Our Grand Feast of Ice and Fire (spoilers)

The pictures from our Game of Thrones night are here! As mentioned earlier, my sister and I hosted a “Feast of Ice and Fire” last weekend, and it was a sumptuous success. We watched the first seven episodes of season 3 of the HBO show and dined on the most splendid meal I have ever participated in creating.

Most of the recipes are either taken from or inspired by A Feast of Ice and Fire: The Offical Game of Thrones Companion Cookbook by Chelsea Monroe-Cassel and Sariann Lehrer, but we added our own touch. See earlier post for review. I absolutely recommend this book to any fan.

I’ll include from which book of the Song of Ice and Fire series each dish is taken, and by whom it was eaten (hence the “spoilers” tag).

Appetizers

Dates Wrapped in Bacon. This is the only dish not from the book, but all you fans out there know that it definitely could be. We felt it was consistent with all of George R. R. Martin’s other abundant food descriptions. And by the way: It. Was. Delicious. 

Remove stones, wrap in bacon and bake at 200°C for 15 minutes. Yummy.

Beverage: Local apple cider, produced on a farm nearby.

Starters

Cream of Mushroom and Snail Soup. The first course at King Joffrey’s wedding feast in A Storm of Swords. We made snail the optional ingredient for the guests.

Vegetable broth, heavy cream, mixed mushrooms, leeks, spring onion, parsley, thyme, oregano and canned snails (stuffed in decorative shells if you like).

Cheese and Onion Pie. Also a dish at King Joffrey’s wedding feast.

Pie dough, eggs, onion, cheese, herbs, nutmeg, pepper. Our own recipe.

Salad at Castle Black. Eaten by Jon Snow and his Night’s Watch buddies at their initiation feast in A Game of Thrones. Up on the Wall you need to think preservation – dried nuts, legumes, fruits and meat; and storable vegetables.

Baby spinach and other baby leaves, chickpeas, raisins, olive oil, salt and pepper. From the book, slightly altered.

Sansa Salad. Eaten at the afternoon feast of the Hand’s Tourney in A Game of Thrones. More lavish than the Castle Black one, this salad clearly represents the more extravagant southern style in Westeros.

Mixed leafy green salad, diced prunes, walnuts, raspberries, mint leaves, edible flowers and a dressing of raspberry vinegar whisked with olive oil, salt and pepper. From the book, slightly altered.

Beverage: Valhalla Mead, a Danish brand. Good quality mead, we found; is a tempting alternative to wine.

Main Course

Quails Drowned in Butter. Eaten by Tyrion and Lord Janos in A Clash of Kings. OK, much to our very short-lived disappointment we didn’t get the chance to buy real quail. But we did get so-called “spring chicken”, which is much smaller than regular chicken. It even tastes more like quail, in my opinion.

Spring chicken, butter (lots of it), salt and pepper. Our own recipe.

Buttered Carrots. Eaten by Cersei and Tyrion in A Clash of Kings. As the chicken was so brutally drowned in it, we substituted the butter for coconut oil here.

Chunky carrots, coconut oil, parsley, vegetables broth; cooked until soft. Our own recipe.

Beverage for the main course: Red wine of the house, ale of various colors and tastes – most from a micro brewery called Ægir (being the Norse god of brew-craft, Ægir supplied the citizens of Åsgard with ale). They are exquisite.

Dessert and snacks

Baked Apples. Eaten at a feast in Winterfell in A Clash of Kings. My favorite dessert right now.

Cored apples, a good chunk of butter, honey and cinnamon. May be served with whipped cream. Our own recipe.

Lemon Cakes. Known as Sansa Stark’s favorite, these cookies appear all the time in the books. They are made from a 1690 Elizabethan recipe. Which is pretty cool, and the fact that they don’t taste like a 300-year-old recipe even cooler.

Flour, sugar, eggs, lemon zest, milk. Straight from the book.

And, last but not least: Mulled Wine. We’d be no true fans if we didn’t include it. A classic among the Night’s Watch, especially good for warming your insides after a long patrol on the Wall. Our guests were given the choice between Medieval Mulled Wine (right) and Southron Mulled wine (left). Some chose both.

