An Unexpected Cookbook: The Unofficial Book of Hobbit Cookery (16 page)

Melt the butter in a wide bottomed stockpot. Add the beef broth, crushed garlic cloves, and fresh kitchen herbs. Give it all a good stir and bring the broth to a boil.

Now add your carrots in a single layer and roll them around in the broth a bit. Turn the heat down to medium and let them simmer for 12-15 minutes, or until the carrots are fork-tender. Gently turn them every five minutes to make sure the carrots stay evenly coated.

Once the carrots are nice and tender, remove them with a slotted spoon. Try to keep them intact for presentation purposes.

Turn the heat back up on the broth. Keep boiling until it’s reduced to a glaze. Fish out the cloves and any whole herbs then pour the glaze on top of the carrots. In addition to glazing the carrots, this makes a great substitute gravy to help flavor your bread or potatoes.

You can continue the theme of stretching out inexpensive leftovers by serving these carrots with mushroom dressing, mushroom soup, leftover tater cakes from lunch and some leftover roast apple bread for pudding.

VEGAN VARIATION

You can use the exact same technique with homemade vegetable broth and a bit of olive oil. It results in a radically different but equally tasty flavor. Try to use home made veggie broth since the quality of the broth is the real star. The carrots are just there to give it substance and sweetness.

Purists say you can’t have a real Yorkshire Pudding without beef drippings from a prime rib roast. There’s no arguing that the drippings give this classic English side a distinctive flavor, but you can still make a pretty darn tasty Yorkshire Pudding using pretty much any flavorful fat you like.

3 large eggs, at room temperature

1 1/2 c / 355 ml milk, at room temperature

3/4 tsp table salt

1 1/2 c / 200 g flour

3 tbsp beef drippings or the fat of your choice

Yorkshire Puddings are actually made from a handful of simple, everyday ingredients. In fact, other than the beef drippings, the only thing separating a Yorkshire Pudding from a pancake is technique.

Mix the milk, eggs, and salt until smooth and creamy. Add the flour and keep mixing until the batter is completely smooth and free of lumps. Pour it into a pitcher and let it rest for at least half an hour.

For best results, you want to make the batter in advance then let it sit for a good while before baking. Thirty minutes is the minimum, but feel free to mix up the batter in the morning and let it sit all day while you’re at work.

When you’re ready to make your Yorkshire Puddings, start by heating your oven to 450F / 230C. Grab a sturdy metal muffin pan and add 1 tsp of beef drippings, butter, lard, or the fat of your choice to each well. Put the pan in the oven and leave it there for 4-5 minutes, or until the fat is completely melted.

When your pan is scorching hot, very quickly pull it out and, as fast as you can, fill each well ⅓ high with batter. As soon as you fill the last well, put the pan right back in the oven and close the door.

Now for the hard part. Do not open the oven door for the next 20 minutes. If you do, your puddings may collapse. Leave them alone and let them rise into gloriously crispy domes with a hollow interior begging to be filled with gravy.

It’s no surprise potatoes are one of the only three new world crops Tolkien couldn’t bear to ban from the Shire. (He also let them keep coffee and tobacco.) Sure, parsnips and turnips were more nutritious English root vegetables, but nothing can replace the cheap versatility of the simple potato.

Boxty was a thick, family sized potato cake cooked in bacon grease and topped with the cooked bacon. Depending on what else you were doing in your kitchen, it could either be fried on a griddle or baked in a pan. The griddled version makes for a lovely, decadent presentation. You can slice it into quarters as a thrifty main dish or cut it into thinner slices to serve a crowd. Either way, it’s one more reason to be grateful Tolkien made an exception to his strict rules about what was eaten in the Shire.

1 lb / 450 g bacon

2 c / 500g potatoes, peeled and grated

2 c / 500g mashed potatoes

1 ½ c / 225g flour

1 tbsp coarse salt

1 tsp freshly ground black pepper

1 tsp baking powder

1 ¼ c / 300ml whole milk

¼ c / 55g melted butter

2 tbsp butter (for frying)

Grab your largest skillet and fry up an entire pound of bacon until crispy. This should leave you with a pan full of delicious juices. Set the bacon aside.

While the bacon is frying, peel and grate the raw potatoes until you have 2 cups of of shreds. Soak them in cold water for five minutes to wash away the excess starch. Drain the potatoes then refresh them in more cold water.

Mix your flour, salt, pepper, and baking powder in a large bowl. Once those are well blended, add your mashed potatoes, whole milk, and melted butter. Keep mixing until you have a thick, pancake-like batter. Strain the shredded potatoes and add them to the party, mixing just enough to evenly distribute them in the batter.

