Lisa Richards' Breakfast Drink

from the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook

Another very nice offering for breakfast from the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook isLisa Richards' Breakfast Drink.  A simple combination of low-fat yoghurt, fresh strawberries, a touch of honey, and a half of a banana if you'd like it, this is a beautiful way to begin the day on a summer morning in Collinsport, or anywhere else.  In 1989, when the cookbook first appeared, healthy breakfast drinks and smoothies were not so well known as they are today, already prepared and available at the market.  But make this one yourself and see how nice it is and how good it is for you too, as the author says.  Try it with a slice of Marie Wallace's Wheat Germ Bread and you've got a great morning meal that will keep you going until noon.

(David Selby's) Quentin's Thirst Quencher and Midnight Haunt Sandwich

from the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook

When I first took a look at the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook one of the things I was most curious about was what David Selby might have contributed to it since Quentin Collins was one of my favorite characters.  His natural charisma and distinctive dramatic style made him completely likable and also made one wonder what he was like off the set, and of course, what he liked to eat.  What I found surprised me.  A sweet and tart brew of lemonade and orange juice and a triple decker sandwich.  The lemonade, Quentin's thirst Quencher mixes frozen lemonade concentrate with the juice of freshly squeezed oranges.  With respect for Mr. Selby, I altered it slightly and used prepared lemonade instead of concentrate and added sliced oranges as well as orange juice.  It's a sparkling and refreshing drink either way and is indeed a thirst quencher.  For the Midnight Haunt Sandwich I used a loaf of freshly baked white bread and a ripe tomato.  It also included bologna, lettuce, yellow mustard, and mayonnaise.  I hadn't eaten bologna in a long time but I can honestly say that it was scrumptious and I enjoyed every bite.  Eating was believing here and I would be pleased to have it again.  A nice combination of ingredients and an old fashioned treat, it was a bit reminiscent of the Dagwood Sandwich days, now gone alas.  Curiously, what I thought about while enjoying the sandwich was when and where Quentin might have made this  snack for himself, and why he called it "midnight haunt."  When he wasn't out in town, Quentin spent a good deal of his time sequestered in his suit of rooms in the east wing of Collinwood and I have always believed that there was a kitchenette up there somewhere that he regularly used.  It is a 40 room house after all.  
As for midnight, this is a perfect sandwich for a late night snack.  It's quick and easy to prepare, and something you can really sink your teeth into after a intense night of werewolfing  in the woods and out in town.

Diana Millay's Vampire's Delight and Dracula's Sunset Cocktails

from the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook

Among some of the more intriguing contributions to the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook are two vampiric cocktails from the occult kitchen of beguiling Diana Millay.  Vampire's Delight is sweet, red, and potent, concocted with fragrant gin, grenadine syrup, and spiked with orangey zest of Grand Marnier.  It indeed has the particular red color that would attract and delight a thirsty vampire.  You'll love it too, perhaps as an after dinner cocktail, but one beforehand wouldn't spoil the appetite either.  It's a nice aromatic drink and an imaginative blend of elements.

Miss Millay's second recipe is for Dracula's Sunset and calls for Chartreuse yellow  as the featured ingredient.  I enjoy Chartreuse very much and purchase the more commonly available green preparation.  The yellow is less often seen in liquor shops, although this would pose no problem for a phoenix at whose command anything might appear.  As it happened, I asked our local purveyor of spirits if he could order a bottle of Chartreuse yellow for me and he said he just happened to have a case in back that had been shipped to him by mistake.  Mere serendipity, or the power of phoenix magic?  I'm really not making this up.  I discovered the crystal skull of vodka by chance at the same time and thought it was perfect to evoke the mood, as well as being something that I imagined Miss Millay would probably have chosen herself.  One part of Chartreuse is blended with two parts of vodka for a subtly sweet, herbal, floral, and mildly intoxicating drink that is definitely worth trying.  I would not be surprised to find Barnabas sipping one (or two) of these upon arising since it is to be served at sunset.  And it has a beautifully surreal color that is hard to describe.  This is the kind of drink you'd expect from the hand of a sorceress like Laura Collins, who probably offered these to visitors she lured to Matthew's cottage while she was a guest there.  A side note to the recipe is my recommendation of a movie about the lives of the Carthusian monks at the Chartreuse monastery entitled "Into Great Silence."  It's the first and only time anyone has been permitted to film the activities inside the this unique and remote location in the French Alps and it includes a section devoted to how the 400 year old secret recipe liqueur is produced.  Be warned however, once under its spell you may become addicted!

