understand how she felt, but as soon as I had my sons, I finally understood and felt as Becky did. And with that thought, I sit in my quiet house, enjoying a little moment of solitude but missing my love, my first born son on his 8th birthday.

 

 

Halloween Decorating and Entertaining Ideas

I love Halloween and I love fall and one of the ways I like to celebrate the season is to decorate my house. I put my kiddos in charge of decorating the outside for Halloween. They have tons of fun placing foam headstones and skeletons and hanging spiders from trees. They put pumpkins on the porch and help hang lights with their dad, but I get to decorate the inside.

My favorite fall decorating item is decorating with pumpkins and over the years, I've amassed a fairly large collection of pumpkins. Most of them are ceramic, but I also have grapevine pumpkins, Styrofoam pumpkins, plastic and glass. I didn't set out to collect them, it just happened over time. Mostly, I hit up the clearance sales after Halloween when I can get them for a steal, but sometimes I splurge a little and buy them at the height of the season. Here are just a few of the little vignettes I have around my house using my pumpkins. I hope they'll inspire you.

Here is just a simple arrangement of some rustic pumpkins with glittery branches in a vase with some Dollar Tree ravens. I added some purple mini lights, later after I took this shot so that it could be lit up at night. The night time look was very cool. (Sorry I didn't get a picture of it, but you can use your imagination.:))
 

This arrangement is just inside my entry hallway. You see it when you first walk in my house. I like to vary the heights of the pumpkins and also play up the different sizes and colors and although it looks simple, this display has a lot of texture, height and colors. I like this shot a lot, because the blue vase is kind of unexpected against all the muted browns and oranges. 

I love this wrought iron skeleton. I got this years ago from a Candlelight party. He is so cute and each year I have fun putting him up for display. Here I just placed him with some more rustic looking pumpkins and a Styrofoam headstone and a Grim Reaper statuary I picked up from the Dollar Tree.  I placed a small battery operated flashing light, the ones you buy for pumpkins, just behind the orange pumpkin in the middle so that at night the whole thing flashes with an eerie light. It's a cool effect.

The picture above is the buffet in my dining room and this is one display that has two new pumpkins. The silver one and the red and silver one in the middle are the two I had to buy from Big Lots. This year, Big Lots advertised a glittery line of ceramic and glass pumpkins and they were too pretty to pass up. All those shiny beautiful pumpkins...I had to have them. (Impulse buy? Yes.) Well, I didn't get the one I really wanted because it was $20 and I couldn't justify it. So, I'll wait until they go on clearance and hopefully the $20 mercury glass pumpkin I really wanted, will still be there and I can get it for less. I love the idea of adding sparkle to all my rustic pumpkins. What do you think?

I was playing around with filters and lighting for some of these pics, so forgive me if there are the same pictures but with different lighting. I just couldn't decide which picture I liked better, so I included both. In fact, I have a ton more I'd like to share but I'm leaning toward the side of 'less is more'. :)

I made this skeleton wreath last year after I saw the idea on Pinterest from Dollar Store Crafts. I love this little guy and I think he adds a nice contrast to all the glittery pumpkins, plus he just screams Halloween. Last year, I had him on display on my porch and I only got to see him as I was coming and going. This year, he's inside, front and center in the heart of my home and I get to look at him everyday...he makes me smile. :)
I think I should name him...LOL!

Entertaining Ideas

Here are just a few ideas for entertaining for Halloween. We had our Halloween Dinner Club last weekend and here are some of the things I put together to set a festive mood for our party. 

I played around with a fun idea for marking wine glasses when entertaining for Halloween. I bought a pack of multicolored plastic Halloween rings and looped them around the stems as wine glass charms. Mix up the colors and rings to make your glass unique. The fun begins at night when you turn on a black light and see them glow! Super cute and festive!

Black Bean Hummus

Here, I used two different sizes of plastic margarita glasses from the 99cents Only Store and used them to serve my Black Bean Hummus and Pita chips. The two sizes gives your table some height and interest when entertaining, plus it just plain looks cool. :) I love the 99cents Only Store and at Halloween they have a ton of really inexpensive Halloween decorations and plastic tableware. The creepy cloth and the Styrofoam headstone were also from the 99cents Only Store. I found the small Grim Reaper statue at Dollar Tree along with the small plastic skulls. The glittery pumpkins were bowl filler that I found at Big Lots.  Be creative and mix it up a bit and you'll have a really fun festive table. 

"Beet"ing Hearts Salad with Blood Red Dressing

In the picture above, I bought the skull salad tongs and creepy cloth from 99cents Only Store. The skull was from Target. I had the platter from long ago and I thought the patina on the platter made it look old and spooky, just perfect for a Halloween table. The Salad dressing decanter reminds me of a volumetric flask from chemistry lab and looks great with the Blood Red Dressing to add to the mood.

Here's an idea for setting up your wine bar when you entertain. Grab a bunch of Styrofoam headstones of different sizes and colors and line them up as a background to frame your table and set a festive mood. Most of these I got from the 99cents Only Stores but the big one I got from my neighbor, Lily when she was cleaning out her old decorations. I love hand-me-downs, thank you Lily! Doesn't it look great as the focal point in this setup? :) 

 
I used a plastic cauldron as a wine bucket and had some fun wine bottle labels that I put on the wine bottles. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of this, but at night when it got dark, I threw 2-3 glow sticks into the ice filled cauldron to make it glow with cool color and to light up the inside of the bucket. It was a pretty cool effect.

