🧛 Monster Mash

October 14, 2026

Listen to them, the children of the night, what music they make! Dracula beckons the Victorian gentleman beyond the eastern borders of known civilization, a place of blood and bats, of wolf song and weird sisters. As the nights grow longer and the pumpkins proliferate, I too have felt the eastward call. Lacking a worthy ship, I steered my EV across the Q Bridge. To Transilvania.

The Transilvania Romanian restaurant in East Haven is not exactly shrouded in secrecy; in fact the roof is strewn with spiderwebs and skeletons (fake…or are they?). Driving around this particular curve of the Post Road, you can’t miss it, nor should you.

“Welcome foolish mortals,” declares a neon sign near the entrance, and any claim to ghosts has the weight of history behind it: almost lost among the novelty graves stands a historical marker charting this site’s real life as 1600s ironworks, 1700s cloth mill, and 1800s grist mill.

Our entrance was a little awkward, à la Jonathan Harker rolling up in a bat-driven carriage and offering the Count wine, which he famously never drinks. We stumbled through the front door to find happy hour in medias res, but it was easy enough to maneuver past Oogie Boogie and the Grim Reaper into the dining room, where we settled in amongst the monster tchotchkes. The beamed ceilings and general hubbub made for instant camaraderie reminiscent of a pre-Industrial roadside inn. Our server brought the children a bucket of toys and asked us what song we planned to do for karaoke. When she walked past a moment later carrying a flaming tray of child-shaped donuts impaled on sticks, the whole place sang happy birthday to the lucky recipient.

Wait, did she say karaoke?

Yes, but officially? “Scaraoke.”

Steve Savage presides over this event on the last Friday of every month. When we arrived, he was spinning a thematic DJ set: “Superstition” by Stevie Wonder, Shakira on “She-Wolf”, a bouncy remix of Rob Zombie’s “Dragula.” And then came the singing.

Surely, the pair with the cool corsets and flawless Goth makeup belting Phantom of the Opera were plants, right? It turned out they were Sabel and Veil, local karaoke enthusiasts who educate children by day and by night rove the countryside with power vocals and stage names. Their repertoire ranged from Ursula the Sea Witch to Ann Wilson of Heart. Their skill level was daunting, but along with Mr. Savage, they turned half the bar into music-making children of the night without a single bite. Our family table dispatched a representative to sing that song about wanting to put their “tender heart in a blender.” On theme, or close enough.

Visitors to Bram Stoker’s Dracula encountered ghostly babes in the corridors. The most visible non-human inhabitants here were the AI hotties who popped up on several dining room screens, cavorting in branded sweatshirts or taking selfies with AI-Vlad. This is a lot visual-stimulation-wise, but the rapid-fire digital content did also include photos of menu items, helpful if you didn’t already know what mici or gulyas looks like. In addition, the screens inform you of a truly staggering number of wicked-awesome (am I using that right?) activities. Transilvania regularly hosts horror trivia and monster bingo, plus one-off theme parties and guest speakers. A recent example: Chris Di Cesare, the “ghost boy” of SUNY-Geneseo.

You’ll see a lot of red on the drinks menu. The Dracula’s Kiss ($13, cranberry juice, lime, grenadine, black cherry ice, “blood rim”) tastes like a Sex in the City-era cosmo – more fruit than bite – though it did actually include a pair of complimentary fangs. I couldn’t say what comprises the blood rim, but its zealous application did have me Lady-Macbething it to the sink. Part of the fun! I do drink wine, and in lieu of dessert I enjoyed a glass of fetească neagră, fermented from an ancient grape of Romania; a quick swirl drapes the inside of the glass with thin red legs, moving slow. Completing the bloody trifecta was my favorite, Dracula’s Blood Punch ($13, red wine, vodka, cranberry juice, pomegranate juice, orange juice, sugar rim), which swirled in its goblet like an evil sangria. I’d expressed concern about how sweet it was going to be, and the bartender was responsive, so I got a drink with a certain sweetness but also a lulling winey undertow to give it, well…body. It paired nicely with a mushroom flatbread from the happy hour menu.

During dinner, we watched some impressive-looking burgers go by, but our party came here for the Romanian hospitality, so we went with traditional picks. The pork schnitzel sandwich ($17.99) was everything you’d want it to be: crispy, chewy, graced with tartar sauce. The stars of the evening were our big plates of stewed meats and carbs. Hungarian Paprikash ($27) was made with chicken thighs, served with in-house spaetzle, and made to sing with a vinegary cabbage and dill salad. The “Traditional Stew” ($29) was made of pork, chicken, and sausage, served with polenta, and topped with an over-easy egg. Both dishes were comfort food incarnate, more stick-to-your-ribs than suck-your-blood.

Should you wish to make a reservation, Transilvania’s number is 203-BITE-YOU. While this may be one of the kitschiest dinner and drinks experiences in all the Havens, an underpinning of authenticity makes it more than the sum of its merch. Owners Alina and Chris Caldarariu are native Romanians (on the map, Transylvania is the heart of modern Romania, around a third of its land mass). They opened this place four years ago with a vision of a macabre clubhouse—and their grandparents’ recipes. Alina is driven by a real reverence for and knowledge of folklore. You’ve heard of Count Dracula, but do you know about Elizabeth Bathory, the bloodthirsty countess whose legend inspired Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla, which in turn inspired Stoker? Did you know that the UK’s King Charles III is distantly related to Vlad the Impaler? History and legend sit side by side, so it’s only natural that they become drinking buddies, raising a glass and painting the town red.