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I’m still cooking my way through my favorite books, videogames and tv shows, but now with my own domain. Check it out for new and old posts on Dota 2, Game of Thrones and all sorts of other fandoms.
Mrs Peacock’s Party Fowl Crostinis
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Mrs. Peacock: This is one of my favorite recipes.
Wadsworth: I know, Madam.
– Clue (1985 film)
It was Mrs Peacock, in the kitchen, with a delicious idea for an appetizer.
For my Clue-themed cocktail party, I served one hors d’oeuvre or dessert and one cocktail themed around each of the six characters in the board game. Mrs Peacock’s dish posed a bit of a challenge to devise, but I’m very pleased with the end result. [Read more]
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Sansa’s Favorite Lemon Cakes
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Later came sweetbreads and pigeon pie and baked apples fragrant with cinnamon and lemon cakes frosted in sugar, but by then Sansa was so stuffed that she could not manage more than two little lemon cakes, as much as she loved them. She was wondering whether she might attempt a third when the king began to shout.
– Sansa III, A Game of Thrones
Lemon cakes pop up regularly in A Song of Ice and Fire – particularly in Sansa’s chapters! Despite their prevalence, there aren’t any precise details about their usual appearance or ingredients. [Read More]
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Pate-a-choux Pokemon Poffins
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What I like best about creating food from fictional sources is trying to figure out how to faithfully translate the fantasy world into a real life or modern kitchen’s methods and ingredients. [Read More!]
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The Iron Throne: Myths, Superstitions & Cersei
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The songs said it had taken a thousand blades to make it, heated white-hot in the furnace breath of Balerion the Black Dread. The hammering had taken fifty-nine days. The end of it was this hunched black beast made of razor edges and barbs and ribbons of sharp metal; a chair that could kill a man, and had, if the stories could be believed.
– A Game of Thrones, Eddard XI
[Spoilers: to A Dance with Dragons and Season 6 of A Game of Thrones]
This post was conceptualized while I spent time making my own mini Iron Throne. Read more about how I made it here!
One aspect of the A Song of Ice and Fire series that I love is the murky borders between myths, magic and superstition. While there is indisputably magic in the ASOIAF world, the magic is interpreted by people in different ways and extra legends and embellishments have been woven in ways that make it unclear what the actual magic is.
I think the Iron Throne is a rather interesting example of this phenomenon. Because of its symbolic representation of the actions and power of the monarch, and because of its unique construction, it seems inevitable that a mythos would arise around the Iron Throne. The Iron Throne has been attributed with the death of at least one man, and is also thought to mistreat inadequate rulers: [Read More]
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DIY Iron Throne Centerpiece
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The songs said it had taken a thousand blades to make it, heated white-hot in the furnace breath of Balerion the Black Dread. The hammering had taken fifty-nine days. The end of it was this hunched black beast made of razor edges and barbs and ribbons of sharp metal; a chair that could kill a man, and had, if the stories could be believed.
– A Game of Thrones, Eddard XI
Valar More-Glue-is: All Men Must DIY
The songs say it took 59 days and 1000 blades to make the iron throne. I made an iron throne in a weekend with around 100 swords. Mine is, to be fair, quite a bit smaller and rather less judgmental of the ruler’s leadership capability. [Read More!]
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‘Unnymoles – a pastry from Redwall Abbey
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“Doan’t knoaw wot ee ‘unnymole is? Lukk an’ oi’ll show ee, you’m pay ‘tenshun naow!”
The molebabe rolled out a small patch of pastry, spread it thick with honey and placed on it a strawberry and a raspberry. Wrapping the pastry carefully over the fruit, he coated the lot with a mixture of honey and damson juice. It looked nothing like a honeyed mole, but the molebabes thought it did. Gurrbowl licked his digging claws proudly and added his ‘’unnymole’ to several others on a tray, ready the go into the oven. He wrinkled his nose proudly at skipper.
“Hurr, that’n be ‘ow t’make ‘unnymoles, zurr!”
– Pearls of Lutra, by Brian Jacques
When I was about nine or ten, I raced my way through the Redwall books, devouring each one I could get my paws on. When I didn’t have a new one to read, I re-read my favorite tales of Redwall – perhaps none more than Pearls of Lutra. I loved the riddles and puzzles the abbeyfolk had to solve to save the day – it was a little bit like The Da Vinci Code starring rodents. So, for inspiration for a Redwall food item, I went first to Pearls of Lutra.
Honeymoles, or “‘Unnymoles,” as chef Gurrbowl calls them, seemed like a particularly fun dish to recreate since the entire process is described clearly in the books. I also loved the idea of crafting something that could conceivably look like a mole if you tried really hard to think like a molebabe. [Read More]
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Dota 2 Viewing Party – The International 6
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I had so much fun making Dota 2 snacks for The International 5 last year, so I had many months of anticipation building up for the TI6 finals (not least because of the amazing games in the preceding two weeks!). See what we came up with!
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Dota 2 Sheepstick Lamb Kabobs
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Turns a target unit into a harmless critter for 3.5 seconds.
– Dota 2 item description text for Scythe of Vyse
Sheepstick can be a little pricey, but well worth it if you need your entree locked down.
In the words of my friend (imagine, if you can, that these words are being said through a mouthful of lamb), “Oh, I get it, sheepstick because it’s sheep on a stick.” As far as Dota 2 food puns go, this one was pretty tasty.
This dish can be prepped easily ahead of time, and then pan-fried in a few minutes when the time is right. (I marinated the lamb right before the Dota 2 International 6 lower bracket final series kicked off, and cooked the lamb in the break before the Grand Finals.) Get the recipe!
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Dota 2 Aghanim’s Scepter Madeleines
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The scepter of a wizard with demigod-like powers [and a delightful lemon-y flavor].
– Modified flavor text from Dota 2 item descriptions
Madeleines are a sort of french sponge cake with a characteristic shell shape. This shape looks conveniently like the jeweled part of an Aghanim’s Scepter, the spell upgrading item from Dota 2. With a few crafty additions, they make adorable little Aghanim’s Scepters. I tried to dub them “Aghaleines” but the name didn’t catch on. Find out how to make them here!
Its All Geek to Me 
