Ready to cook something perfect this Holiday Season? Perfect for you and your equally geeky/nerdy culture-loving pals and more besides? If only there were cookbooks with recipes appropriate to some of our favorite fandoms… Oh wait! There are! And below, you’ll find a small list of rather attractive-to-the-tummy cookbooks celebrating geeky/nerdy fandoms and get-togethers over the table. These are perfect to gift in time for the Holidays!
The recipe for “Sembian Honey-Glazed Rothé Ribs” from Heroes’ Feast (Dungeons & Dragons): The Official D&D Cookbook! Picture credit to booktopia.au
1. Heroes’ Feast (Dungeons & Dragons): The Official D&D Cookbook
Amazon Price: $17.84 (hardcover); $38.99 (spiral-bound); $14.99 (Kindle)
Eighty — count ’em — EIGHTY dishes developed by professional chef Adam Reid to satisfy your inner adventurer of medieval fantasy! Fancy a cuisine centered around Elven, Orc, Drow, or Human cultures? This cookbook invites you to sample them all and have a merry feast with good company. Such delicacies as Elven Bread (which uses honey in the recipe), Orc Bacon, Hommlet Golden Brown Roasted Turkey, Drow Mushroom Steaks… Perhaps a nice Wood Elf Forest Salad to whet the appetite? The preview for this book lists these dishes and more; all of which sound most delicious.
Not only main dishes, but tasty desserts and cocktails too! Trolltide Candied Apples, Heartlands Rose Apple, Dwarven Mulled Wine, the Potion of Restoration, or the sweet and minty Rollrum.
The “Yawning Portal Buttermilk Biscuits” recipe! Picture credit to booktopia.au
On the book’s Amazon page, actor and D&D collaborator Joe Manganiello leaves this review: “For whatever reason, one of the oldest and fondest D&D memories I have burned into my mind is the recipe for Otik’s Skillet-Fried Spiced Potatoes in Leaves from the Inn of the Last Home.” He later adds: “P.S. Try the Halfling Chili . . .”
Be sure to check out the courses cooked up in Blandco’s video review for Heroes’ Feast (Dungeons & Dragons): The Official D&D Cookbook on the latter’s Amazon page.
The Unofficial Studio Ghibli Cookbook offers “Pumpkin and Herring Pot Pie” and “Skillet Bacon and Eggs”! Picture credit to ulyssespress.com
2. The Unofficial Studio Ghibli Cookbook
Amazon Price: $17.96 (hardcover); $14.99 (Kindle)
Studio Ghibli movies; where the food whets your appetite as much as the beautiful animation! And this book is 128 pages of meals and treats meant to emulate those gorgeous dishes we all saw in bits and pieces and said in our own ways: “OMG that looks yum!”
Though each food chapter doesn’t list from which Ghibli movie they originate, it seems a given that readers will recognize their origins closely enough. It seems most, if not all the dishes are more likely implied from the Ghibli movies. For instance: there is the Skillet Bacon and Eggs of Howl’s Moving Castle (2004), On-the-Go Ham Sandwich or Haaaaaaaam Ramen likely from Ponyo (2008), Chicken Congee (Okayu) of Princess Mononoke (1997), and that’s just covering breakfast through dinner!
The “Cantonese Egg Cake” looks delicious! Picture credit to ulyssespress.com
The “Desserts and Bakery Treats” section offers some delicious-sounding things: Hot Honeyed Milk, Rewarding and Decadent Chocolate Cake, Tea Party Cantonese Egg Cake, Pumpkin Bread, and so much more! The dishes will most certainly make you want to go full ham like the spirit in Spirited Away (2001)! Or should I say, like Ponyo?
The book is by data health analyst and part-time food blogger Jessica Ann Yun; her very debut in cookbooks. The Amazon review section says of her cooking style it is called “creative, innovative, and unique”. Do check out the video review from Cookbook Divas on the Amazon page for The Unofficial Studio Ghibli Cookbook! It gives a great look into what to expect from within the pages.
“Mudhorn Eggnog” recipe from Star Wars: The Life Day Cookbook: Official Holiday Recipes From a Galaxy Far, Far Away! Picture credit to amazon.com.ca
3. Star Wars: The Life Day Cookbook: Official Holiday Recipes From a Galaxy Far, Far Away
Amazon Price: $12.49 (hardcover)
It’s not Christmas without that fan-favorite celebration of “Life Day”; the celebration of the Wookiees promoting peace and life across the galaxy. So of course we need a mouth-watering feast! Well, this book offers plenty of that:
Jelly Life Day Orbs and Mudhorn Eggnog for dessert, Wroshyr Bramble (a type of vegetable casserole), and every Star Wars fan’s favorite part of the Life Day celebration: Bantha Surprise! But don’t worry, you won’t have to stir-whip, stir-whip, whip-whip-stir this particular meal.
Within The Life Day Cookbook, one finds 50 recipes covering appetizers, main courses, beverages, and desserts; all familiar to Star Wars worlds like Alderaan, Endor, and of course Kashyyyk!
“Cirilian Noodle Salad” recipe! Picture credit to starwars.com
These recipes come from author Jenn Fujikawa. The Amazon page for her cookbook shares her background in “unique family dinners and geeky baking”… All of these particular to her website. Fujikawa penned this cookbook as chef Strono “Cookie” Tuggs; former head of Maz Kanata’s establishment. The chef’s previous recipe work includes Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge: The Official Black Spire Outpost Cookbook.
All these fandoms and all the mouth-watering dishes you can cook with these cookbooks! They are perfect gifts for the geeky/nerdy cook you know who loves to bring people together ’round the table. Pick one up today!
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