Hangovers Be Gone!!!
 |
| Oh. My. God. |
Evening all,
Raise your hand if you drank near-illegal quantities of alcoholic
beverages last night.
*Hand shoots up so fast that it dislocates shoulder*.
I hope you all had a fantastic Halloween and regardless of
what you did and whatever your physical state has been in today, it was all a good
laugh. I spent the evening round my friend Laura’s flat with her workmate Rob
where all three of us got absolutely wrecked playing the ‘Hocus Pocus’ drinking game. If
there’s anything that I have learnt from this Disney film, it’s that:
- Bette Midler abuses her sisters too much.
- Sarah Jessica Parker is a complete perve throughout the entire movie.
- The other one barks too much.
- The word ‘children’ is used an unacceptable amount of times.
So, what to do?
If you think a good idea would be to dig into a wholesome, hearty,
comforting bowl of cheesy pumpkin pasta, then I would say that you my friend
are someone that I would like to go out drinking with!
This dinner was so easy, tasty and satisfying that I didn’t
feel like I was missing out on all the heavily salted, fast food options
that were (way too easily) available. You don’t really taste the pumpkin in
this recipe but it adds fantastic colour, texture and nutrition with vitamins
B, C, D, E and K as well calcium, potassium and magnesium! Furthermore, the
smooth, cheesy-chive sauce smothers the pasta in a rich and decadent manner
that completely tricks the taste buds into thinking this meal is 100% sinful. How fitting to be tricked in the best way possible by a treat, right
after Halloween!
Hang on a second! Hold the phone! What about the Cursed
event at Pitsea that I was droning on about yesterday? I realize that I am yet
to mention it in this post but don’t worry I haven’t forgotten (I won’t be able
to for at least 6 years). I have included a run-through of mine and my friend’s
experience at Cursed below today’s recipe so if you like; you can spend tonight
gorging on pumpkin pasta, reading a spooky review and all whilst nurturing
those post-All Hallows Eve feelings one last time…
…Or until next year at least. ;)
Happy feasting and
Hello November!
Cheesy Pumpkin Pasta
Serves 3-4
Ingredients:
3-4 servings of whole wheat (or whatever variety of) pasta - I used 75g per person
2 cups pumpkin puree or roasted/steamed and diced pumpkin
1/3 cup Greek yoghurt
1/2 packed cup (50g) mature cheddar cheese (can opt for reduced fat versions)
1 cup vegetable stock (can use a low-salt brand such as Kallo)
1 tsp garlic granules or 1-2 cloves garlic
1 tsp chives (dried or fresh)
Pepper to taste and additional salt if desired (I didn't add any)
Optional - a pinch of cayenne pepper to give it a kick
Optional - 1 tbsp Parmesan
Instructions:
Cook the pasta according to package directions.Whilst the pasta is cooking, combine the remaining ingredients in a food processor or blender and blend until a smooth, creamy pasta sauce texture is achieved. If the sauce texture does not seem creamy enough feel free to add in a few small splashes of almond milk in between blending until a consistency you are happy with is reached.
Once the Pasta has cooked, drain it, before returning to the pan and covering with the sauce,
Stir to coat the pasta whilst over a low heat for a couple of minutes.
Top with some chopped chives as a garnish and serve immediately to people so they can eat it with their faces.
What Happened At The Cursed...
After a week or so of waiting, the evening finally arrived. An evening that would be based around, adrenaline, fear and mild heavy-petting. The weak would fall, the brave may only just survive but all would have to face the same fate - A night that was dark and full of terrors...
...Ok before I go too Game of Thrones on you, I would just like to say that I am in no way sponsored/employed by or promoting this event. I am simply an attendee who found enough spare time on a Sunday to write a little re-cap of his experience at Essex's Cursed 2015. Overall, (although it may seem that I take the piss at times) this event was incredibly enjoyable and both me, my friend Ellen and her sister Beth all came away with some very good memories. Our night began with an eerie walk from Pitsea train station to Wat Tyler Park in near total darkness. Luckily, Beth had her phone on hand to light the way meaning that none of us ended up neither breaking an ankle or worse - stepping in dog crap. After a brief 20 minute queue, we were wrist- banded, put into a group with six other victims and set on our route where we were told to follow the green lights in single file and as a rule, enter any door with flashing orange lights above it. It was all a bit too traffic-lights for me (I don't enjoy learning to drive for a reason). We strolled along the path of green glow sticks until we reached out first stop and that's where the fun began ...
The Toy-shop – This wasn’t
on the schedule, what the hell? Toy-shop? I hadn't prepared myself for this and even worse. the acting at first was a bit over the top. I should mention that over-acting is something that actually causes me to get mildly anxious. Sweaty palms already and we hadn't even gone through one maze yet, Strewth! Despite being caught off guard, it was pretty much what you would expect; Hanging dollies, dismembered toys and creepy men saying how lovely our skin would be to make into dolls (cheers
babe, I put it down to avocado). The best feature was right at the end where we had to squeeze through a narrow corridor with walls covered
in teddies (under one of which a man’s head popped out – literal teddy birth). An average but fun start to our journey.
