LotR marathon, Dinner and a Movie style

[theRogueRooster]

So, I'm all geared up to host a LotR marathon, and am trying to come up with food ideas, a la Dinner and a Movie on TBS. My thought is to serve three meals, with a movie following each meal. But my creative juices are all dried up at the moment, and would love to hear some ideas from all y'all.

Basically, I'm looking for recipe ideas that either come from the story somehow (like lembas bread, or even Beorning cakes) or play off a name or place (like Legolasagna).

Any takers?
-tRR

 

[Wombat]

Reminds me of old movie nights I used to host. The biggest problem came when we hosted Pirate Movie Night -- everyone volunteered rum and we had to squelch that quickly

But for LotR, might I suggest rabbit stew with taters?

 

[RangerWickett]

Taters?

 

[Klaus]

Yes, look for recipes in the movies:

Fellowship of the Ring: Sausages, tomatoes, nice, crispy bacon. With mushrooms! There's also tea, cheese, pie (or whatever else Bilbo served Gandalf in the beginning).

The Two Towers: Rabbit Stew with potatoes (mash'em, squash'em, stick'em in the stew). Gimli is also shown munchin' on something in Theoden's hall.

Return of the King: Chicken (or turkey?) with some nice tiny tomatoes (or whatever Denethor was eating). There's also the celebration in Rohan that might have some food going on.

 

[theRogueRooster]

Thanks for the suggestions so far. Keep 'em coming!

I should probably mention that this won't necessarily be formal dining, so really heavy, multi-course meals are probably best to be avoided. It should also be mentioned that I am merely a level 2 Cook's Apprentice. And I only gained that second level by flipping past the Food Network channel during my regular television surfing.

What I'm looking for is some clever (and not so clever) names for fairly ordinary dishes, or meal items that could tie into the movie in an obvious manner. Some examples that have hit me so far:

Lembas Bread (a snack involving graham crackers somehow)
Beorning Cakes (homemade yeast rolls filled with honey)
Dunedain-ish Pastries (Danish pastries)
Legolasagna (lasagna)
Isildur's Bane-cakes (pancakes) *yeah, I know. They're getting pretty bad.*
something with Aragarnish (something garnished) *groan*
Mount Doom Fudge Cake (mountain shaped chocolate cake with fudge lava poured over the top)
Boromir's Temptation (another dessert)

You get the idea.

The tentative schedule so far looks like this:

Breakfast

Beorning Cakes
Dunedain-ish Pastries
Isildur's Bane-cakes​

LotR: Fellowship of the Rings
Lunch

various clever meal items followed by Boromir's Temptation​

LotR: The Two Towers
Dinner

Legolasagna
something with Aragarnish
​

LotR: Return of the King

Mount Doom Fudge Cake served during intermission.​

So any other ideas would be greatly appreciated. They don't even have to be *good* ideas!

-tRR

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

The Fellowship of the Onion Ring

The Two Taters

Return of Chicken ala King

Employing a little google-fu, here's a recipe for Lembas:

What Tolkien says about Lembas...
-They contain honey
-they are light-colored on the inside and light brown crust
-they are thin and regular-shaped. This implies they were made on some kind of griddle iron.

Some other things we can guess:
-They contain the fruit and maybe the flower-water of the Mallorn tree. I substituted oranges, although kumquats or a hand of Buddha fruit might be better.
-They probably had some kind of finely ground light-colored nut in them. I used almonds.
-They contained some kind of nourishing flour. I used semolina flour, which is a more primitive flour, and also more nourishing.
-Galadriel probably used some kind of grinder to refine the ingredients. I used a blender.

The recipe:
3 eggs
1 cup honey (preferably wild honey)
1 tablespoon grated orange peel or three kumquats or one large finger of a hand of Buddha.
2 teaspoons orange flower water (optional)
3 oz blanched almonds
1/4 cup melted butter
2-1/4 cups semolina flour
1/2 teaspoon salt

Place eggs, honey, orange peel or other fruit, orange flower water, and almonds in blender. Blend on high for 3 minutes. Add 1 cup of the flour. Blend for 1 minute. Scrape into a bowl and add remaining flour and salt. Whisk or stir until well blended. Bake lembas on a pizzelle or krumkake iron 15 seconds each or until lightly brown. You may substitute a waffle iron but add a teaspoon of baking powder. The texture will not be quite accurate in a waffle iron.

and Cram:

3 cups Milk
8 cups Flour
8 tbsp Shortening
6 tsp Brown Sugar
3 tsp Salt

Mix the ingredients. Roll on a floured board to 1/2 inch thickness. Cut into 3 inch squares. Poke holes in each square (three rows of three). Lightly grease a baking pan. Bake in a 400 degree oven for 45 minutes, or until golden brown. Let cool and you'll have enough rations for a short journey.