When I entertain, I like to set the mood and the outside patio table was no exception. Here I made this table scape with all the different small pumpkins I've collected over the years. In this arrangement there are real pumpkins, foam pumpkins, plastic ones, glittery ones and not so glittery ones. Then I added a ton of votive candles and voila! I got these little pumpkin votive candle holders at Michael's on clearance for 25 cents each. Total steal.But the effect is really pretty especially at night. See picture below.

 Here is a picture of my beautiful table scape at night...

Another little fun thing to get when entertaining is to buy some dry ice. Dry ice is carbon dioxide in solid form. When dry ice is at room temperature the solid becomes a gas through a process called sublimation, which is a fancy word to describe when compounds move from a solid to gaseous state without first turning into a liquid.  When carbon dioxide sublimes, it gives off the eerie heavy gas you see below. Dry ice is extremely cold and will burn you if you are not careful but its fun to watch sublime in air and when placed in liquids. (CAUTION: Take extreme care if placing in liquids that you do not ingest the dry ice, it will burn you)
The other photo is a beverage dispenser that my husband filled up with a tasty punch (wink) and placed glow sticks in the dispenser, see the little glow inside the punch? (My husband wanted me to make sure I said that as a safety measure he placed the glow sticks in a small Ziploc bag before placing them in the punch, in case the glow sticks started to leak.)The little test tubes next to it, again were purchased from 99centsOnly Store this last summer. Throw a black light on it and watch it glow.

 
Lastly, this was an idea I had a few year's ago for my oldest son's 6th birthday party. His birthday is October 25th (He turns 8 tomorrow-yay!) and he's always game to have Halloween themed birthday parties. (On the inside, I'm so excited because I love Halloween and I'm happy to dream up fun ideas for the party.) This particular year he also wanted a "Candy Bar" for his party. So I gave it some thought and went out and bought every kind of Halloween candy under the sun. I bought eyeballs, gummy body parts, candy corn, pumpkin suckers and a few packages of the Peeps Halloween Ghosts just to name a few. But I was uncertain at how to include the Marshmallow ghosts in the bar since they were sticky and unwrapped. And then I got this idea when I purchased some glittery branches from Michael's. I wrapped each ghost in small plastic bags (from Michael's in the candy making/cake decorating aisle) and hung marshmallow ghosts on the branches and it served as the centerpiece to the whole candy bar. It was super cute! Anyway, I apologize for the bad pic, it was taken 2 years ago with my old crappy cell phone. But it will give you an idea of what the finished Candy Bar looked like. HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

If you want to see more Halloween Ideas and what's coming up next before I blog it, LIKE  "Castellon's Kitchen" on Facebook. (Click the Facebook link at top of my home page)

Also for some fun Halloween-inspired recipes, click the "Halloween Food" label in the right-hand column of my home page.

Candy Corn Sugar Cookies

I couldn't let Halloween go by without making some sort of Halloween inspired dessert. Since I was pure out of ideas to make something of my own, I found these cute cookies on Pinterest from the blog Kathie Cooks. They were perfect since I had most of the ingredients on hand, with the exception of the lemon, but I substituted with lemon extract. Anyway, these are a breeze to make and the recipe makes over 6 dozen cookies so if you need to make them for a get together or kids party you are sure to have enough for everyone.  I think you could even top cupcakes with these little cuties. So festive and cute. Enjoy and Happy Halloween!

Other Halloween-inspired recipes: Black Bean Hummus, Autumn Beet and Artichoke Salad

Candy Corn Sugar Cookies (slightly adapted recipe from Kathie Cooks)

2 sticks of butter, softened
1c. sugar
1 egg
2 T. Lemon juice
2 t. Lemon Zest
1/8 t/ salt
3 cups flour
1/2 t. baking soda
red food coloring
yellow food coloring
1/2 c. granulated sugar (for dusting)
 
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Combine butter and sugar in a large bowl; beat at medium speed until creamy. Add egg, lemon juice, lemon zest(I substituted with 1/2 t. lemon extract) and salt. continue beating until well mixed. Add flour and baking soda, beat until well mixed. Divide dough into thirds. Press 1/3 of the white dough evenly into the bottom of a parchment paper, foil or plastic wrap-covered loaf pan. Place the remaining two thirds of the dough in a bowl and add yellow food coloring to color the dough a bright yellow. Divide the yellow dough in half and place one half of the yellow dough into another bowl to dye orange. Add one drop of red food coloring to one of the two yellow dough halves. Combine well until you get a bright orange dough. Next, press the orange dough layer  on top of the white dough and then repeat with the yellow dough. Cover and refrigerate until firm. (2 hours or overnight is best.)

Once chilled, invert your loaf pan and unwrap your dough. Flip the loaf over so that the yellow side is resting on the cutting board. Cut loaf crosswise into 1/4-inch slices using a sharp knife, trimming edges to make even, if necessary. Cut each slice into wedges. Place each candy corn cookies onto a plate of sugar to coat and then place 1-inch apart onto a lightly greased cookie sheet. Bake for 7-10 minutes in a preheated 375 degree oven. Let cool until easy to handle but still warm and place in plate of sugar to coat with sugar a second time. Place on a wire rack to cool completely. Store in an air tight container.