I think Sword in the Stone is one of the least plot driven movies in the Disney Universe. Arthur (Wart) basically has fun with Merlin until he randomly pulls out the sword and is king. End movie. It’s a fun movie though…although, it doesn’t have much food.
By Merlin’s Tea and Cookies!
The first food shown is when Arthur falls into Merlin’s place. He has some tea and cookies ready for him.
(Credit: Disney)
I wanted to make digestive cookies, because I really like those. However, I don’t think they existed in the 14th century. So I found a great recipe for shortbread cookies!
Keeping with the medieval times, Sir Kay is shown devouring a turkey leg.
(Credit: Disney)
I have made full turkeys before and didn’t want to make another, so I went to my supermarket and bought a pack of turkey legs. They were fun to cook and actually tasted better than the turkey legs you get at Disney parks (heresy, I know)
Place drumsticks in baking dish with chicken stock
Cook in oven for about an hour or until legs reach a temp of 180F
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I JUST ATE A BUG!
I’m going to be a disappointment here. When Arthur is a fish, his fishy instincts gain hold of him and he eats a water strider perched on top of the moat.
I went out a few times to search bodies of water in hopes to catch a water strider and eat it, but I wasn’t able to find one (but I did get attacked by mosquitos). If I ever find one, I’ll cook it up and eat it.
Roast Pig
Part of a meal shown in the movie was a full roasted pig.
They also show some ham and stuff, but of course, we’ve made that stuff before.
This was another kinda cop-out. I don’t have the resources to cook a full pig on a spit. However, there is a restaurant kinda near me in Chicago called Sun-Wah BBQ. They often have full roasted pigs hanging in the window.
So I went there and ordered some roast pig. It was delicious.
But if you so desire to roast a pig on a spit, you can find directions at this site.
Honey Cake
Along with the roast pig, there is some kind of domed cake.
(Credit: Disney)
I wasn’t sure what it was, but after some research, I decided that Honey Cake was a popular medieval dish, so I made that. It didn’t turn out exactly how I wanted, but it was still tasty, albeit very sweet.
I’ve had lots of people tell me that they can’t wait for me to do Peter Pan because all that food the lost boys eat looks amazing. What they don’t realize is, that’s Hook with Robin Williams. Peter Pan actually didn’t have any food in it whatsoever, besides some rum and a bowl of fruit.
However, I didn’t want to leave everyone hanging. So here’s a recipe inspired by Peter Pan brought to you by me and a robot. (What?! A robot? Read on and find out)
Hook-is-a-Codfish Codfish
Since Peter calls Hook a codfish, and the croc ALMOST eats Hook,
(Credit: Disney)
I decided to make some Hook-inspired piratey codfish. I used a cool webapp called Chef Watson. It uses IBM’s super computer Watson to pair up common ingredients and generate a recipe based off of other recipes. You can actually find a bunch of awesome inspiration on there.
I knew I wanted to use codfish and rum. I also wanted it to have a Caribbean flair. I was able to generate a recipe based on those perimeters. However, I did do some tweaks I added some pineapple to give it a little So without further ado, Here is Hook is a Codfish Codfish.
Bring rum, shallots, coconut water and vinegar to boil in heavy small saucepan.
Reduce heat to low and simmer about 5 minutes.
Remove pan from heat and cover.
Let stand at room temperature.
Preheat oven to 400 fahrenheit.
Place each russet potato on separate sheet of foil, rub in oil, sprinkle with sea salt, and wrap tightly.
Bake about 1 hour.
Remove foil; cool to just warm, about 20 minutes.
Cut lengthwise in half.
Scoop flesh into medium microwave-safe bowl, leaving 1/4-inch-thick potato shell.
Add the canola/peanut oil and milk to russet potato in bowl; mash well.
Stir in creme fraiche.
Season to taste with salt and pepper.
Loosely cover shells and filling separately and let stand at room temperature.
Rewarm russet potato shells, then filling.
Stir anchovy paste into filling; season with sea salt and pepper.
Mound filling in shells.
Sprinkle basil.
Place tomatoes on top.
Place 21⁄2 fl oz water and cod fillets in heavy large skillet; sprinkle with salt and pepper.
Cover; steam over medium-high heat.
