Posted September 29, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
I’m a sucker for a good autumn salad. I’ll take hearty greens, roasted root veg, spiced nuts, soft cheese over a tomato-and-cucumber situation any day. Yet I’ve never had a chance to make one for the blog, so when I saw one mentioned in JONATHAN STRANGE & MR. NORRELL, I knew my time had come. Plus, I knew a beet salad would go perfectly with the other dishes I had planned for my Strange & Norrell menu—wigg buns with orange marmalade, a honeyed Cornish hen pot pie, and an opulent dessert I’m keeping secret for now. 😉
I added honey to my roasted beets to tie them in with both the pot pie entree and the vinaigrette I drizzled over the salad at the end (a honey Dijon variation on my go-to vinaigrette recipe). I wanted robust, earthy greens that would hold up to the deep flavor of the beets, so I used some kale and beet greens (never pass up a chance to use edible root veg greens in your salad—turnip greens are amazing too!). For salt and crunch, I included some bacon and toasted pine nuts.
An autumn salad craves soft cheese, so I went with goat cheese since it’s appropriate for the English countryside setting. Stilton would be even more appropriate, but I couldn’t get any. Up to this point, my salad is pretty much a standard beet salad, so I wanted something unusual to set it apart. Apricots were the answer to my prayer—sweet enough to brighten up all the other flavors, while rich enough not to get overpowered.
I ate this with my sister after I finished taking pictures, and we absolutely devoured it! In fact, she normally doesn’t like goat cheese, but she loved it here. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did! 🙂
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Posted September 15, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
In JONATHAN STRANGE & MR. NORRELL by Susanna Clarke, there is a scene in which the Gentleman with the Thistledown Hair orders an array of fantastical dishes from a restaurant: roasted wyvern, salamander with pomegranate relish, a pie of honeyed hummingbirds, and more! I wanted to be sure to include one of these amazing dishes in my menu, so I chose the pie of honeyed hummingbirds.
There’s no description of the pie in the book beyond the name, though it was obviously a savory poultry pie, so I had lots of room to get creative! I decided to use Cornish hens as my “hummingbirds” (partridge or grouse would be even smaller, but I decided to stick with what people can easily find in a grocery store). I roasted the hens in honey-lemon glaze and used mead (honey wine) in the filling’s creamy broth. Since this is an autumn menu, I added seasonal flavors like pumpkin, leek, and sage to create a delicious, rich, just-slightly-sweet poultry pie. Garnish the crust with a sage leaf hummingbird for that added touch of whimsy, and you’re all set to feast with the malevolent Gentleman with the Thistledown Hair. . . if you dare! 😉
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Posted September 1, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
Today I’m thrilled to begin a menu for one of the best books I’ve read in a long time: JONATHAN STRANGE & MR. NORRELL by Susanna Clarke. It is a historical fantasy that follows the story of two gentlemen magicians whose partnership and eventual rivalry change their world.
Despite the book’s unbelievable length (over a thousand pages!), I found myself wanting to read as slowly as possible, just so I could stay immersed in Clarke’s world. I love how she takes magical elements and seamlessly weaves them into a realistic 19th-century English setting. The aesthetic is reminiscent of gothic fantasy, making it a perfect autumn read, yet the book is narrated like a biography or piece of academic research, which grounds it. The merger of fantasy and reality is helped by footnotes that reference dark folklore and works of magical scholarship alongside historical figures like Napoleon and Lord Byron.
In keeping with this realistic setting, I wanted today’s recipe to be an authentic historical dish. In the book, Stephen Black, a butler who is more than he appears, is offered a wigg bun with marmalade. Wigg buns are lightly sweetened rolls that were popular in the late 18th century. They were traditionally spiced with caraway. I must confess to hating caraway, so I used other period appropriate spices: allspice, nutmeg, and cloves. The recipe below is an authentic late 18th-century recipe I found on Savoring the Past, which explores historical living (it’s a great source of culinary info from that era. I’ve use their collection of online historical cookbooks for past menus). This was really fun to try, and I especially enjoyed making “barm,” the historical alternative to modern dried yeast.
