Posted April 27, 2023 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Teas / 0 Comments
Since there’s an extra Thursday this month, I get to do a bonus post! Usually I make a cocktail for my bonus recipe, but since Captain Nemo doesn’t keep alcohol on the Nautilus (much to the distress of Ned Land), I decided to take the opportunity to create a new tea blend.
If you’re new around here, you may not know that I have a set of custom tea blends on Adagio Teas. I used to make a new one for almost every menu, but now I have over 50 blends! So these days I only make a new tea if I feel truly inspired.
I loved the idea of an ocean-themed blend, so I started with White Tropics, which is a white tea flavored with pineapple and coconut. Those fruits are perfect since they’re both mentioned in the book and also have distinct flavors that come through even in a delicate white tea. For added depth, I mixed in my favorite green tea: Citron Green, which has notes of lemon and orange. I love how the citrus plays off the tropical flavors without completely overpowering them. For a flavor boost, I added dried coconut, dried pineapple, and lemon balm.
I always recommend serving herbal and white teas cold since the flavors are so delicate. This one is SO delicious! The lemon hits you first–smooth and soothing–followed by hints of the juicy tropical flavors at the end. Just the thing to calm your nerves after defeating a giant squid!
Sound delicious? You can order it here!
Posted February 18, 2021 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
Make way for bonbons! Today we’re making the last recipe in my Jane Eyre menu: bonbons inspired by Mr. Rochester’s time in France. Although the rest of this menu was heavily influenced by early 19th century recipes, I had a difficult time finding bonbon recipes from the period. Luckily, the basic process doesn’t appear to have changed that much over the years, so I decided to use modern techniques but stick with period-appropriate flavors. Let’s take a look at the flavors we’re using today: Read More
Posted June 21, 2018 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments
Given the title of this post, you’re probably already wondering about the story behind this recipe. It all started with I started hunting through the Star Trek cookbook for any recipes I might want to include in my Voyager menu. I saw the Maquis Breakfast Bars and thought they looked delicious: homemade granola bars with rolled oats, dates, cranberries, dried apples, shredded coconut, and a bit of honey. I haven’t made anything like that before, so I whipped them up one morning. They turned out great…until it came time to cut them. When I tried to slice the giant sheet of baked granola it absolutely crumbled. There was no way I was going to get even a few bars out of it.
Disappointed, I began to nibble on the crumbled bits as I thought about what recipe I should make to replace it. I stopped short. The granola tasted A.MAZ.ING. I couldn’t stop eating it, and after I shared a handful with the Little Mister, he was hooked too. I crumbled up the remnants in the pan and turned it into loose granola, which the Little Mister and I have been eating with our breakfast every morning since (once it runs out, he may mutiny).
Since I loved the flavor so much, it seemed wrong to scrap the recipe in favor of something else. I didn’t want to risk adding more liquid, since it held together really well in the bowl and I didn’t want to risk soggy granola. Instead, I decided to present it here on the blog as granola bowls. I hope you all enjoy it as much as we did!
P.S. The original recipe calls for melted butter and honey to hold the granola together. For a healthier option, I think melted coconut oil would work equally well with the honey. I haven’t tried it yet, but I intend to. I’ll let you know how it turns out! 🙂
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Posted December 21, 2017 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 2 Comments
Is this more of an appetizer than a side dish? Probably. As soon as I started planning my Grinch Who Stole Christmas menu, I knew I wanted to incorporate Grinch hearts, but I wasn’t exactly sure how. It wasn’t until early this past week that I decided on making fruit skewers with dip, and by then I’d already made Who Hash for my appetizer. So here they are as a side dish! In the end, all that matters is that they’re delicious, right? 😉
And they definitely ARE delicious—easy too! Just cut your strawberries into shape with a small heart cookie cutter and slice the ends off your grapes at an angle. Slide them on a skewer, and you’re done! The fruit dip is easy too. It’s got a tasty coconut yogurt base blended with cream cheese and honey for added creaminess and sweetness. It’s a sweet snack you can feel great about eating, Grinch or not!
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Posted June 1, 2017 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 4 Comments
Fandom Foodies announced earlier this year that they would be doing a Star Trek recipe month this June. This was perfect, since I was already planning on doing a Star Trek TOS menu this month anyway! 🙂
[EDIT: Sooo it turns out the Fandom Foodies theme was changed to Game of Thrones? Lol! You should totally still check it out. There’s always good stuff on the Fandom Foodies linkups. I’m gonna keep doing Star Trek though, since I’ve been looking forward to it for so long. :)]
All the recipes I’ll be making this month are crowd-friendly finger foods, perfect for any Star Trek party.
We’re starting the month off with a Tribble-themed appetizer: cranberry almond energy bites coated in shredded coconut. It’s a recipe I came up with while I was pregnant with the Little Mister, when I needed a quick make-ahead recipe for postpartum breakfasts and snacks. It’s delicious, quick, and easy to customize based off what you already have in your cabinets. Plus, it looks just like those fuzzy little Tribbles: my favorite characters in all of Star Trek TOS!
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Posted March 23, 2017 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 3 Comments
Dessert in the Firefly universe is an interesting affair, to say the least. As intergalactic smugglers, the crew of Serenity is used to simple, tinned food, so when they get a chance for something sweet, they go all-out.
In the episode “The Message” we see River eating an “ice planet”—a large ball of what appears to be ice cream extended on a string attached to a stick. It’s problematic to eat, but it sure looks delicious! I knew I wanted it to be my Firefly dessert.
Since we’re never given a description of the ingredients, I had to get inventive. Since the surface of the ball is coarse instead of smooth, I figured it had been coated in something, and shredded coconut sounded like a delicious pairing. And since the balls were white, I figured they were probably made with vanilla ice cream. I didn’t want plain vanilla for the center, though, so I thought it would be fun to toast some marshmallows and mix them in.
Voila! Dessert is served. 🙂
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Posted November 15, 2016 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Teas / 2 Comments
When I first started thinking about what I wanted to do for my Moby Dick tea, I immediately drew up a list of white teas and went to work on different combinations. I don’t get to play with white teas very often, so a book themed around a white whale was all the motivation I needed to make sure this lesser-known tea gets some love! 🙂
However, most white teas have a very delicate flavor, and I felt like a whaling book would need something with a bit more oomph. I found it in Adagio’s white chai. It combines a hint of tropical flavor with light spice to make a unique take on traditional chai. I added some gunpowder green tea to give it just a hint of smokiness and some extra coconut to balance it all out.
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Posted April 28, 2016 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 6 Comments
Of all our Series of Unfortunate Events recipes, I think this was the one I was most excited about. I knew for sure I would be making Uncle Monty’s famous coconut cake from The Reptile Room as our dessert—it’s the food I remember best from the whole series! All the cakes I’ve made on the blog so far have been chocolate (like Delicious Death and Dauntless Cake), so it was fun to try something different. And you can bet the Mister was excited: he loves coconut! This particular recipe starts with a mix, but I used a few baking tricks to make it more like homemade. The frosting is my own invention too, but I used this BHG recipe as my starting point. The final result is a moist, fluffy cake with just the right amount of coconut. So eat up! If your life is anything like the Baudelaires’, you may not know when you’ll encounter such a delicious dessert again. 😉
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Posted May 1, 2014 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 3 Comments
Happy May Day, everybody! It is with great pleasure that I introduce our new Book of the Month (and first sci-fi pick): The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy! This is easily one of my favorite books. It’s quirky, original, yet sometimes profound. And since May 25th is Towel Day, I knew this month was the perfect time to feature a Hitchhiker’s Guide menu. Let’s get started!
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