Just some more thoughts on this: how does a cosy halfling inn and bakery fit into a ‘gothic horror setting’? First of all, I believe the Ravenloft setting to be varied and flexible enough to allow for such, and secondly, and more importantly, for the element of horror to really work you need to make your audience care enough about whoever it is happening to. The horror of Mordor in LOTR is all the more potent because at the back of the heroes there is Shire, which the Darkness is poised to swallow up. Everywhere in Ravenloft there is Darkness to fight, but it’s less effective unless there are actually believable pieces of light which it may threaten.
And yeah, from storytelling perspective also, humour and a lighter side of things is an essential tool weaving a more compelling tale whatever darker elements may eventually come to make up the bigger part of it.