The Tale of Lucifur’s Tail and a recipe for Fangsgiving Cake

Halloween has once again come and gone, and while I’m so sorry to see my favorite holiday fading into the rearview of the year, I have to admit there is a small part of me that is grateful for a chance to catch my breath and relax for a week or two before the chaos of the true holiday season is upon us (Less than 2 months until Krampmas!)

This October was unusually busy.  I spent the first two weeks on the road driving to Los Angeles for the Fangoria party where I made and delivered a huge zombie groundbreaker themed cake:

I then drove back to Idaho and then again to Salt Lake City for Fear Con where Lucifur and I spent the weekend doing live cooking demos and having a blast meeting fellow Halloween lovers!

I got back home just in time to deliver three huge projects, the Michael Myers cake for Shudder, the Saberhagen Quiche for Syfy and 50 poison apple mousse cakes for the Long Drop Cider release party.  Then it was time to decorate the house, finalize my own personal wardrobe for the big night, and tie up any loose last minute odds and ends.

Somewhere in the middle of all this chaos we had a very special day pass through our calendar, and while we celebrated it quietly, it’s such a huge moment, I really felt the need to share it with you all — but wanted to wait for everything to quiet down enough that it wouldn’t get lost in all the noise.

We’re talking about Lucifur, the Lord of Barkness not only having her birthday (October 13th, same as mine!) but also passing her one-year lymphoma and chemotherapy anniversary.

See, here’s the thing about Lucifur; while she is the Lord of Barkness, the form you see her in (the tiny black Chihuahua mix) isn’t actually her true form.  Her true form is much, much bigger and being crammed into that tiny body can lead to unfortunate side effects, including some lingering health concerns.

You know what…I think it’s time we all heard the story of where Lucifur came from, what she really is, and what really happened to her tail.  And yes, this is gonna be really really long, so if you want to just skip down to the end of the post and get to the recipe, click here to be taken to the recipe for LUCIFUR’S FANGSGIVING CAKE

Still with me?  Ok, then let’s start the story…

The Tale of Lucifur’s Tail

Once upon a time, long long ago when the world was new and humanity was just two naked hairless pink things in a garden debating the benefits of eating fruit and ignoring their creator, there was a great and powerful demon named Lucifur.  No, not LuciFER, that’s a different one. This LuciFUR:

Lucifur, while not nearly as powerful nor as famous as Lucifer Morningstar was nonetheless still a force to be reckoned with. But, before we talk about Lucifur, first we have to talk about the demon Appolyon of the Obsidian (not to be confused with Apollyon, the king of the army of locusts…that’s a whole other post!).

Appolyon was a beautiful demon…so beautiful that it was actually painful to look directly at her. It was said that she was the most beautiful demon to have ever walked the underworld and that, unlike other demons, she had been created rather than born.  The legend was that Satan himself, jealous over God’s ability to create beauty through humanity, had set out to make his own version of life.

Rather than relying on a crude form made of red dust (which is how God first created Adam), Satan dove to the deepest volcano and pulled forth the purest, blackest block of obsidian he could find.  Using his hands as tools, he molded the obsidian into a female form.  Then, instead of breathing life into her as God did with Adam, Satan pricked his own fingers and gave the block of obsidian three drops of blood.

The blood coursed through the sculpture’s veins, turning hard stone into soft flesh and bone.  And so it was that Appolyon was given life.

Appolyon quickly became Satan’s favorite and he took great pride in showing her off. Unfortunately, as he had carved her from stone, her heart, while beating, was still as cold and as hard as the material it was originally crafted from and as such, she was cunning, manipulative, and driven by an unquenchable desire for power.

Satan, although reluctant to admit his original creation was flawed, eventually realized that if left unchecked, would ultimately lead to his destruction as she was hell-bent (no pun intended) on overthrowing him and taking Hell for herself.

In an attempt to try to tame her, he asked Bast to take Appolyon under her paw to try to teach her control.

Bast agreed and Appolyon went to live with her.  At first, all went well, but Bast soon realized that Appolyon wasn’t truly learning from her, but only continuing her manipulative ways, saying what she thought she needed to say in order to keep Bast happy while still doing what she wanted on the side.

Furious at Appolyon’s willful disobedience, Bast turned to her friend Loki, asking for help.  Loki told Bast if she truly wanted an obedient demon she should have gotten a hellhound.  Bast, inspired, cursed Appolyon as she slept with an unbreakable spell that was bound for 1000 years.  And so it was that Appolyon woke to find herself transformed into a huge, powerful hellhound.

Appolyon was, as you can imagine, absolutely furious and set upon Bast for retribution.  Loki intervened, separating the two before Appolyon could kill Bast.

Bast, still intending to teach Apollyon humility as requested by Satan, shrank Appolyon down from a hellhound to a small, pitch black lap dog and returned her to her creator in disgust.

