Bloody Good Recipes

The HBO hit show True Blood is reaching its audience in a new way: through food. The vampire drama is taking things from the living room to the kitchen with its show-inspired cookbook, True Blood: Eats, Drinks, and Bits from Bon Temps.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the show, it focuses around a small country town in Bon Temps, Louisiana. From there, things get complicated with vampires, werewolves, shape shifters, witches, fairies and other things that we can't spell. Oh, did we mention werepanthers?

In the middle of all of the supernatural chaos sits a charming country bar and food joint called Merlotte's, where characters go to eat traditional country dishes. The book features 85 of those country recipes, each one given a character-driven twist. For example, the Sloppy Joe becomes the Sloppy Jason (after the character of Jason Stackhouse). Other recipes include Sookie Stackhouse's Gin & Tonic or a Brujo Burger by Lafayette Reynolds.

The popular show recently wrapped its fifth season and will return next summer for more fantastical drama. So in the meantime, we are here to give you some True-Blood inspired recipes to keep the show alive all year. And in honor of the show's violent (and very bloody) themes, all of our dishes include the perfect shade of red.

Click through the slideshow for some of our favorite crimson dishes.

And if you want more inspiration, read our Cookbook Round-Up!