An Unexpected Cookbook: The Unofficial Book of Hobbit Cookery (15 page)

Snuggle the bird into its vegetable nest. Roast it at 475F / 245C for 25 minutes. Use a slotted spoon to carefully turn the vegetables surrounding the bird. You want to make sure all of them get a little bit of butter and/or drippings. Return the bird to the oven and continue roasting at 400F / 205C for another 45 minutes or until a meat thermometer plunged into the thickest part of the thigh registers 160F / 162C internal temperature.

Check on the bird around the 30 minute mark. If the skin is getting too crispy, tent some aluminum foil on top to keep it from burning.

When you pull your chicken out of the oven, let it rest for 20 minutes before carving. While it’s resting, give the vegetables a good stir to ensure they’re coated in butter and drippings. If they’re cooked through, turn off the oven and leave them inside it to keep warm. If they’re still a little raw in the middle, keep cooking for another 10-15 minutes at 400F / 205C while the chicken rests.

1 leftover roast chicken carcass

2 onions, skin on, quartered

2 carrots, broken into pieces

2 celery sticks, broken or cut into pieces

1 sprig/ 1 tbsp rosemary, thyme or other garden herbs

4 garlic cloves, crushed

After dinner is over, make sure to save the bones, carcass, and any leftover bits. Throw them in a large stockpot. Quarter two whole onions, skin on (the skin adds a delicious caramel color), and throw them in the pot. Add two whole carrots, broken into pieces, and two celery ribs, cut into thirds. If you have any more garden herbs or garlic, throw them in there, too.

Fill the pot with water until ¾ full. Don't worry about an exact amount. This is a ridiculously flexible recipe. Just use your biggest pot. You’ll end up with however much broth that pot can contain.

Bring the mess of bones and veggies to a rolling boil. Cover the pot, reduce the heat to medium-low, and let it continue simmering away for at least 2 hours, longer if you have time. Those leftover scraps will miraculously transform into the best darn broth you’ve ever tasted.

Once you’ve boiled all the flavor out of the bones, strain out the solids and throw them away. You’ll be left with a dark, golden brown chicken broth perfect for use in tomorrow’s soup. This makes the perfect base for a nice Mushroom Soup (pg 69) at Luncheon or an excellent addition to some Savory Mushroom Bread Pudding (pg 116).

Savory bread puddings are a great way to transform scraps into a hearty side dish. Like a good Victorian cook, you’re using up leftover bread from the previous night’s meal and leftover broth from last night’s chicken. Add in a few garden herbs and vegetables plus a Hobbit sized helping of mushrooms and suddenly your scraps are the star of your plate.

With a few minor substitutions, this also happens to make a hearty main course for serving any vegans visiting the Shire.

1 lb / 450 g old, stale bread, cut into cubes

3 c / 710 ml chicken stock (pg 114) or vegetable broth (for vegans)

½ c / 115 g butter (or vegetable oil for vegans)

8 cloves garlic, minced

4 shallots, diced

2 onions, diced

1 lb / 450 g mixed mushrooms, cleaned and coarsely chopped

2 tbsp fresh rosemary

1 tbsp rubbed sage

½ tbsp fresh thyme

1 tsp salt

2 large eggs, lightly beaten (omit if vegan)

To get started, melt 1 tbsp of butter in a large skillet over a medium-high heat. Add the chopped onions and shallots. Cook until the onions barely start to brown.

Add the minced garlic, rosemary, sage, thyme, and salt. Keep cooking for 2-3 more minutes, or until the garlic barely starts to brown. Now add the rest of the butter. Let it melt until you vegetables are completely drowned.

Turn off the heat, but leave the skillet in place. Add your 3 cups of broth. This should warm the broth up without bringing it to a boil. Mix the veggies into the broth until you have a thick, soupy blend.

Pour the broth mix over your bread cubes. If you don’t have a bowl big enough to handle an entire loaf of bread cut into cubes, divide everything in half and use two bowls. Top the damp bread with your coarsely chopped mushrooms. Use whatever favorites grow in your corner of the Shire.

Finally, add the beaten eggs on top.

Now it’s time to get dirty. Roll up your sleeves and use your hands to knead everything together. You want to get some of that flavorful broth and veggies onto every scrap of plain, stale bread while also mixing the mushrooms in as thoroughly as possible. The mix may seem a little dry. Resist the urge to drown it in more broth or you’ll end up with a soggy side dish.

Liberally butter a 9x13 cake pan. Press the mushroom mix into the pan. If you like a dense, heavy bread pudding, keep pressing until there’s no air left. If you prefer yours fluffier, more like American Thanksgiving dressing, just pile it in and spread it around.

Either way, bake it uncovered at 350F / 180C for 45 minutes. The top will become a wonderful crunchy brown while the middle stays moist.

If you opted for the loose pile, gently fluff it with a fork before serving. Otherwise, cut it into squares.

VEGAN VARIATION

Substitute vegetable broth for chicken broth and the cooking oil of your choice for the butter. If you’re using store bought broth, consider doubling the herbs for added flavor. The mix won’t stick together well without the eggs, which means you’re not going to get neatly cut squares which hold together when being moved from the pan to a plate. Therefore, opt for the fluffy version.

