Parsnip Cakes – 1903

“These do not taste of parsnips at all, and can be found still in the little country farms or cottages. Boil 3 parsnips until tender, mash and press through a sieve, mix in proportions of 1 teacupful to 1 quart of hot milk, 1/2 pint of yeast, some salt, and flour to make a stiff batter. Cover, set in a warm place, and when risen to twice its size, knead into flat cakes, very thin. These must rise again and be baked until brown. Can be eaten with butter, like crumpets or scones, or with gravy, like Yorkshire pudding, with a roast of meat.” – With a Saucepan over the Sea, 1903

I get a strange seasonal hankering for parsnips once the snow starts to fly. It’s been happening for years, I think, since I first purchased some for early recipe testing of historical recipes. I watch with bemusement as they slide down the conveyor to the cashier, who puzzles over them for a moment before asking what they are. When I say, “Parsnips!” I see a little light go off in their heads, and more often than not, they say something like, “Oh, my grandmother used to cook with those!” I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had this interaction, but it’s a lot.I’ve had this recipe earmarked for several years now, since I first picked up the cookbook where I found it. It’s listed in the section for Cakes, Puddings, and Pastry, although I’d shelve them under Breads and Buns. They are lightly flavored, and completely delicious smeared with a little salted butter. The consistency is something like potato bread, slightly dense but just puffy enough. They could almost serve as burger buns, if not flattened so fully before baking.The original directions left a little to be desired when it came to clarification, so it took a little trial and error to get a dough that did what it was supposed to. As such, be warned that the amount of flour is… flexible. You’re aiming for a dough that is cohesive enough to be kneaded, so adjust accordingly!I will say, though, that I’d have to agree with the original book that these would be equally tasty with just butter as a side to a roast. I think the recipe is incredibly adaptable, and one could swap the parsnips for pumpkin, yam, potato, carrot, beet, etc. for the parsnips. As the original is written, our modern instant yeast would likely have been swapped for a sourdough starter, which would add some extra awesomeness if you have some of that kicking around. Me? I’m focused at the moment on just keeping my two kids alive and fed, so starters and houseplants will have to wait…

Recipe for Parsnip Cakes

Makes: about a dozen – Prep: 45 minutes – Rising: 1.5 hours

Chelsea’s Notes: Don’t be tempted to go with the whole 1 lb. bag of parsnips, if that’s what you’ve purchased; it makes way, way too much dough! Don’t ask me how I know… ALSO! If you have large parsnips, I strongly encourage you to cut out the woody, pithy center of them before chopping, which will dramatically decrease the bitterness and leave you with just tasty sweet rooty goodness.Ingredients:

3 parsnips, peeled and chopped (see note above)
1 quart warm milk to each cup mash
2 tsp. yeast
generous pinch of salt
enough flour (about 5+ cups, but adjust as needed!)

Add the chopped parsnips to a pot of boiling water, and boil for roughly 10-15 minutes, or until tender. Strain and add the parsnips to a large mixing bowl. Mash, measure, and add milk (it should be about 4 cups). If you’d like a smoother texture, and like me kind of really hate cleaning up sieves, I suggest using an immersion blender to blend the mixture at this point. When you have a consistency you like, add the yeast and salt, then start mixing in the flour until you have a dough that can be kneaded. Knead for a few minutes, then cover and let rise for about an hour, until doubled in size.Punch down, divide, and roll into 12 equal balls. With floured hands, form each into flat discs no bigger than about 1/2″ high and arrange on baking sheets. Turn on the oven to 350F and let the buns rise again while the oven heats. Once up to temperature, bake for about 20 minutes, until golden brown. Best enjoyed same day, and especially while still warm from the oven!

Lembas

In recent weeks, I have received several independent requests for a Lembas recipe, and I have to thank those of you who reached out and gave me the nudges I needed to finally get this recipe up on the blog.

