Samhain – Creative Creations

Samhain marks the end of summer, the end of the harvest. A time of reflection, release and rebirth. For me, it’s also the season where cooking becomes alchemy: transforming pain into flavor and memory into magic.
In this post I share how my difficult relationship with food and perfection slowly turned into what I now call Creative Creation. My personal practice of kitchen alchemy and mindful nourishment. It’s not about recipes. It’s about healing through curiosity and color. 🍂✨

Featured Image 2025 © Lunareth

🏷️ Tags and Trigger Warning: Chronic Illness, Joy, Resilience, Wonder, Inspiration, Samhain, Creative Creation, Kitchen Alchemy, Seasonal Magic, Witches New Year, Healing Through Cooking, Mindful Living, Trauma Recovery. This post mentions themes of internalized shame, chronic illness, parental criticism, emotional trauma and reference to near-death experience. Please read with care and kindness toward yourself.

🕯️ Disclaimer

The story below reflects my personal thoughts, emotions and experiences. It is not meant to place blame or assign judgment, but to offer understanding, invite reflection and remind others that they are not alone. My intention is never to hurt or accuse, only to shed light on what we often carry, the mistakes we make while trying to live and the possibility that healing begins with honesty.

Everything I share here is personal, never professional advice. These are fragments of my journey, offered with three hopes:

That someone reading might feel a little less alone and a little more understood, even comforted.
That someone reading might discover a new idea or at least a spark of clarity, bringing them one step closer to a “better” tomorrow. One day at a time.
That even someone in a completely different situation might find the words speaking to them, maybe as inspiration for understanding or at least some food for thought.

Thank you for reading with compassion.

… the Beginning and the End …

The veil grows thin.
The world exhales.
Candles flicker and somewhere between the scent of smoke and spice,
I find myself remembering how this all began.

I didn’t grow up loving the kitchen.
My Mam did. She lived in it. Chopping, stirring, seasoning, perfecting.
Working, cleaning and cooking were her way of keeping her world from collapsing.
Her spell of control against the chaos of her past that once hurt her and still haunted her.

But standing beside her was almost never comfortable.
Feeling outlines of a war that wasn’t mine to fight.
Every time I tried to help, her voice would cut through the air.
Her way of battling her crushing fear of losing control.

“No, not like that.”
“You’re too slow.”
“Why would you do it that way?”
“That looks terrible.”

Cooking was never my joy and love.
The opposite. It became proof of failure … so I left.
Still always a foodie, but never a cook.

Years later life demanded that I return.
After my near-death experience in 2020, my body changed.
My stomach and bowels never fully healed and food became something I dreaded rather than enjoyed.
Every bite just unpredictability – would it hurt again this time?
I started cooking again out of necessity, despising every minute of it.

Until one night … I realized something.
What if … it wasn’t “cooking” but something newly claimed?
What if … it was not only renamed, but something else entirely?
What if it was … Creative Creation?

No rules. No measurements.
No one to say “You’re doing it wrong” to me.
Just me, my curiosity and a quiet spark of magic.

At first, I followed HelloFresh recipes because I needed guidance.
But curiosity crept in like a cat … how do flavors work?
Why do certain ingredients work with each other?

That’s when I began to taste with awareness, started to feel the world through flavor.
My own exploration. My own adventure.

🍬 Sweet – Comfort (Carrots, Corn, Pumpkin, Fruit, Berries, …)
🧂 Salty – Grounding (Soy, Olives, Salt, …)
🍋 Sour – Refreshing (Lemon, Vinegar, Tomatoes, Lime Juice, …)
🍄 Umami – Depth (Mushrooms, Miso, Onions, …)
🌿 Bitter – Cleansing (Kale, Leek, Arugula, Coffee, Cocoa, Herbs, …)

Each one became a whisper of something greater.
And my biggest lesson was: It’s about balance.
Not only in the flavors, but also in the act itsself.

And from that experiment, my own magic was born …

Three Light Alchemy

You’ve probably heard of “traffic light” recipes: red, yellow, green.
But I call mine: Three Light Alchemy.

Because for me, cooking isn’t about following a recipe.
It’s about conjuring harmony.
I choose one red, one yellow, one green – or more! – guided by instinct and flavor …
and what’s in the fridge or pantry.
Then I add the Base, the heart that ties everything together.
Finally I whisper the secret words that gives the spell power: Carbs and PRO-TE-IN. 💪✨

That is my witchy spell:

Red, Yellow, Green,
The Base, Carbs – and PRO-TE-IN!