The Pig pen – After walking across a ridiculously foggy field outside
we reached our second maze, the pig pen. Made up of metal grated fences it was full of people stalking around the cage-like structure dressed up as human-pig hybrids. We too had to
weave around the fences/pens whilst being grunted and screamed at but luckily for us we had some dashing young men in
our group who the pigs took a liking to. This meant that they left us alone pretty much. Again, this was quite good especially considering it was probably the cheapest
set of the night.
The Forest – maybe
this was meant to be the field of screams – no one could tell at this point as
to whether the 8 Cursed mazes were actually being utilized but to be honest nobody really cared. We were guided through a section of the woods by a seemingly nice
woman who was clearly from Pitsea herself (most risky part of the evening for sure). She
told tales of an abandoned diamond mine where people died leaving their spirits
roaming the woods (diamonds in Pitsea? Please!). Another tale involved little children who had disappeared in the forest only leaving behind ribbons tied to trees. The walk ended with us being chased by people who
were either not really dressed up in Halloween gear at all or made to look like
cousin it from the Adams family – girl looked fine. A particular funny moment for me was when Ellen got
over excited and ran into a bramble bush. She actually managed to leave scarred (although not in the way we originally thought).
The Mine – This was possibly
the one that came closest to actually scaring me. The reason for this was due to the fact that it played on claustrophobia, something that always gets my heart rate up. The first corridor was one of
those inflatable crusher tunnels where you’re squeezed tighter than you were
at birth and left completely enveloped by darkness. The rest of this maze was only made harder to navigate due to some sections being so small that you had to crouch/crawl through and also because our group lacked the brain power to figure out where the exit was. All the time whilst we were in there scary miners jumped out at us in the darkness. This maze was really good and well thought out although it lost a
few points for the miners not being hot enough or shirtless.
Broth Hell – The First
part of this maze was a little confusing (again not good for our group's limited IQ) and consisted of a mini maze where the corridors just seemed to go around in a circle and
lead back to one small room. After a few minutes of all of us waiting in the room like lost puppies the lights were cut –and a freaky prostitute jumped out to scare us. The rest of the corridors held more scary prostitutes (some tied to beds etc) and a really weird springy floor section that scared Ellen half to death as
she thought she had stepped on somebody’s face in the darkness. This was definitely an interesting design for a horror
maze, although I would say that the Red Light District in Amsterdam is about 1000 times scarier.
Uncle Tyler’s Workchop – I thought this one would be lame – it wasn’t. All started off well as the sign outside made me laugh a bit too hard by reading 'No
preggies or sickies' however, the rest of this haunt proved anything but funny. The interior was similar to a warehouse set up with machinery, cages, wooden boards and plastic sheeting. It was also very dark and featured a large number of jump-scares from more pig-people, although these ones were dressed in building attire. At one point one
of the actors started crawling around our legs and because I didn’t see him, I
think I may have kicked him in the head (dearest apologies). Whats more, the layout was an actual maze with multiple routes (I think) and as a result we did abandon lose some of the people at the end of our group.
#Survivalofthefittest. The layout for the workchop was really well-planned and also utilized sounds and smells effectively - how they got it to smell like burning rubber and sulfur, I don't even want to know.
Cell 13 – We were very wrong with our prediction about this maze, it wasn’t
a laboratory theme at all but an asylum. This was probably the best one of the whole night so it was quite fitting that it was our last stop. It had the classics like people reaching/screaming through cell windows and extreme strobe lighting that
rendered you near blind but it also included twists such as electric chairs and actors walking up walls and across the ceilings.
They stroked Ellen's hair, told Beth that they liked her smell and crawled around our
legs enough to make me shriek like an elderly woman who has just seen a toad in her
trifle (mmmm trifle) Focus Alex! The finale was something that I should have seen coming – a chainsaw wielding maniac chase. As I was at the back of the
group with Beth by this point, I near enough shat my pants.
We had such a fun time at this event and it was the perfect balance between not being too scary but also not being too crap. As a pretty big horror fan, I enjoyed the creativity of the genres used whilst also getting a good few scares and a laugh whilst both Ellen and
Beth (not as big horror fans) also enjoyed it due to the scares not being too intense. All round I would say that it was a winner and I definitely think it’s worth grabbing
your mates and giving it a go if you want to have some mild adrenaline pumping fun next Halloween. Scary but not terrifying = something that everyone can enjoy. I would say that I am definitely going next year
but I think Thorpe Park’s Fright Night may be calling my name. ;)
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