You might think to yourself, “Huh, it’s super weird that there aren’t more LotR recipes on this super awesome fictional food blog!” Well, there’s actually a reason for that. Years and years ago, after Feast of Ice and Fire was newly published, I actually made a lot of LotR foods, mostly as proof of concept for a LotR cookbook pitch. Unfortunately, that attempt didn’t go anywhere, so I decided to self-publish what I had in the form of the Shire Cookbook. It was well received by the few folks who found it online, but I’ve since taken it down as part of an effort to try for an official cookbook again. It’s such a great fit for what I do, and how I do it, and the fanbase would LOVE to have it. Cross your fingers!

In the meantime, I’ll be uploading a few of my favorite recipes from that collection to the blog. And what could be a more perfect start to that than Lembas? For this recipe, I considered a number of things when building the ingredients list. First off, the practicality of this needing to be a pretty durable high calorie travel food. Thus the inclusion of some tasty fat in the form of butter, healthy sweetener from honey, and awesome flours. We don’t know what spiffy magic things the elves include in their lembas, so I decided to have a little fun with mine, including some elderflower as a play on “eldar” and some thyme because elves are so long-lived. The result, I hope, is something comforting and familiar, with just enough otherness to keep it interesting.

And that is PLENTY enough words on my end. :) I just hate when you have to scroll through half a novel just to get to the good part, The Recipe:

Lembas Bread Recipe

Ingredients:

1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup honey
1-2 tsp. freshly minced thyme
2 tsp. dried elderflower
1 cup oat flour
1/2 cup nut flour (chestnut, hazelnut, acorn, or almond)
1/4 cup hot water
large leaves for wrapping
twine

Preheat the oven to 300F and set out a sheet of parchment paper.

Beat the butter and honey together in a medium bowl until light and fluffy. Add in the thyme and elderflower, then gradually work in all the flour, adding just a little water at a time if necessary. You should end up with a fairly stiff dough that can nonetheless be rolled out. Roll out the dough on top of the sheet of parchment paper to somewhere around 1/2-inch thick. Move the dough and paper over to a baking sheet and bake for about 20 minutes, until the lembas is just starting to turn golden. Remove from the oven and cut into small squares while still warm.

To prepare your lembas for travel, wrap each square in a leave and tie off with twine. Many types of leaves work well for this task, but if you are lucky enough to live somewhere with Sassafras trees, I found that their leaves are the best substitute in shape and size for those of the mallorn.

Witcher – Honey Spice Cake

Guys, I know it’s been a while since I polled you all online about what fictional worlds you’d most like to see new recipes from. Like, a really, really long time. I’ve been mobbed with work projects, and the blog took the hit.

BUT! Witcher was the winner of those polls, and I’m so excited to present you with this spice cake recipe today! The basic outline for the recipe comes from a recipe that you can find in-game, but the proportions of that are… interesting. I’d love to give it a try, as written, one of these days, because I suspect it might be pretty cool. For the meantime, I balanced the ingredients out a little to make a more recognizable cake and added a really tasty honey cream cheese drizzle over top, just because. It’s a really moist, somewhat dense cake with rich spice and honey flavors. Definitely a welcome addition to the breakfast or teatime lineups during this frigid winter week!

Recipe for Ra’mses Gor-Thon’s Honey Spice Cake

Note: The original recipe calls for buckwheat honey, which is super dark and heavily flavored, and not liked by everyone. To be on the safe side, a more common wildflower honey will do just fine.

Cake Ingredients:

1 cup whole milk
1 cup honey
1/2 tsp. five spice
1 tsp. cardamom
1/4 cup unsalted butter room temperature
2 whole eggs beaten lightly
2 1/2 cups spelt flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp. baking soda

Preheat oven to 350F and lightly butter an 8″ round cake pan.

Combine the milk and honey in a small saucepan over medium heat, and warm up until just combined. Remove from heat and stir in the spices and butter. Using a hand mixer, blend in the eggs, then the remaining ingredients, beating until you have a nice smooth mixture. Transfer this into the prepared cake pan, then bake for about 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean.

Let the cake cool for about 20 minutes in the pan to let the sides pull away, then turn out onto a cooling rack to cool the rest of the way. While the cake is cooling, make up the icing below.

Icing:

2 Tbs. runny honey
4 Tbs. cream cheese
~1/2 cup powdered sugar

Using a hand mixer or an immersion blender, blend together the honey and cream cheese until completely smooth, then stir in just enough powdered sugar to get a thick consistency that can still be drizzled. Decorate the cooled cake with whatever pattern you like.