Meanwhile, rewarm rum-shallot reduction over medium-low heat.
Add coconut oil and pineapple, alternating 1 tablespoon at a time, whisking continue whisking until beurre rouge is thick (do not overheat or sauce may separate).
Season with salt and pepper.
Spoon sauce onto 4 plates.
Place russet potato on the remaining side.
Arrange the cod strips atop sauce on each plate; sprinkle with cumin and basil.
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Will it Make you Fly off to Neverland?
Watson, by George we’ve done it. (Ok, wrong movie). But this recipe turned out great.
The potatoes were a great paring to the pineapple rum codfish. I was thinking it would be a good addition to add a tangy piña colada-type sauce on top of the cod. So if someone makes this and comes up with such sauce, let me know.
“Fe-Fi-Fo-Fum I smell the blood of an anthropomorphic rodent!” – Willie the Giant (paraphrasing…kinda).
I had not seen either of these movies, but I had seen the short of Mickey and the Beanstalk included as part of Fun and Fancy Free. I hadn’t seen the other short film that was part of Fun and Fancy Free, Bongo the Bear. That was enjoyable, though, not as fun as Mickey and the Beanstalk.
Make Mine Music was kind of like Fantasia, but with more jazzy and contemporary songs. It was quite enjoyable. It make me want to boogie. It also included Peter and the Wolf. I used to watch that short ALL THE TIME when I was a kid. I absolutely loved it. Too bad it didn’t have any food to cook in it.
‘Murican Ice Cream (Make Mine Music)
Make Mine Music is set up kinda like Fantasia. It is a series of animations set to music. The only food shown in the whole movie comes from my favorite section of the movie called All the Cats Join in. The animation is happening as a pencil draws all of it, set to jazzy music. Some kids go into a Malt Shoppe and get some ice cream. I wish Malt Shoppes were popular when I was in high school, that would have been groovy.
Anyway, the “bartender” starts serving up a great big ice cream boat for a bunch of the cool cats to eat.
(Credit: Disney)
(Credit: Disney)
(Credit: Disney)
It makes it pretty easy to see what is going into the ice cream. And luckily, I didn’t have to buy a bunch of different tubs of ice cream, because it looks like only chocolate, vanilla and strawberry are used. GO NEAPOLITAN!
Now onto Fun and Fancy Free! The first segment is all about Bongo the Bear, however, no food is shown in it, besides a caterpillar chomping on a leaf…and I didn’t want to eat any more plants after Bambi.
In the second section, Jiminy Cricket jumps into a live-action house where a little girl, Luana is having a birthday party with her strange adult friend and his two ventriloquist dummies. It was actually pretty funny. They made some great puns. I’m all about puns. Anyway, that lucky little girl had two cakes at her party. The first one shown is a nice white cake with pink flowers on it.
(Credit: Disney)
We couldn’t find any pink frosting at the store, so we settled for red in this recipe.
In mixing bowl combine all ingredients until moistened, then beat with mixer on medium speed for 2 minutes.
Pour batter into pans.
Bake at 350 for 29-33 minutes.
Toothpick should come out clean when inserted into cake.
Cool 10-15 minutes before removing from pan.
Cool cake completely before frosting.
Frost bottom layer first, then put the second cake on top and frost over.
Use pink icing to make flowers or spell “happy birthday.”
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A Cricket’s Chocolate Delight Cake (Fun and Fancy Free)
Jiminy, that lucky cricket, start scarfing down an entire human-sized chocolate cake slice and the crazy adult friend is telling the Mickey and the Beanstalk story.
(Credit: Disney)
Even though they had some good desserts at Luana’s house, the real food doesn’t come into play until Mickey and friends get up to the giants house.
In mixing bowl combine all ingredients until moistened, then beat with mixer on medium speed for 2 minutes.
Pour batter into pans.
Bake at 350 for 29-33 minutes.
Toothpick should come out clean when inserted into cake.
Cool 10-15 minutes before removing from pan.
Cool cake completely before frosting.
Frost bottom layer first, then put the second cake on top and frost over.