Appolyon, still furious with Bast and back in the presence of Satan, quickly fell into a routine of obedience and (relatively) good behavior (not too good, she was still a demon after all).  Satan, unable to undo the curse placed upon her by Bast and feeling partially responsible for her current form, renamed Appolyon Lucifur, branded a blazing white “L” on her chest, and granted her dominion over large swaths of his kingdom which she ruled with a tiny iron paw and a bark that carried the full weight of hell behind it.

Lucifur’s rule was ruthless and harsh.  She expected full subservience and her regard for humanity was barely tolerant disdain on the best of days.

And so it was that she ruled alongside Satan, with her tiny form striking fear into the hearts of both mankind and demons and her bark heralding death and destruction on a grand scale.

Nine hundred and ninety-nine years and one day after Bast’s curse was cast, it was discovered that Lucifur had been quietly amassing a small army of loyal followers in her bid to again attempt to overthrow Satan and wrest control of hell for herself upon the expiration of her curse.

Furious at her betrayal, he called for her to be brought to him for punishment.  Rather than destroy her and be forced to admit again that his perfect creation was flawed, he decided to cast her out of his court and banish her to Earth, extending the curse for another thousand years.  With his flaming sword, he cut off her tail, severing both the appendage and with it, all her supernatural powers including her mighty and ferocious bark.

Then, to add insult to injury, he casually tossed her tail to earth, letting it fall to an undisclosed location.

Powerless, confined to a form that weighed less than 10 lbs, and with her hell shaking bark reduced to little more than a pitiful squeak, Lucifur found herself banished to Los Angeles, damned to a life lived at the whim of the very humans she once ruled over with cruel compassionless calm.

When my path crossed with Lucifur’s, I knew instantly that there was more to this tiny miserable dog than met the eye.  Unfortunately, her short time on earth had already been anything but kind.  Her first home had been cruel, and when she came to me she was just shy of 9 months old, a tiny black dog in an already badly broken shell.  She’d been starved and abused, she cowered before me in fear, sick with both pneumonia and kennel cough, a swollen and bloody tail stump, and with absolutely no memory of her powerful origins.

It took months of work for her to even become comfortable with me touching her, much less anyone else.  Her road to recovery was long and winding, but with patience and perseverance, she began to regain her memories and her strength.

It took three long years but suddenly one day Lucifur woke up, looked me straight in the eye and said “Demon. I recognize you for one of my own. My memories have been restored and I know now that I am Lucifur, the Lord of Barkness, formerly Appolyon of the Obsidian.  Long was my reign of terror and long has it been since I was home.  I demand you find my tail so I might assume my powers once again, seek the spell to break this curse, and return to my rightful place at the right hand of Satan.”

I’m sure you can imagine her displeasure when she discovered that while we might both be demons, I was nothing more than a cook in the kitchen of the underworld, and while I might have the favor of the devil himself, I was in no position to help her get her tail, much less break any curses or overthrow anyone in Hell.

Disgusted with me, but seeing that being on her own in this present form was far from ideal, she agreed to stay with me on the condition that I take her with me everywhere I go in the hopes that she might stumble upon her tail herself and regain her powers that way.

To date, Lucifur has been with me for over 8 years, and in that time we’ve looked for her tail in Idaho, Washington State, New Mexico, Florida, California, Arizona, Oregon, Nevada, and Utah.  And while we’ve searched each location, we have yet to find her tail.

Now comes the most frustrating part of the story.  You see, while Lucifur has been shrunken down to this size and her tail removed, she is still in possession of massive quantities of latent powers and abilities, and while they remain out of reach and untapped due to the removal of her tail, they are nonetheless buried deep in her core.  All this power is a little bit like dropping a package of Mentos into a bottle of Diet Coke and then recapping it.  The pressure builds and builds and builds and that tiny form just wasn’t made to hold that all back indefinitely.  Unfortunately, that means that her little earth vessel has to find new ways to compensate for this excess power and last year that struggle manifested on the 28th of September 2017 as a massive tumor in her spleen that unexpectedly ruptured when she jumped off a chair, causing deadly internal bleeding.

We rushed her to the vet where she underwent an emergency spleenectomy.  The surgery saved her life for the moment but ultimately revealed that she had lymphoma.

After two weeks of recovery following her surgery, we were able to begin an aggressive schedule of chemotherapy (a huge shout out to the Army of Barkness supporters who helped us through this difficult time both emotionally and financially).

She endured her chemotherapy somewhat patiently (if you’ve ever seen a patient demon, especially one as powerful as Lucifur herself, you’d be impressed), and together with her amazing vet team, she ended up beating the disease back to the point where the doctor declared her officially in remission.

Now here, one year later, on the 13th of October 2018, we had four things to celebrate:

1.  My birthday
2. Lucifur’s birthday
3. Day 2 of Fearcon, our first horror convention as demonstrators
4. The official 1 year celebrating her surviving surgery, lymphoma, and chemo.