Interstellar Garden Salad

Dish: Interstellar Garden Salad

First appeared in: Star Wars Galaxies, video game, 2003

Planet: Coruscant – Region: Core Worlds

Maintaining a healthy diet can be difficult while traveling through space. Fortunately, scientists and bio-engineers have devised numerous nutritional supplements and mealstuffs to help interstellar travelers keep in fighting form. In fact, such a demand for healthier options has even been reflected in the offerings at classic diners and dives known for their rib-sticking grub.

This particular salad is a popular side at Dex’s Diner on Coruscant, where it features an array of ingredients from across the system, including Mandalorian oranges, Sriluurian raisins, and Wol Cabasshews, topped off with luptoomian dressing. Now, for the first time, Dex’s secret preparation for this refreshing salad has been revealed. It’s a versatile recipe that can be tweaked to reflect your deepest salad desires.

Interstellar Garden Salad

Makes 6 small servings

Prep: 15 minutes – Chilling: 2 hours

Ingredients:

2 cups water
1/2 cup chopped cucumber with skin
1/2 cup mixed salad greens
~1/2 cup assorted salad toppings
2 Tbs. agar agar
freshly ground pepper

Simmer the cucumber in the water for around 10 minutes, then strain out the pieces, reserving the hot liquid and discarding the cucumber. Add the agar agar to the hot liquid, stirring until dissolved. Pour this mixture into muﬃn tins or other molds, ﬁlling each spot nearly full. Wait for 5 minutes, then scatter the various salad toppings in each serving, then place the whole tray in the fridge to chill for about 2 hours. If the salads need a little help coming out of the mold, dip the bottom of the muffin pan into some warm water to loosen them. Plate and sprinkle with a little freshly ground black pepper to serve.

Elder Scrolls – Kwama Egg Quiche

You voted, and I cooked!

In my (relatively) recent Twitter poll, I asked which of several fictional worlds had recipes that you’d like to make in real life. We got a good response and with many more folks weighing in on Facebook, the clear winner was Elder Scrolls, with Star Wars not too far behind. I’ve got some Star Wars recipes coming up as well, because I just couldn’t help myself, but in the meantime, here’s the first of the Elder Scrolls recipes!

Now I have to preface this by confessing that I’m generally not a quiche person. It’s something about the texture, and with the occasional addition of wilted spinach or some other leafy green, I just can’t do it. This one, though, was pretty darn tasty, and for the first time probably in my life, I had a second helping of quiche. And as an added bonus, the ingredients are all from an in-game recipe that can be found in Elder Scrolls Online. Here’s hoping this is the first of many successful and tasty dishes from Tamriel – check out the list of other contenders on the new ES page!

Kwama Egg Quiche

Ingredients

1 cup flour
pinch of salt
1/4 cup olive oil
cold water, enough for dough
1 Tbs. salted butter
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
2 medium tomatoes, 1 chopped, 2 sliced, divided
one medium kwama egg, or 4 chicken eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 cup grated cheddar cheese
1/2 cup parmesan cheese
1/2 tsp. salt

Directions

Start off by making up the dough- Whisk the salt and olive oil into the flour, then gradually add just enough water to bring the mixture together.

Preheat the oven to 350F. Roll out the pie dough to about 1/8″ thickness, and gently drape over a tart or pie pan. Press into the bottom and sides, and trim off any excess. Prick the bottom of the pastry with a fork to prevent it from bubbling up.

Melt the butter in medium skillet over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook for several minutes, until slightly browned. Add the tomatoes and cook for another few minutes, until the tomatoes are soft, but not yet falling apart.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, cheese and salt. Pour this mixture into the pastry shell, then top evenly with the tomatoes. Bake for about an hour, or until the top is golden and puffy. Allow to cool for 10 minutes before slicing.

A Weedy Salad and Pottage

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to tag along on one of the many Weed Walks around Pennsic (or as I like to call it, “medieval summer camp”). This, in addition to a great introductory class about medieval gardens, inspired me to take another look at my garden plots, and the “weeds” growing in them. There’s a great list here of the various plants, many of which we would consider “weeds”, that medieval gardeners and cooks would have prized for their extra nutritional boost, either in salads or pottage.

