What You Should Bring to This Weekend's Pagan Potluck

On Sunday, the Nine Houses of Gaia hosts an energy-raising pagan potluck picnic to build up energy for next year's Northwest Fall Equinox Festival. We know you're already on top of memorizing your part in the Goddess-appreciation ritual, and you always have your djembe on hand for drum circles. But you may be wondering what food to contribute to the potluck and how to make your dish stand out. Here are some of my favorite dishes for pagan gatherings.

Pagan Rye Bread

This one is easy, since we are all accustomed to making our own rye bread. The only difference in pagan rye bread is inoculating your rye with ergot fungi before you go through the bread-making process. This recipe has been bringing communities together since the Middle Ages.

Mannish Drank

Goat meat can be a hearty and symbolic ingredient to throw into your pagan dishes. Mannish Drank is a variation on the Jamaican aphrodisiac, Mannish Water, which is made by seasoning goat parts in a stew of spices, yams and bananas. To make your own aphrodisiac potion, just throw goat parts, bananas, spices and yams in a blender, then add a little Everclear. After downing that chunky concoction, something magic will happen to you.

Fairy's Whisper Cookies

Here's a cute dessert that is always a hit with the kids—human ones, not the baby goats you'll be slaughtering at the picnic. These delicious sugar cookies are a simple mixture of flour, baking soda and baking powder beaten together with premixed butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla and ground-up bits of our tiny friends from the forest, fairies. Their green blood and guts add some interesting color to the cookies, as well as a pleasant hint of ginger.

The Enlightened Portobello Burger

This burger is beyond divine—at least that's how it made me feel any time I've eaten one. First you'll mix together cream cheese, bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, basil, grated garlic and salt, using the mixture to fill about three-quarters of a portobello mushroom cap. Bake it at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes, then remove it and fill the last quarter of the cap with about an eighth of an ounce of dried psilocybin mushrooms. Drizzle some lemon juice to really activate the ingredients.

A Live Pig

Just show up with a pig between the age of 4 months and 1 year, and there should be plenty of onsite slaughter and sacrifice stations. You know what that means? Fresh pork chops!

GO: The Pagan Picnic is at Creston Park (Site B), 4476 SE Powell Blvd., on Sunday July 17. Noon-5 pm.

Willamette Week