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Slim Bean Sandwich (Fun and Fancy Free)
This is probably the most depressing meal I’ve made. Poor Mickey, Donald and Goofy. Mickey pulls out a slice of bread and cuts paper thin slices. Which is insanely hard to do, I tried. I need one of those Japanese sushi knives.
(Credit: Disney)
He then pulls out a single bean and cuts that into thirds.
(Credit: Disney)
The gang puts the bean into their paper bread slice and has the most tear-jerking sandwich of all time.
Luckily, fortune rests upon Mickey, Donald, and Goofy when they wander into the giant’s castle and find all of his food. I’ll just post screenshots of all of food that didn’t require recipes here.
(Credit: Disney)
(Credit: Disney)
(Credit: Disney)
(Credit: Disney)
(Credit: Disney)
(Credit: Disney)
Jello is the only non-fresh food in that list of pictures, but it is so easy to make from a box, I didn’t want to bother with the recipe.
Anyway, one of the center pieces on the table is a huge chicken.
(Credit: Disney)
I looked into a medieval-style of cooking the chicken, because the giant lives in a castle, just like in the medieval times.
The recipe I went off of calls for saffron. I had no idea of how crazy expensive that was. $10 for a little pinch of it! So I found out that Turmeric is a good substitute, so I used that.
Set aside.Place the flour, baking powder and salt into a large mixing bowl and whisk to combine.
Combine the coconut milk and coconut cream in small bowl and set aside.
Place the butter into the bowl of a stand mixer and using the paddle attachment, cream on medium speed until fluffy, approximately 1 minute. Decrease the speed to low and gradually add the sugar slowly over 1 to 2 minutes.
Once all of the sugar has been added, stop the mixer and scrape down the sides.
Turn the mixer back on to medium speed and continue creaming until the mixture noticeably lightens in texture and increases slightly in volume, approximately 2 to 3 minutes.
Stir in the coconut extract.
With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture alternately with the milk mixture to the butter and sugar in 3 batches, ending with the milk mixture. Do not over mix.
In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks.
Fold the egg whites into the batter, just until combined.
Divide the batter evenly between the pans and bang the pans on the counter top several times to remove any air and to distribute the batter evenly in the pan.
Place in the oven on the middle rack.
Bake for 40 minutes or until the cake is light golden in color and reaches an internal temperature of 200 degrees F.
Cool the cake in the pans for 10 minutes then remove and transfer to a cooling rack.
Once the cakes have cooled completely cut across the equator of each to form 4 layers.
Place the 1/3 cup coconut water into a small spritz bottle and spray evenly onto the cut side of the 4 layers.
If you do not have a spritz bottle you may brush the coconut water on with a silicone pastry brush.
Allow to sit while preparing the frosting.
Frosting:
Bring 1 quart of water to a boil in a 4-quart saucepan over high heat.
Decrease the heat to medium to maintain a steady simmer.
In the meantime, place the egg whites, sugar, coconut water, cream of tartar and salt into a medium size-mixing bowl.
Place the bowl over the simmering water and immediately begin beating with an electric hand mixer set to low speed.
Beat for 1 minute and then increase the speed to high and continue to beat for 5 minutes.
Remove from the heat and beat in the coconut and vanilla extracts for 1 minute.
Allow the frosting to sit for 5 minutes before using.
Frost the top and sides of the cake and sprinkle with the shredded coconut.
Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before serving.
Right before we come to the end of the Mickey and the Beanstalk story, it cuts back to the live-action scene and we see Jiminy stealing more food, this time some lemonade with raspberries in it.
(Credit: Disney)
I kinda went a step beyond just putting a couple raspberries into lemonade and made full on raspberry lemonade. It was a good decision too.
Place raspberries in a bowl and lightly mash so the juices get flowing
Add the raspberries
Stir together
(Optional) Let sit in fridge for a couple hours to allow the flavors to mesh
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Fe-fi-fo-Plum Pudding (Fun and Fancy Free)
I had a huge debate with people about what exactly this food was. Look at the mound with the cherry on top.
(Credit: Disney)
I had seen a recipe with a picture that looked like that mound before. I think it was in one of my mom’s old cookbooks. My first thought was a chocolate-lava cake, but that didn’t feel right. I asked a bunch of people and finally, my mother-in-law came up with the answer. Plum Pudding. I had never had plum pudding, so I was excited to try it.