One of the most interesting finds in the yard was Lambsquarters. Pretty much everything about this plant is great, except perhaps that you’ll likely find it growing in your garden as a “weed”. Well, before you go tossing it onto the compost heap, consider for a moment that it’s related to chard and spinach, but more nutritious than both. In fact, Michael Pollan counts it as one of the most nutritious plants worldwide. How about that? PLUS it can serve as a decoy for garden pests, luring them away from the more cultivated crops. I’m all kinds of crazy for this stuff. And since I’m halfway doing a medieval-style cloister garden, I’m not too fussed about leaving some good weeds here and there. Because let’s be honest: Ain’t nobody got time for all the weeding.

Anyway, back to the food. For today’s post, I’ve actually done two simple recipes, one for a salad and one for a pottage, which is a sort of herbaceous oatmeal. Because winter is not only coming, but it can be tough, and back in the day, getting enough greens was hard to do.

Here’s my pick list from the yard and gardens, which I divided among the two recipes:

Wood Sorrel
Clover
Lambsquarters
Dead Nettle
young Plantain
Creeping Charlie
Oregano
Marjoram
Mint
Nasturtiums
Creeping Thyme
Violet Leaves
Borage

And a few things I have, but didn’t include: purslane, hops shoots, lovage, burdock, and a few others.

See how many delicious green edibles could be lurking just outside your door? Then again, as one of my cousins recently observed, “Wow, most people just grow cucumbers and stuff, but you only have weird things!” Whoops.

Anyhow, I was surprised just how tasty both these recipes are. And I know that “recipe” is a bit of a stretch for the salad, but even so. They taste… healthy. And they really are, especially compared to the flavorless crunch of iceberg lettuce, or the nearly-always-wilty storebought baby spinach. My husband called the greens an “elf salad” because of how zesty and healthy they tasted, and I love the idea. I’ll admit that I’m not much of a vegetable fan, so whenever I find a new way to get some leafy greens, I’m a happy eater. While the salad is a quirky take on a fairly timeless dish, the pottage is pretty unique. But the more I thought about it, the more I reasoned that it was probably the medieval equivalent of slipping some healthy greens into a smoothie to hide them!

Where in Westeros?

Just about anywhere for the salad, and for the pottage anywhere they’d have a rough winter. A lot of “weeds” are the first plants to come up in the spring,

Salads always strike me as a more southern Westeros fixture, though, for the Reach, or even King’s Landing, if the castle gardens were up to the task. The pottage seems a decidedly Northern dish, though. I could easily see the cooks in Winterfell or Castle Black slipping some greens into the morning oats to keep everyone’s scurvy levels down during those interminable winters. If they couldn’t get fresh greens (I might die in a Westeros-length winter), they might have pickled some to store through those long, long cold months.

A Salat

Take persel, sawge, grene garlec, chibolles, oynouns, leek, borage, myntes, porrettes, fennel, and toun cressis, rew, rosemarye, purslarye: laue and waische hem clene. Pike hem. Pluk hem small withyn honde, and myng hem wel with rawe oile; lay on vyneger and salt, and serue it forth. -Form of Curye, 14th Century

Basically, you pick an assortment of the greens listed in the link above, toss with a little olive oil, then a little vinegar and salt (I used red wine vinegar, but pick your favorite).

To make buttyrd Wortys

Take all maner of gode herbys that ye may gette pyke them washe them and hacke them and boyle them vp in fayre water and put ther to butture clarefied A grete quantite And when they be boylde enowgh salt them but let non Ote mele come ther yn And dyse brede in small gobbetts & do hit in dyshys and powre the wortes A pon and serue hit furth. -Pepys, 15th Century

This one is a little more complex, but not by much. Essentially, parboil your greens in some broth, then strain and press out the liquid. Chop them small, with some oatmeal (which I’ve taken to mean uncooked oats, in this case). Boil some broth, then add everything into the pot. Boil a bit (until the oatmeal is done), adding more broth if needed then serve.

