Dining With The Doctor: The Unauthorized Whovian Cookbook (13 page)

If you’re feeling extra fancy, you could always boil up a dozen eggs, buy a couple jars of roasted red bell pepper strips, and have a salad plate (or tea saucer) sized personal Ood servant waiting for each of your guests at a sit down dinner. It’s honestly not much more hassle than the single big Ood platter. You just need more tasty external brains.

Sontaran Soldiers (S4E5 - The Sontaran Stratagem)

6 russet baking potatoes (jacket potatoes for UK readers)
6 tbsp/180 g butter
12 tbsp/180 g kosher salt or coarse sea salt
12 blue cupcake tins
12 almonds
small frozen blueberries
ketchup
Additions:
½ cup or equally sized small serving bowls of toppings such as:
butter
chives
sour cream
bacon bits
shredded cheese

Admit it. The first time you saw the Sontarans, you found yourself craving a fresh baked potato. Luckily for you, that means you have a super simple, easily recognizable, totally Whovian recipe that doesn’t require any special ingredients. As a bonus, it’s even made of things people will actually eat. If any of your guests don’t instantly recognize these guys, they’re lying about their love of Doctor Who.

There are two ways to make baked potatoes; the fast way and the delicious way. The fast way is to simply poke the potato with a fork a few times and microwave it into oblivion. You can do that if you’re really crunched for time, but for the purposes of this recipe, I’m going to pretend you opted for the delicious way instead.

Preheat your oven to 400F. While it’s heating, give your potatoes a good, firm scrubbing. You want to get rid of any residual dirt and, as it happens, texturize the skins slightly at the same time.

Once all your potatoes are nice and clean, rub each one down with a tablespoon of butter. It’s okay if you have some butter left over as long as you’ve thoroughly coated the potatoes. Now that they’re nice and buttery, rub each potato down with two tablespoons of coarse kosher or sea salt.

Arrange your potatoes on a foil lined baking sheet. Bake them at 400F/205C for one hour.

While your potatoes are merrily baking away, fill half a dozen small serving bowls with your choice of baked potato toppings; butter, bacon bits, chives, sour cream, salsa, cheese, diced onions, or whatever you like on a potato.

When the baked potatoes are finished, take them out of the oven and let them rest for at least 10 minutes. Brush off the excess salt, cut each potato in half, and put the halves cut side down into a blue cupcake tin. If you're really lucky, your grocery might even have the blue metallic cupcake tins, which add a really nice touch. Either way, your potato in its blue collar already looks like a Sontaran. Complete the effect by adding a couple finishing details.

First, push the almond into the upper middle of the face for the nose. Next, cut two horizontal slits just above the nose. Push your frozen blueberries in place for the eyes. Don't use fresh blueberries. You want something that can stand up to some pressure.  To make the mouth, carve a squared frown just below the nose. Pull the skin out slightly and add a little catsup to really define the mouth.

You now have a dozen Sontaran soldiers to serve your guests, should they be worthy. All hail Sontar!

Clone Vat Cocktail (S4E6 - The Poison Sky)

1 shot mango rum
1 shot coconut rum
2 bananas
1 cup fresh spinach
½ cup coconut milk
½ cup frozen peaches
½ cup ice
½ tsp/2.5 g cinnamon

You don’t have to be a force grown Sontaran clone to enjoy this cocktail. It has your birth vat's same thick, creamy texture and clearly alien greenness alongside some mind altering rum to help you forget whether you’re the original or the clone.

This is even easier than growing a spare Martha Jones. Set aside one banana. Throw everything else into a blender. I promise you won’t be able to taste the spinach. It’s there for color, and it works beautifully. Plus, between the banana, spinach, and peaches, you can honestly say you’ve had your daily servings of fruits and vegetables in one glass. If you want to celebrate by tossing in a third shot of pineapple rum, I think you well deserve it.

While the blender turns your solids into liquids, slice your banana in half lengthwise. Put the long banana garnishes into two glasses, fill them up with the Clone Vat Cocktail, and find someone to share with. If you’re feeling extra fancy you can add a small nugget of dry ice so the cocktail will smoke like an Atmos equipped car.

Baked Hath Served over Black Beans & Topped with a Red and Green Cabbage Slaw. (S4E7 - The Doctor’s Daughter)

Fish:
2 tilapia filets
4 tbsp/60 ml orange juice
1 tbsp/15 ml olive oil
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1 tsp/5 g salt
½ tsp/2.5 g red pepper flakes
Slaw:
1/4 head of red cabbage
1/3 head of green cabbage
2 tbsp/30 ml rice wine vinegar
2 tbsp/30 ml orange juice
1 tbsp/15 ml sesame oil
1 tbsp/15 g mayonnaise
1 tbsp/15 g sugar
1 tsp/5 g ginger powder
½ tsp/2.5 g salt
 
Black Beans:
1 14 oz/400 g can of black beans
½ cup/220 g cooked yellow corn/maize
1 tomato, diced
½ onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp/5 g cumin
Juice of ½ lime

I humbly present a dish inspired by the alien who saved Martha Jones from drowning in quicksand. The fish is for the Hath, the black beans for the sludge he drowned in, and the red and green cabbage slaw for the colors of the Hath’s scales.