As for the marmalade that accompanied Stephen’s buns, I used a slightly tweaked version of a recipe I found on Mon Petit Four, since I’d never made marmalade before. I love this recipe because it’s super easy to follow, doesn’t use a lot of ingredients, and successfully avoids the bitterness that can happen in homemade marmalade. It takes a couple hours, but a lot of that time is spent waiting for things to boil. Plus, it’s easy to scale up without much added cook time. It was super delicious, I’ll definitely make it again. Enjoy! 😀
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Posted August 18, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
As summer shifts to autumn around us, my current menu is coming to a close. Cooking food from MY SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN by Jean Craighead George has drawn me out of my comfort zone in the best way possible. I seared fish wrapped in leaves on an open fire, made salad with dandelion greens, and simmered stew made from venison my dad hunted himself. I really got to capture the outdoors with this menu, and I truly enjoyed it. I’m sad to see it end, but I’m also excited to dive into my autumn menu. Let’s finish off the summer with one last delicious recipe, shall we? 😀
In MY SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN, one of the most common foods Sam makes is acorn pancakes topped with his friend Bando’s blueberry jam. “But wait,” I hear you say, “this post is a recipe for ALMOND pancakes!” And you’re right. Since I work on these menus a couple months ahead, acorns weren’t ripe yet when it came time to make this (and since I don’t have an oak tree, I’m not sure I could have scrounged enough acorns to make enough flour anyway). Almonds were an easily sourceable substitute, and I knew they’d pair beautifully with blueberry jam. And I was right! 😀
They turned out delicious, though I’ll admit the almond flavor isn’t super strong. The almond flour itself doesn’t carry a lot of flavor in this preparation, instead contributing more to the texture of the pancake, making it more moist and just a touch chewier. I added some optional almond extract to the ingredients if you want more almond flavor. You can also increase the amount of almond flour to 1/2 cup (and reduce the all-purpose flour to 1 1/2 cups). However, that will make the batter more finicky. It’s thinner and spreads a lot, so you’ll want to pour less batter per pancake (approx. 3 Tbsp). I also had to increase the burner temperature to just below medium. I found all that to be bit too tedious, but it’s an option if you want to try it.
The blueberry jam was a really fun pairing and a perfect way to take advantage of summer fruit. I’m not big into syrup on my pancakes, so I appreciated the change of pace. Add some fresh whipped cream and sliced almonds on top, and you’ve got yourself the perfect recipe to finish off a menu for MY SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN. See you all again in September!
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Posted August 4, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
Today we’re making another recipe from MY SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN by Jean Craighead George! One of my favorite things about this book is that it actually includes simplified recipes for a lot of the foods the main character, Sam, eats over the course of the story. I wanted to make sure to include one of these recipes in my menu, so today we’re making Sam’s venison stew. When explaining how to make one of his meals, he says, “brown puffballs in deer fat with a little wild garlic, fill pot with water, put venison in, boil.” Granted, he doesn’t call it “stew,” but pretty much the only difference between soup and stew is how long you cook it and if/how you thicken it. Venison can be a tough, lean cut of meat, so I think it’s more likely Sam cooked it for quite a while to tenderize it, like you would for stew. Plus, we know he had acorn flour on hand, so he could have used that as a thickener later if he wanted.
I used Sam’s instructions as a jumping off point, but my recipe below has a few more ingredients, ensuring a rich, deep flavor. I used a venison hindquarter roast I got from my dad (my mom says venison steaks would work well too), white button mushrooms (since puffball mushrooms weren’t in season), carrots and potatoes (because what’s a stew without some hearty root veg?), and a whole mess of herbs and spices. It turned out tender, rich, and hearty—just what Sam would want after a long day of hunting in the Catskill Mountains.
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Posted July 21, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
My Fire Roasted Foolbird recipe from last year was my first time cooking anything other than marshmallows on a fire, and it was SO fun! I knew I had to do some open fire cooking again. What better time than with a menu inspired by MY SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN, the tale of a young boy who lives alone off the land in the Catskill Mountains?
The main character, Sam Gribley, cooks loads of meals on an open fire. It was tough to choose which one, but remembering how long it took to cook the foolbirds, I decided to go with something that would cook a lot faster: fish. I was intrigued by Sam’s method of cooking trout wrapped in grape leaves. Since I couldn’t get trout, I chose snapper, which he eats earlier in the book.
This was SO easy to make, and the flavor was amazing—salty, garlicky, and acidic in all the best ways. The only hard part was the weather! I made this in mid-June and OH MAN THE RAIN. We just couldn’t seem to get any dry weather. My husband, who’s enough of a camping wizard that he can still start a fire with damp wood, just couldn’t get it going in a way he was happy with. It took us over a week (I had to go out and buy more ingredients—the first set had to be cooked on the stove before they went bad), but It was worth it. Considering it only takes about 15 minutes, this is going on my list of go-to vegetarian recipes. Enjoy!