Medieval Mulled Wine: red wine, ginger, rose pepper, sugar, nutmeg, nuts and dried berries (optional).

Southron Mulled Wine: red wine, clementines, cloves, orange juice, ground cinnamon, cinnamon sticks, fresh ginger, honey, sugar, lemon juice.

From the book, but we added a little star anise to both wines.

…

Decorations and Atmosphere

Important stuff, and of course lots of fun! We used natural materials like earthenware, wood, worn metal, furs, linen, roughspun, etc. We had tapestries, maps, candles, swords, musical instruments and music (from the HBO show, medieval music, from Skyrim, from Sims Medieval, the Hobbit, some folk music etc.).

The Table:

The room:

Replica of a tapestry found in a Viking Ship.

The Quizzle House Sigil. Read the story here.

Ser Lyonel Baratheon’s helmet. Read the story here.

…

The hosts:

Lady Quizzle. Current Head of House Quizzle.

Younger sister Quizzle. Joined the Night’s Watch after a marriage dispute with her family, where she is now concealing herself as a man.

The guests:

Mie a.k.a. Halgrim Half-shirt the Braavosi.

Sofya, noble Craftswoman of the Free City of Norvos.

… and Leia, draped in her Lannister Crimson.

…

All in all it was an evening most epic; I strongly urge you to repeat if:

• you are a fan
• you like to cook
• you like to eat
• you like awesome things.

Quizzle House Sigil

This is going a tiny bit outside the purpose of this blog, but I have no regrets. Allow me to tell you the story of the Quizzle House. Its sigil displays an orange cat sinister, sejant erect, holding a black staff, upon a field of green. More elaborate versions are adorned with a black-and-gold helmet and a flower. The Quizzle words are: “In soil we trust.”

The Quizzles of Greenfield Hall trace their roots a thousand years back to Kvisle, founder of the House. He came from the far East, though no one knows exactly where. He was apparently fair of skin and hair. His transportation of choice was walking – and so he walked, walked and walked, the thousands of miles from the East to Westeros, where he found his home to the north of White Harbor. According to legend Kvisle also walked across the Narrow Sea – or rather, under it. He was a short man, and for a walking stick he used a staff meant for the old Eastern measuring unit alen – around 24 inches. Our blessed father used to joke that he must have gone mighty wet.

The Quizzles are bannermen to House Manderly of White Harbor, who are in turn sworn to the Starks. Quizzle family traits are said to be a certain strategic cunning and calm sarcasm. Rather than choosing conventional ideas of honor over wealth, the House has upheld a tradition of marrying rich merchants and merchants’ daughters every now and then, thereby acquiring access to substantial amounts of gold – but also contributing to the somewhat lesser awareness of House Quizzle in the Seven Kingdoms. Ofttimes called the “Highgarden of the North”, Greenfield Hall is seated in a fertile and prosperous land on the banks of the White Knife; its proximity to White Harbor enabling the maintenance of a network of trading contacts throughout Essos, regularly bringing exotic fruit, spices, nuts, fabric, olive oil, weapons, armor and other Eastern novelties up the White Knife. Greenfield Hall, in turn; exports grain and vegetables to Essos (mainly Braavos).

Despite their occasional deviations from the customs of Westeros, the Quizzles keep a good relationship with the Manderlys (mainly because, according to rumour; the Manderlys enjoy generous loans with favorable interests from the Quizzles). The current Lady Quizzle is married to a younger son of Lord Wyman Manderly.

The cat is there because Greenfield Hall is, well; full of cats. Cats everywhere. Cats of every color, shape and size – though a line of distinctly orange cats has been preserved for a long time. It is said that when the cats are gone from Greenfield Hall, or when they are treated badly, all our luck in trade will turn and bring about the ruin of our House. Few of the Quizzle family admit to adhere to this superstition, but nevertheless, whenever he was travelling a member of the House would bring back a cat with him – from Winterfell, Oldtown, King’s Landing or Lannisport, some from across the Narrow Sea, and even from beyond the Wall. There must always be a cat in Greenfield Hall.