Add potatoes, carrots, raisins and mixed fruit, lemon extract, and butter.
Mix well until batter is moistend through (this will take a few minutes).
Put in buttered mold, fill about 2/3 full.
Three 3″ fluted pans will hold the mixture.
Steam for 3 hours.
You can use a crockpot with steaming capabilities or put the molds in a larger baking dish, fill larger dish with boiling or very hot water, cover with foil and steam in the oven at about 300 degrees for 3 hours.
Let sit 10 minutes before removing puddings from molds.
Sauce:
Combine sugar, flour, salt, and vanilla/rum flavoring.
Add enough cold water to make a thin paste.
Cook over low heat until paste thickens up.
Add butter or cream until desired thickness is reached.
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Candied Beets (Fun and Fancy Free)
This was another debatable food from the same screenshot.
(Credit: Disney)
Behind the plum pudding are some pink ovals on greens. One of my facebook friends figured this one out. Candied beets. So naturally, I let the beet drop!
Using a coarse grater, grate cold butter into flour.
Add a pinch of salt and pepper.
Using your fingers, gently rub the butter into the flour until it begins to resemble breadcrumbs.
Add a little cold water to help it bind into dough.
Divide dough into 12 pieces and gently roll each into a round dumpling.
Place dumplings in pan and place on top of pot or dish full of water. Cover so the moisture doesn’t escape
Cook for 30 minutes.
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MMM, Chocolate Pot-roast (Fun and Fancy Free)
We don’t actually get to see this one. Willie the Giant holds a pot to his face and takes a big whiff and says “mmm, chocolate pot-roast.” That seems really strange. Chocolate on pot-roast? Well I tried making it anyway. And it was delicious. Who would think that chocolate would flavor beef so well.
Add pistachios and enough olive oil to lightly coat.
Cook for about a minute (the pistachios should not change color).
Add cream until heated throughout.
Remove from heat.
Add seasonings to taste.
Put in food processor or blender, puree
Return to stove, add milk and flour.
Stir until you get a good gravy thickness
Remove from heat.
Serve.
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Will it Make You Say “Fe-fi-fo-yum?
The Make Mine Music ice cream was good, just as good as ice cream is. Nothing amazingly special. The fish sandwich was an odd combination. It was hard to eat a boney fish inside of a sandwich. The avocado spread alone was good though.
The live-action food from Luana’s house was really good. The cakes were tasty, but the raspberry lemonade is the true recipe that took the cake from the cakes.
Now onto the giant’s feast. Wow, that was a LOT of food. The chicken was the real winner here. We had some guests over to help us eat the food, and they all raved about the chicken. Although everything was really good. I was impressed with the plum pudding, having never tasted it before. The chocolate pot roast was good and even better with the green gravy. It is kinda crazy how the bitterness of the chocolate and the saltiness of the potroast and pistachios really blended well. And I can’t forget about the coconut cake. That was to die for. My wife didn’t like it because she doesn’t like coconut, but everyone else that tried it loved it.
Verdict:
Ice Cream – 7/10
Fish Sandwich – 4/10
Avocado Spread – 6/10
White Cake – 8/10
Chocolate Cake – 8.5/10
Raspberry Lemonade – 10/10
Medieval Chicken – 10/10
Chocolate Pot-roast – 7.5/10 (with the gravy 8.5/10)
Plum Pudding – 8.5/10
Candied Beets – 6/10 (3/10 for those that don’t like beets)
Dumplings – 5/10 (better when sopping up meat juices)
One of the saddest parts of Pinocchio is that Geppetto made a huge mouthwatering feast that no one got to eat!
The Fish Figaro Failed to Eat
So as it goes, Pinocchio gets turned into a living puppet that’s a little less creepy than RL Stine’s Night of the Living Dummy. Geppetto is ecstatic to have a son, so he takes it slow and kinda gets him familiar with the world around him, right? Wrong. The next day, he gives him a juicy apple and sends him off to school, just in time to be picked up by a sly fox and his cat sidekick.