Ingredients:

a few handfuls assorted greens
as many handfuls rolled or flaked oats
enough fish or chicken broth

Gooseberry Hops

I first saw this idea over on Ivan Day’s site, Historic Food, and knew that I had to try it at some point. But that was actually several years ago, when I didn’t even know where to buy gooseberries in New England, let alone expect to have any of my own.

But when I found myself in my own house, with heaps of fertile dirt outside (the place used to be a giant sheep farm), I went in search of a few currant and gooseberry bushes of my own. In the process, I discovered that they are scarce in the states in part because of what I’ve nicknamed the War on Fruit. It turns out that the genus ribes, of which gooseberries and currants are members, can also be a carrier for a disease that harms pine trees.

But surely, I thought, New Hampshire will sell me some of these plants- they live free or die! Nope. They’re banned in the entire state! But trusty old Vermont came through for me, and you’d better believe I planted one of each- red currant, black currant, and gooseberry. This was the first year they produced anything in quantity, so I get to actually play with the fruits, and see what cool old recipes I can dredge up. They’re all classic fruits, noted throughout the medieval period, and especially in colonial American cooking. So that’s where I’m headed for the gooseberries!

This is a recipe from 1792, which means it’ll be a perfect contender for colonial Thanksgiving this year. The idea is to string together several sliced gooseberries so that they look like candied hops flowers. It’s so quirky. I love it.

I followed the instructions (below) pretty much exactly. I’m also lucky enough to have inherited some massive concord grapevines, so the leaves for blanching were no problem. And I’ve got to say, I’m utterly charmed by how they turned out. They look just like little juicy hops! I could easily see them being a simple subtlety down in the Reach, where they love all things green and growing, but I could also see them being a treat up North, where they would be preserved to liven up some cold blustery day.

That’s what I’ve done with mine- they’re in a jar of the sugar syrup in the fridge, topped off with a little brandy, until I can pour a bit of beeswax in there to seal them up until Thanksgiving. I’m looking forward to seeing how they are then!

Recipe for Gooseberries in Imitation of Hops

TAKE the largest green walnut gooseberries you can get and cut them at the stalk end into four quarters. Leave them whole at the blossom end, take out all the seeds, and put five or six one in another. Take a needleful of strong thread with a large knot at the end; run the needle through the bunch of gooseberries, tie a knot to fasten them together, and they will resemble hops. Put cold spring water into your pan, with a large handful of vine leaves at the bottom; then three or four layers of gooseberries, with plenty of vine leaves between every layer, and over the top of your pan. Cover it no that no steam can get out, and set them on a slow fire. Take them off as soon as they are scalding hot, and let them stand till they are cold. Then set them on again till they are of a good green, then take them off, and let them stand till they are quite cold. Put them into a sieve to drain, and make a thin syrup thus: To every pint of water put in a pound of common loaf-sugar, and boil it and skim it well. When it is about half cold, put in your gooseberries, let them stand till the next day, give them one boil a-day for three days. Then make a syrup thus: To every pint of water put in a pound of fine sugar, a slice of ginger, and a lemon-peel cut lengthways very fine. Boil and skim it well, give your gooseberries a boil in it, and when they are cold, put them into glasses or pots, lay brandy-paper over them, and tie them up close. –The Housekeeper’s Instructor,1792

Ingredients:

1-2 cups fresh gooseberries
several fresh grape leaves
1 lb. sugar to every pint water
a slice of fresh ginger
a little lemon peel
a large needle and some thick cotton or linen string

Cook’s Note: The original directions are pretty great, and I followed them fairly closely until near the end; my gooseberries were ripe when I started, and I worried that the continuous boiling in sugar syrup would cause them to fall apart. We’ll see if I was wrong to mess with a good thing!

Take your gooseberries and slice them into four segments, starting at the stem end, and leaving the blossom end still attached. Carefully scoop out all the seed and discard them. Tie a large knot in one end of the string, then thread about 6 of the prepared gooseberries onto the string, turning each slightly so the petals are alternately spaced. It helps if you start with a larger gooseberry on the bottom, then slightly decrease the size of each as you go up. Cut the string, leaving several inches at the top, and repeat this until you’ve used up all your gooseberries.