Grayson Hall's Obscenely Simple Spiced Tea Punch

from the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook

Naturally the chapter including drinks in the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook is interesting.  Cocktail and bar books are always fascinating and we're always curious about what people are drinking.  I was struck by Grayson Hall's Obscenely Simple Spiced Tea Punch and decided to try it today.  Tea based punches hold a standard place in in the history of cookery and drinkery and this one was indeed as simple as adding water, or perhaps boiling water that is.  But the addition of freshly squeezed orange and lemon juice, then sweetened and infused with allspice turned it into something extra special.  It's refreshing iced but would be quite nice served hot on a winter night, in the Collinwood drawing room perhaps, where it likely would be spiked, or "deuced" as the author says, with some of Roger's brandy or whiskey sitting on the shelf nearby.  This is another recipe that one might expect from Grayson Hall being interesting, zesty, and distinctive.

Ken McEwen's Curry/Plum Appetizer

from the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook

Ken McEwen, Associate Producer of Dark Shadows, has come up with another practical yet elegant recipe that continues to make the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook interesting and peppered with the unusual.  Here is his Curry/Plum Appetizer. Kicked up a notch from the red pepper jelly and cream cheese that we all know and love, this is very exotic with the cream cheese having been seasoned with curry powder, and then smothered with a combination of chutney and damson plum preserve.  But this is not just any chutney.  Mr. McEwen specifies Raffeto Chestnut Chutney.  The Rafetto company has been in business since the nineteenth century as manufacturers and purveyors of gourmet foods, but with so many specialty food items on the market you have to search for their products.  Also, it appears that they no longer make the chestnut chutney but have replaced it with what they call Chut-Nut Colonial Chutney which includes black walnuts among the many other ingredients in this intriguing blend of fruits, vegetables, and spices.  Combined with the damson plum preserve this makes a fabulous cloak for a ball of curry flavored cream cheese.  Topped with chopped walnuts and served with Triscuts, as the recipe calls for, this is at once a sweet, savory, salty, crunchy, tangy, creamy, spicy, bite of...well you try it and see.  Serve it for a party, or maybe just have it for snacks with drinks while you're watching some of your favorite Dark Shadows episodes.

Donna McKechnie's Onion Rounds

from the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook

I always thought to myself that Donna McKechnie was someone who would be fun to meet at a party, so I was not at all surprised to find that she had contributed a recipe for party fare to the Dark Shadows Celebrity Cookbook.  Donna's recipe is for a great little hors d'oeuvre called Onion Rounds.  Circles of sour dough bread the size of a quarter are topped with thinly sliced onions and then a spot of finely chopped bacon mixed with a bit of mayonnaise.  The rounds are broiled for just a minute or two and served hot.  Here's a recipe where the end result is much more than the sum of its parts.  I was pleasantly surprised to find that the onion slice cooked very gently and the bacon and mayonnaise mixture turned a golden brown.  Each bite was absolutely savory and left you wanting another.  Donna says to allow five per person, but that can be up to you.  And don't forget the dusting of paprika.  I am very fond of Donna and loved the sparkle and energy she brought to her characters.  I guarantee these cocktail bites will be the hit of your next party.  Try them with dry Martinis before dinner or with a Bloody Mary before brunch and imagine you're being entertained by Amanda Harris and that you are contemplating that mysterious portrait of Quentin.