(credit: Disney)
Luckily, Jiminy shows up in time to tell Pinocchio that he should not be an actor and should go to school (sounds exactly like a conversation I had with my parents in high school). However, right after Jiminy tells Pinocchio not to go with the fox and cat, he turns face and goes with them. Talk about a block head. Fun fact—the cat (Gideon) that was with the fox was originally to be voiced by the famous voice-actor Mel Blanc, who also did Bugs Bunny and almost all the other Looney Toons. But all of his lines were cut, except for a couple hiccups.
Anyway, Geppetto is home cooking a fantastic feast to present to Pinocchio after his first day of school. I wonder how a puppet’s digestive system even works.
(credit: Disney)
We got some chicken, some fruit, a yellow cake with chocolate frosting and a fish all cooked up for Figaro the cat. Figaro is about to go all in and rip apart that delicious fish, but Geppetto tells Figaro to wait until he finds Pinocchio.
(credit: Disney)
And since Pinocchio was chilling with Stromboli the Gypsy at this time, there’s no telling if Figaro ever got to eat the yummy fish. But lucky for us, we got to taste it.
Bass is a common fish in Italy, so I got that kinda fish. We can see in the movie that there is lemon on the fish, some butter and some olives.
If Geppetto is half as good of cook as I am, Figaro really missed out, because the fish is delicious. It was a fun experience. I had never cooked a full fish before, let alone gutted one. So if anyone is like me and needs to know how to gut a fish, this link is really helpful.
Stuff the fish with 3-4 lemon slices, 2 whole cloves garlic, some cherry tomatoes, and some olives.
Add all herbs, inside and out.
Add the rest of cherry tomatoes, olives, and lemon slices on top of or around the fish.
Fold foil up to create a bowl around the fish.
Bake for 35 minutes, or until the fish flakes.
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A Cake Worth its Weight in Gold-fish
Man, how spoiled is Cleo. I guess you can’t blame Geppetto, she is a darling fish. I wonder how she felt as Figaro was about to devour her steaming uncle. Cleo the goldfish was given a beautiful yellow cake with a ribbon around it. Talk about presentation.
(credit: Disney)
I think she would be about 3x her size if she ate that whole piece. If I were her, that’s a risk I would take.
We kinda cheated on this recipe due to time and budget restrictions. Although, just because we used a box cake mix, doesn’t mean that my wife can’t enhance it and make it absolutely savory.
Make cake mix according to package directions with added milk and vanilla extract.
Bake in 2 round cake pans according to cake package directions.
Check with toothpick.
Let cakes cool completely, then dump out onto plate or serving ware.
Frost one cake top completely with a half carton frosting.
Put the other cake on top, frost top and sides completely with 1 carton of frosting.
Most importantly, enjoy!
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Jiminy Chicken!
The last thing that Geppetto made for his feast was a succulent chicken. I kinda took some liberty in making this because I’ve been wanting to try this recipe for chicken cooked in milk for a while. So I didn’t do my research and cook the chicken exactly like they would in Italy at that time. But who’s to say that Geppetto didn’t cook his chicken in milk. Cooking in milk makes the chicken really tender and moist.
Fry it in a little olive oil, turning the chicken to get an even colour all over, until golden.
Remove from the heat, put the chicken on a plate, and throw away the oil left in the pot. This will leave you with tasty sticky goodness at the bottom of the pan which will give you a lovely caramel flavour later on.
Put your chicken back in the pot with the rest of the ingredients.
Cook in the preheated oven for 1½ hours, covered.
Baste with the cooking juice when you remember.
The lemon zest will sort of split the milk, making a sauce which is absolutely fantastic.
To serve, pull the meat off the bones and divide it onto your plates.
Spoon over plenty of juice and the little curds. Serve with wilted spinach or greens and some mashed potato.
So the next meal we get to see is when Stromboli is thinking about how rich he’ll be with Pinocchio in his show. He has a platter of veggies, some spread, some sausage, cheese and some french bread. Why does he have French bread in Italy? Well he is a gypsy. Maybe he just came from France.
(credit: Disney)
Anyway, during this time, he takes a bite out of an onion as if it were an apple.
(credit: Disney)
I wouldn’t advise to do that, but if you so desire, chomp into an onion and eat this bread. You can find some sausage and cheese to go with it as well. This is a pretty simple bread recipe, perfect for a gypsy on the move.