Line a pot with grape leaves, then lay the gooseberry hops on top. Cover with a few more grape leaves, then cover the whole assortment with water. Put the cover on the pan, and bring up to just under a simmer, then remove from heat and allow to cool. Transfer the hops to a clean jar, and make up your sugar syrup. Dissolve the sugar in the water in a saucepan over medium heat, along with the ginger to give it a little flavor. When it’s dissolved, pour over the “hops” until the jar is mostly full. You may need to gently push the gooseberries back down. At this point, I topped the jar off with a little brandy, but I also plan to seal it with a little wax on top. It’s in the fridge for now, until I get a spare moment to melt the wax!

Highgarden Apple Roses

Thoughts:

The people have spoken, and the winner of my recent Twitter poll for the next recipe’s region was overwhelmingly Highgarden. I guess we are all in the mood for some green growing things and flowers after winter, huh? :)

These stunning little show-stopping desserts are actually easier to make than you might guess. You may remember seeing them as part of Margaery Tyrell’s ideal meal from last summer, but I’ve never quite stopped thinking about them since. They’re just beautiful as an addition to a feast spread, but they’re also a nice surprise dessert to a simple dinner.

The variations presented simply by the choice of jelly are numerous- personally, I really love a version with apple cider jelly, but consider also a rosehip jam (perfect for Highgarden), or a redcurrant, or even a thin layer of lemoncurd. Try them out, and see what you think!

Highgarden Apple Rose Recipe

Makes: about a dozen, depending on size

Prep: 45 minutes Baking: 20-25 minutes

Pie dough:

2 cups flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 stick salted butter
cold water

Ingredients:

2-3 apples
1 cup water
splash of cider vinegar
2 tablespoons brown sugar
pinch each cinnamon and nutmeg
3 tablespoons jelly
Powdered sugar, for dusting (optional)

Start off by making your pie dough so it has time to chill: combine the flour and sugar, then rub in the butter until you have only small pieces remaining. Gradually add in the cold water until you have a dough that comes together. Fold over on itself several times to encourage layering, then wrap in plastic and chill for at least an hour.

Preheat the oven to 375°F. Grease a standard muffin tin, and/or a mini muffin tin (I like making at least two different sizes for a nice look on the plate).

Combine the water, vinegar, brown sugar, and spices in a small saucepan over medium-low heat.

Slice each apple in half down the stem end, the scoop out the core using a sharp knife or the small end of a melon-baller. Slice the apples as thin as you can, then pop them into the prepared pan on the stovetop to keep them from browning. Stir the apple slices as you cook them for around 5-10 minutes, until they are starting to turn translucent but still hold their shape. Strain them out of the pan, and set aside to cool somewhat.

Take the pie dough out of the fridge and roll out half at a time on a lightly floured surface to about 1/4″ thick, and about 10″ wide (you can do shorter strips, or cut long strips in half if using a mini muffin pan). Cut into long strips about 1 1/2″ wide. Spread a very thin layer of jelly on each strip, then begin layering the apple slices on the top half of each strip, as below:

Fold the bottom of the strip up over the top, then gently coil the apples and dough into a cinnamon roll shape, which should give you that lovely rose shape on the top. Move each finished rose to the prepared muffin pan, then continue until all the dough and apples are used up.

Bake for around 25-30 minutes, or until the dough starts to turn golden. These apple roses are best served warm, and are also delicious with a little ice cream or custard sauce on the side.

Apple Rose with custard and redcurrants

Salad in Castle Black

“‘From the Lord Commander’s own table,’ Bowen Marsh told them. There were salads of spinach and chickpeas and turnip greens, and afterward bowls of iced blueberries and sweet cream.” (I: 372)

Medieval-ish Salad

Our thoughts:

This salad is earthy and quite tasty. The different greens provide a wide variety of flavors; the splash of lemon from the sorrel, the refreshing crispness of the mint, and the classic tangy pairing of oil and vinegar. That said, we weren’t crazy about the oniony greens in the mix. Our big change? Swap out the mushy chickpeas for the crunchy Middle Eastern snack kind. Yum!

Make it at Home!