This recipe comes straight out of the Lord of the Rings 💍, so to all LOTR fans, this goes to you guys!
I present Sam Gamgee Stew with Nasty Fries and Lemba!
This serves 4
Preparation time: 30 mins
Cooking time: 45 mins
For the stew:
- 2 Saddles of rabbit (about 1 lb 5 oz)
- 1 Onion
- 4 Carrots
- 3 1 ⁄2 oz White mushrooms
- 1 1 ⁄2 oz Butter
- 1 t Honey
- 1 T + 1 1 ⁄2 oz Flour
- 2 T Veal bouillon powder
- 18 fl oz Hot water
- 1 Bouquet garni Salt and pepper
- 6 Potatoes
- 1 T Coarse salt
- Neutral-flavored oil, e.g. corn
- 2 Eggs
- 2 T Honey
- 2 T Grapeseed oil
- 2 T Orange blossom water
- 2 1 ⁄4 oz Ground almonds
- 1 1 ⁄2 oz Flour
- 1 t Baking powder
- 1 pinch Salt
- 1 pinch ground star anise
- Zest of 1 orange
- 3 T Pumpkin seeds
- 4 Large fruit tree leaves (e.g., fig leaves)
Heat enough oil to cover the base of a frying pan and add the fries. Cook them for a few minutes and season. Check whether they’re cooked with the tip of a sharp knife—if the blade comes out easily, they are cooked!
Make the lembas: Preheat the oven to 350°F. Whisk together the eggs with the honey. Stir in the grapeseed oil, orange blossom water, ground almonds, fl our, baking powder, a pinch of salt, star anise, orange zest, and pumpkin seeds. Pour the batter into 4 cups in a cupcake pan and bake for 10 minutes.
Remove the cakes from the oven and let them cool, then tie a large fruit tree leaf around each. Arrange the rabbit and vegetables attractively on the plates.
Spoiler alert
If there were to be just one book left in the living room library, it would be this one, my precious! J. R. R. Tolkien’s œuvre spans generations, both in his books and on screen. In the second installment of the film trilogy, Sam makes a stew with the rabbits Gollum catches, the only way to eat them in his opinion. Gollum wants nothing to do with the “nasty fries” Sam finds so tempting, but it’s certainly a change from lembas—the elven bread they have in their bags.
This recipe is from The Geek’s Cookbook by Liguori Lecomte.
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