Now, there are two ways to make this dish; the tasty way and the fast way. For the fast way, just buy yourself some frozen tilapia in mango sauce, grab a can of black beans, and pick up a tub of coleslaw at the deli counter.

Let’s make it the tasty way instead.

For the fish, whisk together everything but the tilapia in a shallow bowl. Once you have a bowl of tasty citrus goodness, coat both sides of the fish as thoroughly as possible, then leave it soaking in the marinade for at least an hour.

While the fish is soaking, make the coleslaw. If you’ve never made coleslaw from scratch, I promise it’s a lot easier than you think. For this one, mix everything but the cabbage in a large bowl. Blend it all as thoroughly as possible.

While those ingredients are cheerfully mingling, it’s time to take a hatchet to the cabbages. If you have a large chef’s knife or, if you’re very lucky, a butcher knife, making coleslaw is fun. You can roughly dice it into squares, precisely cut it into nice, long slivers, or you can go crazy just hacking away at it in a mad frenzy of vegetative destruction until you come out of your fugue state and find a pile of thin cabbagy slices in front of you. I won’t judge.

Mix the two types of cabbage together then throw them in the bowl with your dressing and do your best to coat all the cabbage. This isn’t a thick, gloppy dressing. It should be light, even a little thin, creating an aromatic coating. Let the coleslaw sit at room temperature until the fish is fully cooked so the flavors will have plenty of time to mingle.

Finally, make the black beans. Watching Martha’s poor Hath friend drown in that lumpy, black sludge inspired this recipe to begin with. Mix everything but the beans into a bowl. Stir it hard, until everything is well blended. Drain the can of black beans then add them to the bowl and gently coat them with the mix. It's pretty easy. By now, your fish should be nicely marinated.

Preheat an oven to 400F/205C. Coat the bottom of a glass baking dish with butter or olive oil. Put the fish in the dish, pour the marinade on top, and bake it uncovered for 20 minutes or until the fish flakes easily with a fork.

This makes two hearty servings. Divide the black beans between two plates and spread them into a neat oval. Top the black beans with your freshly baked fish. If there’s any sauce at the bottom of the pan, spoon a tablespoon or two onto each tilapia filet. Top the tilapia with a carefully arranged handful of the fresh slaw and fill in the rest of the plate with extra slaw.

You now have the entire episode capsulated on one plate. To complete the effect, this dish is best served with a lime green Jell-O shot.

Timelord Cyanide Detox Platter (S4E8 - The Unicorn and the Wasp)

ginger beer
anchovies
walnuts
salted almonds
olives
pickles
salty ham or thin sliced prosciutto
smoked salmon slices

If you ever need to stimulate inhibited enzymes into reversal because you’ve been poisoned with cyanide, don’t try to heal yourself with a Harvey Wallbanger. Also, don’t take medical advice from a show about aliens. If you happen to be a Time Lord, what you probably need is a big shock, but first, you’ll want to stuff yourself with protein and salt.

This makes an easy appetizer platter for hardcore Whovians. The Doctor guzzled a bottle of ginger beer before chowing down on anchovies for salt and walnuts for protein. Once you’ve arranged those on a plate, you can add whatever salty, high protein foods you want. Since this episode was set in the roaring twenties, other period finger foods would’ve included salted almonds, olives, pickles, smoked salmon, and thin sliced prosciutto or ham. If that’s a little too much salt and protein for you, nearly every food related scene in this episode featured a fruit bowl with green and purple grapes, red apples, and some oranges for extra color.

This appetizer platter is best served with a sidecar in honor of Donna Noble or The Doctor’s preferred lime soda if you’re driving the Tardis home tonight. If you’re worried about vespiforms invading your party, sneak a little fresh ground pepper into the platter.

Vashta Nerada Detection Kit (S4E9 - Silence in the Library)

bag of mixed green salad
dressing of your choice
8 chicken legs/drumsticks
2 tbsp/30 ml Worcestershire sauce
1 tbsp/15 g prepared dijon mustard
1 tbsp/15 ml olive oil
1 tsp/5 g black pepper
4 garlic cloves, minced

Consider this highly portable meal your security blanket against the darkness. If you’re afraid of something in the shadows, toss one of the drumsticks into the dark. If you end up with hair on your food, you’re safe. If the shadows clean the meat off the bones, get a flashlight because you’re in danger from the Vashta Nerada.

Most dollar stores stock plain metal boxes with lids. You can just as easily substitute any disposable rectangular plastic-ware dishes. The great thing about this dish is it’s a super cheap, super easy, super recognizable way to serve all your guests a main course they’ll instantly recognize.