While we celebrated my birthday and Fearcon publicly, Lucifur and I decided to celebrate her birthday and survival anniversary in a quieter setting with a special cake made just for her.  And while I still haven’t been able to find her tail, she appreciates the effort of the cake nonetheless and has granted me permission to share the recipe with you all at the end of this post.

But first, back to the conclusion (for now) of our story.

Now that Lucifur is in remission, we’re grateful for the time we have, but are well aware that we will most likely face another health scare down the road as we were able only to address the lymphoma and not her super concentrated core of power. This means it’s only a matter of time before her levels of awesome power again burn out her earthly guise.

We’ve spoken at great length about what she thinks might happen next, and as far as we can both tell (based on the fact that she’s still missing her tail and that Satan has not yet lifted her ban from hell), when she exhausts her current form she will simply be cast into another form similar to the first and will continue on with her banishment…  Which means, when it comes time to say goodbye to this version of Lucifur, while it will be heartbreaking and difficult, it won’t be for forever…and all I have to do is keep looking for her next vessel and we can continue our adventures together as we continue to search the globe for her tail.

So there you have it, the tale of Lucifur’s tail; how Appolyon was created and then became Lucifur, and how she came to be my companion and I became her caretaker.  Now, let’s get to the cake we made for her to help celebrate all of this, the Fangsgiving Cake.

This cake originally appeared in our e-book “The Care and Feeding of your Favorite Hellhound” and was dictated by Lucifur herself to me to celebrate all sorts of milestones in any Hellhound’s life.  It’s been specially formulated to work well with her temporary canine physiology, including the use of yogurt chips for the fangs in lieu of white chocolate.

Now, as we all know, a few weeks ago there was a certain spooky DIY television show that was on a certain streaming platform that claimed that white chocolate was okay for dogs…but out of concern for Lucifur’s health, I checked with her vet and got this statement from her:

Chocolate is directly toxic because it contains methylxanthines. In particular, it contains theobromine and caffeine. The more chocolate liquor there is in a product, the more theobromine there is. This makes baking chocolate the worst for pets, followed by semisweet and dark chocolate, followed by milk chocolate, followed by chocolate flavored cakes or cookies and even white chocolate.  It takes nearly four days for the effects of chocolate to work its way out of a dog’s system. If the chocolate was only just eaten, it is possible to induce vomiting; otherwise, hospitalization and support are needed. Most common clinical signs of chocolate toxicity in dogs are: vomiting, diarrhea, hyperactivity, tremors, seizures, and in worst cases – death.

Thank you, Dr. Metos for keeping an eye out for us and Lucifur’s health!  While white chocolate contains what could arguably be called scant or scarce amounts of theobromine and caffeine, even the smallest amounts can lead to an increased heart rate in a dog, a risk neither of us want to run, especially in the weakened state of her earthly form.  So please, if you can’t find yogurt chips, we suggest just skipping that part altogether and going with just frosting your cake and presenting as is.

So, without further ado…

LUCIFUR’S FANGSGIVING CAKE

For this recipe you will need:

• 1 cup white or whole wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon (or 2 capsules) activated charcoal powder
• 1/2 cup peanut butter, divided
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup applesauce
• 1/2 cup pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/3 cup honey
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup plain Greek yogurt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon beet juice (optional – for color)
• 1 cup white yogurt chips

Start by preheating your oven to 350F/180C.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking soda and activated charcoal.

In another bowl, combine 1/4 cup of your peanut butter with the vegetable oil, applesauce, pumpkin puree, honey, and egg.

Once mixed, pour the wet ingredients into your dry ingredients and mix on medium speed for approximately 2 minutes or until well combined.

Pour this mixture into an 8″ greased and floured baking pan and bake for 25-30 minutes.

Once baked, allow to cool on a wire rack before moving on to frosting it.

While the cake is baking and cooling, let’s work on the frosting.

In a clean bowl, combine your Greek yogurt with the remaining 1/4 cup of peanut butter, the cinnamon and the beet juice.  Mix well and chill in the fridge until you’re ready to frost your cake.

To make the Fangsgiving fangs, simply microwave your yogurt chips in 30-second bursts, stirring between sessions until smooth and then transfer to a piping bag.

On a piece of parchment paper, pipe out your teeth and allow to cool.

To assemble your cake, use your frosting to frost your cooled cake and then decorate the outer edge using your yogurt chip teeth.  We also sprinkled a small dusting of excess yogurt chip bits on the top for added crunch and texture.

Slice off a generous slice of cake and serve to your favorite Hellhound, making sure to also include comments about how they are the best Hellhound you’ve ever encountered and how ferocious and intimidating they look, even with frosting on their faces.

And if you’re wondering how this cake tastes, respectfully ask your Hellhound if you can have a bite or two and then give it a try.  Trust me, it’s pretty dog-gone good (oooh…bad pun, I know.)

Bone appetite!

Want another Hellhound inspired treat that’s doggone delicious?  We’ve got a recipe for Cold-Hearted Killer Hellhound Treats here!

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