The next part requires patience. To make one large, family style boxty, you need slow, low, steady heat. Leave your bacon grease filled skillet at a steady medium, no hotter. Pour the batter in and spread it around the skillet until you have a single, giant pancake, no more than ½ inch / 1.25 cm thick. If you have any leftover batter, get out a second skillet and make some baby boxty’s fried in butter.

Let the bix boxty cook for about ten minutes. You can use a spatula to peek under the edge in order to make sure it isn’t burning, but do your best to just leave it in peace. Once the underside is a nice, golden brown, carefully slide it out onto a plate.

Add the last 2 tbsp of butter to the pan and let it melt. Now carefully, quickly, put the buttered pan on top of your plate and flip it over so the raw batter side goes splat down onto the hot skillet.

Put the boxty back on the medium heat and let it continue cooking for another 10 minutes, or until golden brown on both sides.

Slide your glorious disc of boxty onto a large plate. Remember all that bacon you fried? Tear it into small pieces and pile them on top of the boxty. If you’re making oxtails for people who are averse to seeing bones on a plate, you can also pull all the meat off the oxtails and pile it on top of the boxty then serve it with oxtail gravy on the side.

VEGAN VARIATION

Purists will say you can’t have a proper boxty without bacon. However, in lean times families might cut the bacon in half or even down to a quarter the usual quantity. Think of the vegan variation as being extra thrifty.

Substitute 2 tbsp of your favorite vegan cooking oil for the bacon grease and an equal quantity of oil for the butter. You can also substitute in your favorite non dairy substitute for the whole milk, but try to get one that actually has some fat. To enhance the flavor, add 1 heaping tsp each of onion powder, garlic powder, and black pepper into the flour mix. You don’t want to add any herbs because the long cooking time and griddle method could cause any in the crust to burn.

Chester Pudding is an eggier, almond infused, Victorian ancestor of the modern Lemon Meringue Pie. One of the nice things about this historic dessert is the kinder, gentler meringue standing a mere two inches / 2.5 cm high. Instead of stressing over creating the airiest of egg whites, relax and enjoy the simple wholesomeness of a moderately fancy looking pie that has a mere seven ingredients.

Crust:

1 ½ c / 200 g flour

¾ c / 100 g butter, softened

¼ c /50 g sugar

1 tbsp water

Filling:

6 eggs, yolks and whites separated

⅓ c / 70 g sugar

zest of 1 medium lemon

juice of 1 medium lemon

¾ c /100 g butter, softened

½ c /50 g almond flour

Start by making the pastry crust. Mix the flour and sugar. Now add the softened butter and work in into the mix until it becomes crumbly little pebbles. Add the water, a little at a time, until the dough is just barely sticky enough to hold together. When in doubt, err on the side of less water rather than more.

Once the crumbly mix is transformed into a dense dough, gently knead it a couple of times then put it in the fridge for at least 15 minutes.

When the dough has cooled down, roll it out so it’ll fit into an 8 inch / 20 cm tart pan. Press the dough into the pan, making sure it extends up the sides, and trim off any remainder on top. Feel free to turn the spare dough into Plum Heavies for tomorrow’s Afternoon Tea.

To make the filling, first separate the egg yolks from the egg whites. The two have very different roles to play in this pie.

Add the sugar, lemon juice, lemon zest, and softened butter to the egg yolks and whisk them together until the mix is completely smooth. This will be the base of the pie filling.

If you have a double boiler, add the eggy mix to the top and a few inches of water to the bottom. Bring the water to a gentle boil and continually whisk the lemon mix for 3-4 minutes until it thickens to the consistency of custard. If you don’t have a double boiler, you can always put an oven safe glass bowl on top of a regular pot. Fill the pot with a few inches of water, but not enough to touch the bottom of the bowl. You’ll achieve the same effect as a double boiler without any special equipment. Just be extra careful handling the bowl, as it will be dangerously hot.

Pour the filling into the pie crust and bake for 20-25 min at 400F / 205C.

While the pie filling bakes, prepare the meringue. Victorians would have whisked this by hand until their arms were sore (“until a maid is completely worn,” is a common instruction in period cookbooks) but you’re welcome to use a hand mixer or stand mixer. Beat the whites for about 3 minutes, then add half the almonds. Keep beating for another 1-2 minutes, or until the meringue is barely starting to firm up, then add the rest of the almonds. Continue beating until the egg whites are light and fluffy. Don’t keep going past that point, though, or you risk them collapsing.

When 25 minutes are up, pull the pie out of the oven and quickly spread the meringue on top. Stretch it out in an even layer from edge to edge. Pop the pie back in the oven for another 10-15 minutes, or until the meringue stiffens up and the top turns a light golden brown.

Let the pie cool for 10-15 minutes before serving, but not much longer. It’s best served while still warm and slightly runny in the middle.