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Posted July 7, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
Summer is here, and with it comes picnics, firepit cooking, and a banquet of fresh foragables. This abundance is what inspired me to choose MY SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN for my July-August menu. In the book, 10-year-old Sam Gribley runs away from home and lives alone in the Catskill Mountains, foraging and trapping his food. He describes dozens of wild edibles, most notably a “wild salad” of dandelion greens. So that’s what we’re making today!
Sam doesn’t specifically state what’s in the salad (apart from the greens), so I included lots of other items Sam eats in the book like fresh strawberries, apples, walnuts, and bird’s eggs (I used quail eggs). I roasted the walnuts in maple syrup, since Sam makes maple syrup in the book, and I for one LOVE a good candied nut in a salad. Of course, Sam wouldn’t have had any dressing, but I whipped up a quick maple syrup vinaigrette because to me salad just screams to have something holding everything together. I’m glad I did, because I think this is my new favorite dressing! It’s sweet-tart, with just a hint of spice from stone ground mustard. If you want to drizzle something book-accurate on your salad instead, you could whisk some maple syrup with a bit of rendered animal fat.
Full disclosure: I found the dandelion greens a bit bitter, but I would DEFINITELY make this again with a mix of dandelion and other greens.
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Posted June 23, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
This recipe goes out to my brand new “brother-in-law-in-law” (anybody know the term for a sister-in-law’s spouse?). My sister-in-law got married last month, and her husband LOVES guava! For her bridal shower, she made cupcakes filled with super luscious guava jam, and I’ve been dreaming about them ever since. So when I saw guava mentioned in SWISS FAMILY ROBINSON, I knew I had to try my hand at making my own guava jam.
But what to pair with it? That was easy: coconut. In the book, coconuts are mentioned no less than 36 times! Such a prominent ingredient simply HAD to be in my dessert, so I decided to make coconut macaroons and turn them into little guava thumbprint cookies. I used this macaroon recipe from The Slow Roasted Italian as my jumping off point, then started riffing from there.
These cookies turned out SO good. They’re sweet, a bit tart, and caramelized at the edges where the coconut get nice and toasty. Plus, the cookies are egg free, so they’re perfect if you have an egg allergy!
DEFINITELY making these again soon. Maybe for the next family gathering!
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Posted June 9, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 2 Comments
Time for more tropical goodness! This recipe is a snap to throw together and includes multiple ingredients mentioned in Swiss Family Robinson: pineapple, cabbage, carrot, and lime. Plus, it’s dotted with cute little carrot hearts. Let’s make some Pineapple Slaw!
Pineapples turn up regularly in Swiss Family Robinson, so even though I used them in my Seared Salmon with Pineapple Mango Chutney, I wanted to use them again. I loved the idea of a cold, fresh side dish to pair with my salmon entree, so I went hunting on Pinterest and found this Hawaiian Slaw recipe from The Skinny Fork. I love that it uses so many ingredients from the book, and it has a touch of gingery, peppery spice to complement the chutney in my entree. Plus, how cute are those little veggie hearts??? I just made a few minor changes to suit what I had in the fridge.
With the weather heating up, this refreshing, sweet-n-spicy side dish is the perfect thing to keep in mind when those sweltering summer days are upon us. Enjoy!
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Posted May 26, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 2 Comments
Are you ready to get tropical??? 😀 Since Swiss Family Robinson mentions LOADS of tropical ingredients, I wanted to use as many as possible in this menu. I don’t get many chances to make island-inspired dishes here on the blog, so this has been lots of fun for me. Let’s begin!
As the canvas for my island flavors, I chose the salmon Ernest catches in chapter four. I love that it’s such a personal triumph for Ernest. He’s one of my favorite characters, maybe because I think his father is too hard on him (Astronomy is a worthy pursuit, Mr. Robinson! 😉). Plus, salmon pairs well with so many of the fruits mentioned in the book, so it’s a great choice from a culinary perspective too!
For my fruit, I chose to make pineapple mango chutney. Since this was my first time making chutney, I looked to two recipes for guidance: a pineapple chutney recipe from Garlic & Zest and a mango version from Tastes Better from Scratch. Mango isn’t expressly mentioned in Swiss Family Robinson, but I felt it would bridge the gap well between the sweet pineapple and other savory flavors of the chutney. It’s also great at carrying spice, and although this chutney isn’t flaming hot, I wanted the heat that IS there to shine through.
Everything came together so beautifully. The salmon was tender and delicate, melding perfectly with the juicy fruit, bright bell pepper, and sharp onion. The spicy kick from the pepper flakes and sweet Thai chili sauce (one of my favorite condiments!) added just the right level of complexity. What an easy way to make a memorable dish!
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