Make the Food To Die For Recipe for Lizzie Borden’s Meatloaf

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As soon as the calendar flips to September, it’s officially Spooky Season. But to paranormal investigator, Amy Bruni, it’s a year-round thing. The Newport resident, ghost hunter and TV star of “Kindred Spirits” and “Ghost Hunters” just released a new cookbook, Food to Die For: Recipes and Stories from America’s Most Legendary Haunted Places.

The book pairs haunted destinations with recipes that relate to them. Bruni got the idea for the book after exploring America’s most haunted locations through her TV shows and podcast, Haunted Road.

“The idea of writing this cookbook came to me over years of investigating the paranormal,” she said in a statement for her book release. “Food has a long history of bringing people together. I hope Food to Die For inspires exploration of the spooky world.”

I can envision many Halloween parties with menus focused around recipes from Food to Die For, including Lizzie Borden House’s meatloaf from Fall River, Massachusetts; seafood chowder from the Hawthorne Hotel in witchcraft-centered Salem, Massachusetts; or penne al la vodka from Twisted Vine Restaurant in Derby, Connecticut, where a flood claimed eighty-seven lives and unearthed coffins from cemeteries. For dessert, there might be cinnamon cookies from Alcatraz or white almond cake from the White House. Rhode Island locations with recipes include the haunted White Horse Tavern in Newport and its lobster mac and cheese, and the Valley Inn in Portsmouth.

Bruni teamed up with renowned local journalist and cookbook author Julie Tremaine, who has also written for Rhode Island Monthly magazine, to brainstorm, test and execute the recipes, especially the ones with meat, since Bruni is a pescatarian.

The more than fifty recipes are accompanied by the stories behind each dish as well as beautiful photography. Locations featured in the book include eerie hotels, haunted homes, historic landmarks, hellish institutions and ghost towns.

Here’s a sneak peek recipe for Lizzie Borden’s meatloaf:

LIZZIE BORDEN’S MEATLOAF

This recipe comes straight from Lizzie Borden’s handwritten recipe card from the early 1900s, which is now the property of the Fall River Historical Society. We do not recommend this recipe for guests unless you are perhaps entertaining otherworldly guests.

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Cook Time: 1 hour

Yield: 6 to 8 servings

Lizzie Borden’s Meatloaf. Photo by Emily Dorio.

INGREDIENTS

1 pound steak

½ pound pork steak

1 egg

1 small onion

3 soda crackers

Herbs

Salt and pepper

Lizzie’s recipe is very bare, so I’ve added a few notes:

1. Make sure both the beef and the pork steak are ground or minced.

2. Dice the onion, crumble the crackers, and chop the herbs (we used a small onion, three whole saltine crackers—not divided on the dotted lines, and a tablespoon each of fresh thyme, basil, and parsley).

3. Mix all the ingredients in a large bowl until just combined.

4. Then follow Lizzie’s instructions, “Grease tin,” pat meat mixture into the tin, “cover loaf with hot water, and bake for about 1 hour.”