Add yeast to the water in a medium to large bowl, then sprinkle the sugar over top of it.
Let it sit for about 5 minutes, until the yeast mixture looks frothy on top.
Stir in salt, oil, and flour. Before continuing, put a bowl of water in the microwave and set it for 4-5 minutes.
Return to bread and knead the dough until it’s smooth and comes away from the sides of the bowl easily.
Continue to add flour if it’s sticky.
Return to microwave and remove the bowl of water, discard (be careful, it’s hot).
Put the dough in the microwave with the door closed for 15-30 minutes, until the dough is almost doubled in size.
Next, remove the dough and divide into two equal balls. Roll out into rectangles, and then shape them into a bread shape.
Place both loaves next to each other on lightly greased cookie sheet.
With a sharp knife, make 3-4 diagonal slits in each loaf, cutting about halfway down.
Cover and let rise while the oven heats to 375.
Bake both loaves for 30-35 minutes, until golden brown.
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Pleasure Island Pie
One of the last foods shown is in the infamous Pleasure Island. A quintessential fun-land for boys in the 40’s. If Pinocchio were remade for a modern day audience, it would be a bunch of Xboxes, Nintendos and Playstations running on giant screens and…maybe a bouncy castle, because what kid doesn’t like a bouncy castle. Even though the modern Pleasure Island would be different than the 40’s Pleasure Island, the food would be the same. We see Pinocchio walking around with a full pie and ice cream, and his friend Lampwick (what a funny name. Good ol’ Lampy. Always brings such light in our lives) with a full roasted chicken.
(credit: Disney)
Since we already made chicken as part of Geppetto’s feast, we focused on the pie. It isn’t explicitly shown what kind of pie Pinocchio has, other than it has red filling. So after some research into common Italian berries, we went with the tried and true strawberry (which isn’t actually a true berry, but whatever). They also drink beer and smoke cigars later. But since I’m not in the business of letting little boys smoke and drink beer, I’m gonna skip those recipes.
Pull out frozen pie crust, let thaw while working with other food.
Mix the 1/2 box pie crust mix with 2 tablespoons and 2 teaspoons water.
Roll out on floured surface to 1/2-1/4 inch thickness, to cover a 9 inch round pie pan.
Slice fresh strawberries and mix with sugar and 1 teaspoon water. P
our pie filling into thawed pie crust, place fresh strawberry mixture on top.
Cover with rolled out pie crust, mesh sides together all the way around the pie.
Cut vents into top crust. Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes, or until crust is golden-brown.
Serve with pink ice cream and go break something.
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Will this Food Make Your Tongue into a Pleasure Island?
I loved Geppetto’s feast. Pinocchio was crazy to have missed it. The fish was tender and had a great flavor. The cake was moist chocolatey and yup, I loved it. The only thing that was somewhat lacking was the chicken. I was saddened by that because I was so excited to try out that recipe. It definitely was tender, but I don’t think it was flavorful enough. So maybe when you cook it, you can add some more seasonings. Let me know if you improve the recipe.
Stromboli’s snack was good. I didn’t particularly enjoy eating an onion whole, maybe it’s an acquired taste. But the bread was fluffy and delicious.
I would go to Pleasure Island for the pie. It was scrumptious. I didn’t have any pink ice cream, just vanilla, so I added some of the pie filling to it. It turned out great and pink. Just be careful not to turn into a donkey.
There is a full recipe given in this movie, but since I’m not in the market for eating a poisoned apple, I decided to opt for the other foods featured in the movie.
MMM….SOUP!
The first food shown in the movie was right after the dwarves discovered the not-so-monsterous Snow White hogging up three of the dwarves’ beds. She goes down the stairs and checks the giant cauldron.
(credit: Disney)
The dwarves rush to the edge of the steps and say in unison “MMM…SOUP!” Then rush down and start fighting over hard-rolls.
(credit: Disney)
Now, there aren’t many hints to what kind of soup this is. We do know that the dwarves have potatoes in their house that we see when Grumpy hides in the sack.