Each color brings its own magic:

❤️ Red – Tomatoes, peppersweet, beets, kidney beans, apple, strawberry, goji berry, …
💛 Yellow – Corn, bell pepper, carrots, cauliflower, beans, chickpeas, lemon zest, hemp seeds, mushrooms, mango, sweet potato, …
💚 Green – Avocado, edamame, lentils, spinach, spring onion, leek, zuchini, broccoli, cucumber, root salad, lamb’s lettuce, kale, rucola, swiss chard, grape, …
🤍 Base – Coconut flakes, coconut yogurt, broth, oils, lime juice, curry, mustard, hummus, panko, cheese (like feta, sheep cheese or any shredded cheese), herbs (like parsley, chives, basil, coriander, mint, …), sprouts (like cress), nuts (almond, peanut, walnut,…), seeds (sesame, chia, sunflower, pumpkin, …), …
🤎 Carbs – Rice, couscous, amaranth, quinoa, millet, buckwheat, spelt, noodles, potatoes, … also: sweet potato and corn – if you wanna use them here!
🖤 Protein – Chicken, beef, pork, fish, tofu, eggs, … also: Chickpeas, hemp seeds, lentils, beans, edamame – if you wanna use them here!

Whatever calls to you.
Sometimes it works beautifully.
Sometimes it’s chaos.

Either way – it’s Creative Creation.

Because there’s no right or wrong.
Even if I wrote carrot under yellow, if you already have yellow, take it as red!
Or you would rather use mushrooms and beans together, but no red?
Go for it!

When I say red, yellow, green, it’s not a rulebook. I would say it’s guidance.
It’s just a map of color and feeling and personal experience that having one of each is probably healthy and tasty.
But you don’t have to use carrot because I wrote it in “yellow” or tomato because I wrote it in “red” or something to that effect.

You use what calls to you, what you already have and you taste as you go.
The magic lives in curiosity and balance, not rigidity.

This is my guide to intuition – not instruction.

None of this is about being right.
Even if I list carrot under yellow, if your dish already glows with yellow,
let carrot become red instead and use something else that speaks “yellow” for you.

Swap, mix, break the pattern.
The point is the passion, the tasting, the listening.

You taste, you adapt, you learn, you try again.
Alchemy isn’t about perfection, it’s about noticing when your tongue says: yes.

There is no precision – there’s only curiosity and that spark that whispers:

“What if…?”

2025 © ComFORTYart

🕯️ My Ritual ~ My Hope ~ My Light

Before I light my candle, I always like to remember where this moment began.
Samhain (pronounced SAH-win or SOW-in) is one of the oldest Celtic festivals,
celebrated around October 31st to mark the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter.

To the ancient Celts it was the New Year,
the time when the veil between the living and the dead grew thin.

Fires were lit to guide souls home.
Families gathered to honor their ancestors with food, candles and stories.
It was a night of endings and beginnings, loss and renewal.
A sacred pause between worlds.

Over the centuries, Samhain’s traditions wove into All Saints’ Day and Halloween,
but its heart remains the same: reflection, remembrance and gratitude.

It’s a night to honor what has passed, to release what no longer serves us
and to open ourselves to what’s yet to come.

And though I don’t follow the old ways exactly,
I carry their spirit forward.
Not in grand bonfires, but in small, glowing rituals of my own.

That’s what it means to me.
When the nights grow long
and the air smells like wood and spice,
I return to my peaceful Samhain ritual…

I light a candle, not for ceremony, but for remembrance.
Beside it, I place a cookie or a small pouch of herbs.
A humble offering to the universe,
to the people who came before me,
to the quiet thread that connects us all.

Then, I take a small piece of paper
and write down what I want to let go of: regrets, fears
or the weight I’ve been carrying through the year.

When the words feel honest, I burn them ( safely, of course, in a fireproof dish )
watching the smoke curl upward, carrying those feelings away.
And as the paper turns to ash, I whisper gratitude:
for what I survived, for what I learned, for what I still hope for in the year ahead.

That’s my Samhain.
Simple. Quiet. Real.
A balance between farewell and beginning.

✨ Why I Call It Alchemy

I don’t bake anymore, at least not the way I used to.
But that’s the point:
life, like cooking, isn’t about following instructions.
It’s about intuition and intent.

That’s why I call it Alchemy.

Because I’ve always loved finding magic in the mundane.
The way a Geisha turns movement into meaning,
or a witch finds wonder in herbs and flame.

Alchemy reminds me that transformation isn’t reserved for fairy tales.
It happens every time I turn raw ingredients into nourishment, chaos into calm, fear into curiosity.

And there’s something powerful in renaming what once wasn’t good for you.
Cooking belonged to my Mam.
But Alchemy?
Alchemy belongs to me.

It’s the reclamation of what once felt lost.
The act of taking something old, reshaping it and making it yours again.
That’s magic.
That’s healing.
That’s my Creative Creation.

🌙 Closing Reflection

This Samhain I won’t bake a feast or knead a perfect loaf.
I’ll simply stir something warm, light a candle
and whisper thank you to the universe.

Because maybe the truest kind of creation isn’t about precision, but about presence.

And maybe that’s what this season is teaching us:
that endings are also beginnings,
and every act of care,
no matter how small,
is a kind of spell.

So this Samhain.

🕯️ May your own hands find warmth
and your heart find light in all the dark days to come. 🕯️