 

[KnowTheToe]

You need a lot of small meals/snasks to incorporate all the meals

Breakfast, second breakfast, elevensies, lunch, & supper (I am missing one but can't think of it.


Here is a great soup that can act as your stew, it is very easy and only takes a half hour. Add some corn bread and you will be in heaven.



INGREDIENTS:

* 2 skinless, boneless chicken breasts
* 1/2 teaspoon olive oil
* 1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
* 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
* 2 (14.5 ounce) cans chicken broth
* 1 cup frozen corn kernels
* 1 cup chopped onion
* 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
* 1 tablespoon lemon juice
* 1 cup chunky salsa
* 8 ounces corn tortilla chips
* 1 can drained black beans
* 1/2 cup shredded Monterey Jack cheese (optional)

DIRECTIONS:

1. In a large pot over medium heat, saute the chicken in the oil for 5 minutes. Add the garlic and cumin and mix well. Then add the broth, corn, onion, chili powder, lemon juice and salsa. Reduce heat to low and simmer for about 20 to 30 minutes.
2. Break up some tortilla chips into individual bowls and pour soup over chips. Top with the Monterey Jack cheese and a little sour cream.
3. Warm corn muffins surved with real butter

This will feed 4-6 people, if you are going to have 6-8, I would suggest doubling the recipe. For the standard recipe, I also add an extra can of chicken broth, double the garlic, and add a touch more chili powerder. It does not add too much heat and anyone can add more cheese to absorb the heat. Remember soups are not like cakes. You can add more salsa or corn or chicken if you want it a bit more "meat" in the soup or anything else for that matter..

Now you also do not want to spend all of your time cooking ang that can be prepared the day before and just reheated. I also recommend open faced or if you prefer small finger sandwiches. You can buy 2-3 different types of loaves, cut a few different types of deli meat, tomatos, lettuce etc and make mini sandwiches. They are tasty, clean, do not take much effort to eat and are easy. These can also be prepared in the morning before everyone arrives or the night before if you do not put any mayonaise or mustard on them.

Things I would stay away from. Anything that requires a lot of cutting because it is hard to to on your lap or in a confined space. Chips with chees crap that gets on everyones fingers. They are fine for 2-3 people, but get messy and require people to constantly wipe their hands down.

You could make trail mix or GORP as some like to call it. Raisens, pretzels, m&ms, peanuts etc..

Unless you have experience with decorating cakes, your mountian cake is harder than you think it will be. My wife decorates cakes so I see what goes into shaping them and it can take work.

Two desert/snack ideas. First, monster cookies, they are great, and few people eat them very often. I also have a recipe for home made ding dongs, we call them woopy pies. Basically, they are two small hand held chocolate cakes with a layer of white cream in the ceter. They are good and uncommon. If you are interested in the recipe, let me know and I will post it. I can do the same for monster cookies, but that one is easy to find on the web as well.

 

[Chaldfont]

I don't know how much lead time you have, but you could make your own homebrew beer. Hobbits love their ale. Serve it up in the biggest mugs you can find ("they come in pints!?").

I just started homebrewing and its not that much work and a lot of fun. My gaming group has two homebrewers now and we sample the wares during the game.

Check out http://www.northernbrewer.com to get started.

 

[Qlippoth]

Might I suggest...nice fish...raw & wriggling?

 

[ssampier]

S'Mores

Why? Hobbits love s'mores (dwarves get the chocolate stuck in their beard)

Interesting idea, I wish I could join. If I were cooking a casual dinner for gamers, I'd go with tasty and easy; not necessarily movie appropriate. Sandwiches with all the fixin's, hamburgers on a indoor grill, and homemade pizza. All tasty, but fairly easy to make. Don't forget to serve it with dwarven mead (locally brewed beer).