A Witch's Brew

Happy Halloween!

I went to a Halloween party, and was assigned to bring the alcoholic beverages. Bummer! How do you make themed drinks that can keep up with the kids who got assigned dessert? Dessert is always the best for matching a theme.

Anyways, I perused the Internet, and decided to make two things. The first were jello shots, which I thought I could spruce up with gummy worms, awesome presentation, and bright colors. Here's the recipe I (pretended to?) used: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Tainted-Fruit-Shots/Detail.aspx


I made two batches. The first used strawberry flavored jello. I accidentally got my measurements wrong, and ended up with 1 3/4 cups of vodka and 1/4 cup of cold water, rather then the 1 1/4 cups vodka and the 3/4 water the recipe actually called for.

I put the mix into individual 3oz cups. I would have preferred black cups, but had to settle with what they had at Target, which were green. I placed them in the fridge for about an hour, then put the gummy worms in, so that the mix had solidified enough that the worms wouldn't just sink to the bottom.


The second batch, with the green jello, had the "correct" measurements. This batch never really solidified like the red batch did. It was great for taking them as shooters, but not so great for making rotten fruit. The jello wasn't really solid enough to transport outside of a cup. I ended up eating the rotten fruit myself! Gee. Such torture.


The way to make the rotten fruit is to slice an orange, and then sink the slices of rind into the slightly solidified jello. I'd use an 8x8 square pan, or something similar. When the jello is set (normally about 4 hours) you can cut the rinds out and then shape each one to look more like a slice. My picture gives you an idea of what they'd look like. Do-able, adorable. But a lot more work than the gummy worm shots.
I spruced up the presentation on my wormy shots by putting down a layer of "dirt" made of a mix of brown sugar and coffee, and then putting plastic spiders and additional gummy worms all over. This probably would have looked super cool if I'd used all green, rather than the mix of red and green.

Every party needs some sort of punch. You can't survive on jello shots alone. I took some inspiration from the following recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/candy-corn-cordials-recipe/index.htmland then entirely changed everything around. I made the candy corn infused vodka, which didn't really taste like candy corn, but had an AWESOME bright orange color. I think if I did it again, I'd infuse the vodka overnight, rather than three hours, and just let the candy corn dissolve entirely into the vodka. When I served it, I used a handle of the vodka, a liter of sprite, a liter of 7-up, and half a bottle of orange liquer. It was a lot of punch. I had intended on using the lemon juice, but forgot to grab it in the rush to get out of my house. These things happen.

To make the punch more spooky, I also made "zombie hand" ice cubes, to float in the punch and keep it cool. Just take latex gloves, wash the outside throughly, then flip them inside out, and fill with water. Hang them in the freezer for 24 hours. When you want to use them, run them under hot water for a few seconds to loosen the latex, then peel it off. Watch out, because the fingers are delicate and will break, but that just makes the hands more creepy! The final trick for making a totally awesome witch's brew is dry ice. Create a sort of double boiler. I used a big silver basin, but it would have been cooler with a cauldron. Make some type of platform in the cauldron (I used a big pot), and then put water (any temp, but the hotter the water the more smoke you'll get) into the bottom. Add a few pieces of dry ice, and TA-DAAAAA! You've got a smokey witch's brew! You really don't need much dry ice to keep it smoking all night. 1lb, maybe 2, will probably be more than enough.


Other items worthy of a shout out at this party (add your recipes, please!):

Katie's rotten deviled eggs

Lisa's finger cookies:

Floren's adorable chocolate pumpkin cake:

Rachel's AWESOME graveyard cake (she made those toppers herself!):

I don't have a picture of it, but Dean's pork tenderloin was delish and perfectly moist. Overall, everyone did a great job of working within the theme to come up with a great spread! Please post your recipes, and if you've got pics of your own dishes, let me know and I'll post them!