Happy Halloween: the scary night!

Trick or treat* ?

Halloween is celebrated on 31 October. It’s an exciting event in the United States and in Great Britain. Every American calendar has Halloween marked on it. Halloween has ancient Celtic origins.

The Celtic priests, called druids, practised religious rituals. They also predicted the future. On this day the Celts made big fires and dressed in scary costumes. They wanted to frighten the evil spirits. They dressed as ghosts, skeletons and witches.

They believed that ghosts came out of their tombs on the night of 31 october.

In the 19th century Irish immigrants took their Halloween customs to the United States. They introduced the custom of « trick or treating ». American and British children and teenagers go « trick-or-treating » on Halloween evening. They go from house to house in their costumes and ring doorbells. When the door opens they shout : « Trick or treat* ? ». People usually give them sweets or money. If not, the children play a trick ! They write on windows with soap or spray shaving cream on cars and people !

*des bonbons ou un sort

American teenagers have a Halloween party in the evening. The party is usually in the school gymnasium and everyone wears a costume and mask. The best costume usually wins a price.

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Halloween Sweets Almost Too Cute to Eat

American Pumkin Pie

Ingredients
2 kg of pumpkin
½ litre of milk
4 eggs
4 tablespoons of flour
1 teaspoon of baking powder
100 g of butter
¼ teaspoon of salt
¼ teaspoon of cinnamon powder

Cut the pumpkin into smallpieces and remove the peel.
Put the pieces into a big saucepan and add the milk.
Cook the mixture for 30 minutes and don’t forget to mix it while it’s cooking.
Now break the eggs into a bowl.
Add the flour, baking powder, butter, salt and cinnamon powder.
Mix these ingredients well.
Add the pumpkin and milk mixture to the ingredients in the bowl and mix.
Put the mixture into a non-stick pie dish.
Put the dish into the oven (180°C) for one hour.
Serve the pumpkin pie cold.

Happy Halloween !!!!!

Halloween Brownies

Ingredients
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into pieces, plus more for pan
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pan
1 1/4 teaspoons coarse salt
1 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed light-brown sugar
Royal Icing for Halloween Brownies

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter a 9-by-13-inch baking pan, and line it with parchment, leaving a 2-inch overhang on 2 sides. Butter and flour parchment, tapping out excess.
Combine flour and salt in a small bowl. Melt butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Sift cocoa powder over butter, and whisk to combine. Let cool 3 minutes. Gently whisk in vanilla and eggs, then stir in sugars and flour mixture until just combined. Spread batter evenly in prepared pan.
Bake until top is firm and set, about 30 minutes. Transfer pan to a wire rack, and let cool for 20 minutes. Remove brownies from pan using parchment overhang, and let cool on wire rack. Cut brownies and decorate using royal icing, as desired. Brownies will keep at room temperature for up to 3 days.

This Halloween brownie recipe is adapted from the October 2008 issue of Martha Stewart Living.

Halloween’s events in Paris
(via evous.fr)

24 Nov. => Thanksgiving