HALLOWEEN, SUGAR SKULLS, AND CANDY CORN

By Liz Gilbert

Ah, Halloween, All Hallows Eve, Dia de los Muertos, Day of the Dead, a day of costumes, candy, parties, demons, the dead, and great food.

Every year, my best friend goes all out and has the best Halloween party ever! She decorates the house, with plenty of tombstones, rats, creepy severed hands, scary lighting, and an amazing Dia de los Muertos shrine.

We all dress up in fun costumes, the year before last I went as Supergirl and kicked some ass. Actually I just ate a ton of great food, and drank a wee-bit too much.

Anyway, GREAT time.

I usually go early to help make the food as my friend and her husband, are always running around like chickens with their heads cut off trying to get everything ready. They always make the best food though. It's amazing, because there are never any leftovers by the end of the night. I guess you need something to soak up all that alcohol.

My favorite thing about her parties is the Dia de los Muertos shrine. We always make sugar skulls, we have candles lit everywhere, little skeletons with hats and Day of the Dead, decorations. I absolutely love to make and decorate the sugar skulls. Giving them funny faces, scary faces, and the just plain weird faces is really cool. I made one with spikes coming out of his head and colored out teeth. I named him Fred.

The year before, the recipe we used to make the skulls didn't work very well though, the sugar was too loose, and they didn't hold together very well. They kept crumbling when you picked them up. So, this last time, I was prepared. I went online to find a new recipe to test before the big party. I found this awesome website with a whole bunch of Halloween recipes, including one for sugar skulls. www.best-halloween-recipes-ever.com

They also had recipes for candy corn, caramel apples, homemade pumpkin pie, and ever a recipe for butterbeer! The drink of choice for the Harry Potter gang!

Anyway, I tried making the sugar skulls from their recipe, and they turned out great!

I then tried a few of the other recipes, to bring to my friend's party. Butterbeer is fantastic, I totally felt like Hermione sitting in the Three Broomsticks in Hogsmeade village.

I also, made some candy corn, which is so much more tasty when it's fresh! It might be a Halloween miracle!

So, I brought the sugar skull recipe, my own homemade candy corn, and some caramel apples to the party, and they went over great. The apples were gone as soon as they were set out, and we didn't have any candy corn left at the end of the night either.

I was so pleased with myself, that I can't wait until this Halloween to try some of the other recipes. Well, with Thanksgiving coming up next month, I'm sure I can still make a wicked pumpkin pie and those delicious sounding pumpkin chocolate chip muffins.

This Halloween try something new, step away from those boring old cupcakes and cookies, and try something homemade and delicious, and you'll never go back to those old, boring staples.