Food to die for Recipes & stories from America's most legendary haunted places

This hybrid cookbook will appeal to ghosthunters and Halloween party planners. Bona fide professional paranormal researcher Bruni, a go-to source for reality TV programs, gathers 50 or so U.S. places that have earned the sobriquet haunted, providing ghoulish details plus a recipe or two from each site. Divided into five categories--hotels, homes, watering holes, historic landmarks, hellish institutions, and ghoulish ghost towns--each place receives a well-researched write-up along with reports of apparitions and ghostly noises. Accompanying recipes are usually borrowed from a local cookbook or hotel/restaurant/bar menu. For readers curious about the ghost-hunting biz, Bruni and Tremaine detail types of experiences and how to capture evidence, from a voice recorder to a spirit box. Dishes, most of which are familiar, provide a good flavor of the haunted place they represent, like Key West's Bloody Mary, cinnamon sugar cookies from Alcatraz, and Mary Todd Lincoln's white almond cake (representing the White House). At the end, seven suggested menus with titles like "a toothsome turn-of-the-century gala" and "a bloodcurdling brunch" provide whole meals "to die for."

Paranormal investigator Bruni combines her work as a TV host, podcaster, author, and self-described foodie to highlight some of the most famous haunted locations in the United States and pair them with recipes that reflect their history and ghostly lore, in a book written with Julie Tremaine. Enthusiasts can read about the Lizzie Borden home and make her killer meatloaf, then get drawn in to the White House to learn about Mary Todd Lincoln's obsession with spiritualism and make her favorite white almond cake. Featured are additional infamous haunted homes, hotels, and landmarks that are showcased with bold photography, along with sometimes-macabre paired recipes. Bruni also includes explanations of the basics of paranormal investigation, which lends credibility to the subsequent stories of hauntings. The recipes, while written a bit inconsistently (some list ingredients first, while others list preparation steps first), offer many options to put on spectacular themed events and dinner parties. VERDICT This niche cookbook will be of great interest to a specific group of readers and cooks, paranormal activity aficionados and fans of ghostly legends in particular.--Ron Block