A lot of people shy away from cuts of meat full of bone and fat. It’s a shame, because that’s where the best flavor hides. In Tolkien's day, nose to tail eating was the norm. A nice segmented oxtail was a great way to get a few bites of rich meat for the whole family with the added bonus of creating a pot of incredibly flavorful broth that would last the week.

3 lbs / 1.3 kg oxtails

1 tbsp butter

2 c / 475 ml red wine

2 c / 475 ml beef or vegetable broth (whatever you have)

2 bay leaves

2 sprigs fresh rosemary (about ½ tbsp pulled off the stem)

1 whole onion, peeled

6 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed

Melt 1 tbsp butter in a Dutch oven or large, sturdy stockpot. Over a medium-high heat, brown the oxtails on all sides. Make sure to brown the fatty side. That adds a lot of flavor.

Once your oxtails are browned up, drown them in red wine and broth. Add the bay leaves, fresh rosemary, crushed garlic cloves, and whole, peeled onion. You can tuck them in a cheesecloth sachet if you’d like to keep things tidy, but it’s not strictly necessary.

When the wine and broth mix comes to a boil, put the lid on your Dutch oven. Reduce the heat to low and let it continue simmering for the next 2 hours. Check on the oxtails every half an hour or so to baste them in the cooking liquid.

If you want to make a stew of it, after two hours of cooking, add 3 lbs / 1.3 kg peeled carrots, potatoes, turnips, or the root veggies of your choice. Make sure they’re all cut into equal sized pieces no more than 2 inches / 5 cm. Bring the pot back to a boil, then turn the heat down to low and keep simmering for the next 30-45 minutes, or until the veggies are all soft, but not yet falling apart.

If you don’t want to make a stew of it, just simmer the oxtails for 2 hours and 45 minutes, or until they’re so tender the meat nearly falls off the bone.

Now you have a couple choices. If you’re feeling extra rustic, you can serve the oxtails whole and let people pick at them to find all the good bits. However, if you have guests who are a little squeamish about seeing an actual piece of bone on their plate, go ahead and pull the meat off the bone for them. If you’re making a stew, pile the meat on top of the vegetables right before serving. If you’re just making oxtails, try serving the meat on top of a fresh slice of Boxty (pg 125).

Before serving, remove 1 cup of fluid from the pot to use as a sauce. You can make an easy gravy by whisking together 2 tbsp flour with ⅓ c cold water until the mix is free of lumps. (If you’re allergic to gluten, substitute 1 tsp cornstarch.) Mix the cup of reserved juices into the cold flour water, whisking violently to keep it lump-free. Add salt, pepper, and Worcestershire sauce to spruce it back up.

After dinner (or after picking the bones clean for squeamish guests), return the bones and other leftover bits of the oxtails to the pot. Fill it the rest of the way up with water and bring it back to a boil. You can add a couple carrots and celery sticks for added flavor if you’d like. Let it boil while you entertain your guests at dinner, or for at least 2-3 hours. That gives it time to leach all the last flavor from the bones and marrow. If the night runs late, you can always put everything in a crockpot set to low and forget about it while you go to sleep.

Either way, you now have delicious home made beef broth you can use in anything. Take a sip and you’ll never want to use store bought broth again. Strain out the solids and store it in the fridge for up to a week.

If you’re not in the mood to make broth from the leftovers, at least make sure to strain all the juices out of the pan left after making your gravy. You can make a simple, filling soup of it the next day by adding 1 part water to 1 part juices or just sop it up with stale bread for a truly lazy yet decadent snack.

You can’t make a meal of meats and carbs alone. Well, you can, actually, but it’s nice to have a little something green on the plate, too. When you remove your roast or chicken from the oven, put this side dish in its place. You’ll have an easy, no fuss vegetable ready in the time it takes to properly cool your meat.

1 lb / 450 g fresh green beans, trimmed

3 tbsp melted butter

2 tbsp fresh basil leaves, sliced thin and bruised

1 tsp coarse salt

Turn your oven down to 400F / 205C.

Spread the butter, basil leaves, and salt over the bottom of a cake pan or baking sheet. Arrange the trimmed green beans on top.

Let the green beans cook for 6 minutes. Stir the pan to evenly distribute the sauce, shake it so the beans sort themselves back into an even layer, and close the door for another 6-8 minutes. You’ll end up with perfectly crisp-tender green beans in a subtly flavored butter sauce.

If you prefer your green beans a little mushier and you have ample space in your oven, you can put them in there along with your chicken and roast for up to half an hour in order to thoroughly soften them up.

VEGAN VARIATION

Substitute olive oil for the melted butter. Double the bay leaves and add another ½ tsp of salt to enhance the flavor.

Meat was expensive enough during Tolkien’s childhood that few rural families could afford it daily. However, there are lots of tasty ways to stretch out the flavor of meat in an otherwise vegetarian meal. In this case, leftover beef broth brings plenty of taste plus some extra calories and minerals to an inexpensive bunch of carrots.

2 ¼ lbs / 1 kg carrots, peeled

2 c / 475 ml beef broth (or leftover oxtail broth)

2 garlic cloves, crushed

2 sprigs fresh kitchen herbs (rosemary or thyme)

2 tbsp butter

Sort your carrots to find the ones that are no more than 1 inch / 2.5 cm wide and 6 inches / 15 cm long. Alternately, you could simply cut your carrots into evenly sized pieces, but sometimes it’s fun to be a presentation snob. Peel the carrots and cut off any woody end pieces.