The most prized artifact contained within Greenfield Hall is a black-and-gold helmet that once belonged to Ser Lyonel Baratheon, the Laughing Storm. Although our family could never really boast great jousters, some hundred years ago our great-great grandfather Olaf Quizzle won a tilt against the famous knight as part of a bet, earning him the nickname Olaf Last Laugh (and quite a bit of gold). However he was soon forgotten, as lesser foes of greater knights often are. Despite his alleged prowess with sword, shield and mace; Olaf has been known to sigh with relief at the notion, commenting: “All the better. They bother famous knights with all sorts of important matters, and I have no desire to be involved in important matters.”

Sigil design and artwork: Turi Rust Kvisle.

Anticipating our Feast …

… finally! A week from now my sis and I will be hosting a Game of Thrones night – or a “Feast of Ice and Fire” as it’s been popularly called. Inspired by the Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin, it will feature the following:

• a viewing of season 3 this far. I have – you won’t believe it – actually been saving myself and … I. can’t. wait.
• a medieval atmosphere most splendid! We’ll have furs, tapestries, music and lots’n’lots of candles, and most importantly …
• … food! Which I am perhaps even more excited about than season 3. OK, maybe equally excited. But it’s gonna be great – appetizers, several courses, and of course: plenty of mulled wine!

Also, good company. My sister has even designed a family House Sigil. This is geek level 100. I will be posting it (and the story behind it) next week, along with pictures and the glorious menu – stay updated.

Dornish Breakfast

Dorne. Land of deserts, fiery peppers, strange customs and hot-blooded people. Probably the equivalent of Spain in our world, Dorne makes up the southernmost part of Westeros in the A Song of Ice and Fire series. The ruling lords, house Martell, style themselves “Prince” and “Princess”, and women are granted the same right to the throne as men.

Seems about right that their breakfasts should be a little weird. This one consists of spiced scrambled eggs with cheese, onions and jalapeños served with a bowl of bell peppers. From A Feast of Ice and Fire: The Offical Game of Thrones Companion Cookbook (see earlier post for review).

A Feast of Ice and Fire

Ever get hungry when you’re reading the A Song of Ice And Fire series by George R.R. Martin? I know I do. The books are teeming with wonderful descriptions of food, and many a time have I found my stomach violently rumbling during those long hours of adventures in the Seven Kingdoms. Here’s a sample for you:

“Cersei set a tasty table, that could not be denied. They started with a creamy chestnut soup, crusty hot bread, and greens dressed with apples and pine nuts. Then came lamprey pie, honeyed ham, buttered carrots, white beans and bacon, and roast swan stuffed with mushrooms and oysters.”

I remember thinking: “Someone should make a cookbook out of this.” And you know what? Turns out I’m not the only one! Chelsea Monroe-Cassel and Sariann Lehrer has created A Feast of Ice and Fire: The Offical Game of Thrones Companion Cookbook,  complete with a foreword by G.R.R. Martin himself.

This is a book that is so much to my taste it is almost too good to be true. I’d easily give it a 10/10 for the creative recipes, the research into medieval cookery to make the food as authentic as possible, the beautiful mouthwatering pictures – and for thoroughness. There are about 70 recipes, divided by region (the Wall, the North, King’s Landing, Dorne etc.), all extracted from a segment of the books, often with a medieval and a modern version of the same recipe. These are good fans, and true!

So – get the book for a mere $22, prepare to rest your loins and dine on Cream of Mushroom and Snail Soup, Beef and Bacon Pie, Rack of Lamb, Summer Greens Salad, Quails Drowned in Butter or Iced Blueberries in Sweet Cream. For the more daring: Dornish Snake with Fiery Sauce or (!) Honey-Spiced Locusts. Beverages to go with it: Lemonsweet, Iced Milk with Honey and – of course – Mulled Wine.

My version of “Breakfast at Winterfell”.

Oh, and do check in (pun intended) on the authors’ amazing blog The Inn at the Crossroads. It features plenty of recipes not found in the book, as well as great fan photos. You’ll also find menu suggestions for various holidays, if you want to do a whole feast.