(credit: Disney)
But that is the only real visual hint. However, after the meal and festivities of the night, the dwarves retire to bed and grumpy is sent to sleep in the cauldron. He pulls a ladle from behind his back and says “A fine kettle of fish this is.” Now, the saying, “a fine kettle of fish” is used to express an awkward situation, but we took this to be a double entendre. That it was an awkward situation, and the soup they had was indeed fish soup. That would make sense given the rivers nearby. Also, I have a hard time imagining sweet little Snow butchering one of her cute animal friends and boiling them in the soup.
I did some research into the story of Snow White and found that it took place in Germany. I also found that perch is a common fish in Germany, and my local grocery store had perch, so I went with that fish. I couldn’t find a recipe that I liked, so I kinda shot from the hip when making this. It was a little harder than I expected, but you can learn from my mistakes.
Start by scoring perch and soaking in 2 Tbsp lemon juice, set aside for later.
In a large soup pot melt 2 Tbsp butter on med-hi heat and mix in 2 Tbsp flour, creating roux.
Add 1 Tbsp butter with onions and fennel bulb. Sautee until onions are clear.
Add beer, reduce heat to medium and let simmer (about 10 mins).
Next add salt, seafood stock, vegetable stock, and heavy cream. Stir well,
Add carrots, potatoes, and green onions. Turn heat to high.
Add spices: bay leaves, fennel, dill weed, paprika, and garlic, with the honey and 1 Tbsp lemon juice.Add salt and pepper to taste.
Leave soup on high heat until boiling, mixing well. Once at a boil, reduce heat to medium low and cover. Let simmer for 45 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Crumble cooked bacon into soup, chop perch into cubes and add to pot.
Cook 30 more minutes (partly uncovered) or until fish becomes flakey.
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Grumpy Gooseberry Pie
Right before the evil queen, finds Snow in the woods, we see Snow lovingly baking a pie for the down-in-the-dumps Grumpy. She even has a little bird write his name on it.
(credit: Disney)
She had mentioned making a gooseberry pie earlier in the film, and we can assume that the pie she is making in this seen is indeed a gooseberry pie, judging by the green berries shown inside the pie.
(credit: Disney)
I had never seen a gooseberry in my life. I didn’t have a clue where to buy them. They aren’t a common berry you see at the market. I looked online and saw that a company called Oregon Fruit sells canned gooseberries. You can buy them on amazon, but I didn’t want to pay over $30 for a pack of 8 cans. I looked at my local grocery store, but they didn’t carry them. Luckily, on their site, they have a little map icon that allows you to see what local store sell them. I was lucky enough to have a Whole Foods nearby that carried them, so I went and bought a couple cans at around $5/can. Expensive.
My wife is the baking master in our relationship so I let her handle the gooseberry pie. We kinda skimped on making the pie from scratch though. We bought a premade chilled pie crust and some pie dough mix for the top. But if you desire to make your own pie dough, you can follow the dough recipe below.
Mix ingredients with pastry cutter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs.
Slowly add water and mix until mixture forms a ball. You might not need the whole 1/2 cup. Split into two balls.
Optional: refrigerate balls wrapped in plastic overnight.
On floured surface roll out each ball to fit 9 inch pie plate.
Press one crust into pie plate evenly, reserve the other for pie top.
Filling
In saucepan, mix sugar, cornstarch, and salt.
Strain gooseberries and pour syrup into saucepan.
Turn on medium heat and stir for 5-6 minutes, until mixture starts to thicken.
Turn off heat and add gooseberries, cinnamon, and nutmeg.
Gently mix together then pour into pie plate.
Final steps and Glaze
Top with second crust and press top and bottom crusts together.
Poke holes to vent top crust.
Optional: Use overlaying crust from the topper to spell “Grumpy” like in Snow White.
For a nice pie coating, beat heavy cream and egg yolk together then brush onto pie top.
Bake at 425 for 15 minutes, then at 375 for another 20-30 minutes, until pie crust is golden brown.
Let cool before serving.
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Good enough to wake a sleeping princess?
It was definitely a nice meal. The fish stew was yummy and filling, but it wasn’t amazing. The gooseberry pie on the other hand, WOW. I now know why the dwarves were so excited. That stuff was DELICIOUS. It was sweet, yet tart. I hadn’t had a pie quite like it. It went well with a little bit of ice cream too.
Disney Meals 