Autumn/Halloween stuff that you like?

[wesleysgirl]

Okay, lay it on me...

It's definitely fall here in New England - the nights are cold, the leaves are turning color, and we're only a few weeks away from Halloween. If you enjoy any of the things associated with this time of year, share them with me!

Do you have a favorite Halloween/scary movie?

A favorite food that you associate with autumn weather and/or Halloween?

If you celebrate Halloween, what do you do to celebrate it?

Comments

[kimberly-a.livejournal.com]

I, too, am a big fan of The Nightmare Before Christmas -- it's a pivotal part of our household tradition to watch it on Halloween night. As for other scary movies, I'm actually quite fond of Scream, because I enjoy how it simultaneously emulates and satirizes the genre. I'm not a big fan of scary movies -- especially ones that involve people/things jumping out unexpectedly -- so I usually close my eyes during the really suspenseful parts.

But Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin ... how can you miss with them?

As for food, I have these pumpkin cookies I like to make. They're supposed to have raisins, but I substitute tart dried cherries, because I like the flavor better. I haven't made them in a while, since the recipe calls for shortening, which just doesn't feel healthy these days, but the cookies are yummy. Do you know of a good substitute for shortening?

Also: hot, spiced apple cider.

Also, going out of my way to step on crunchy leaves on the sidewalk. In autumn, I tend to weave a rather wending path when I'm out walking, occasionally -- when I see a particularly "juicy" big dry leaf -- stomping down with a bit more force than necessary.

[wesleysgirl.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen the original Scream for years! I'll have to see it again. (A little boy in our neighborhood excitedly told me this morning that he's going to be "Scream 4" for Halloween, LOL! Um, and the Scream 4 character looks different from the original Scream character how?)

I don't know what you could do instead of shortening... I think it's a different texture, you know? I guess I'd try with an equal amount of butter first and see what happens. If the results weren't terrible, I'd probably then try using half butter and half applesauce (which is a great substitute for some of the fat in baked goods, and I think the apple would be great with pumpkin and cranberry.)

[kimberly-a.livejournal.com]

After reading your comment and being extra extra intrigued by the possibility of applesauce in my cookies (I've used it as a substitute for oil in muffins and other baked goods before, but never for shortening, since shortening isn't used in a lot of modern recipes.), I found these two useful-looking webpages:

Common Ingredient Substitutions
Healthy Recipes: A guide to ingredient substitutions

(I thought I'd list the URLs here, since you might find them useful, too.)

The Mayo Clinic page suggests applesauce for half the recipe's required shortening, but they warn quite explicitly not to replace the rest of the shortening with oil, but it looks like butter might be okay. So maybe half butter and half applesauce. Hmm. I'll have to try this recipe again soon! Thanks for getting me thinking about it more actively.