Dining With The Doctor: The Unauthorized Whovian Cookbook (6 page)

Baked Potatoes:
2 russet/jacket potatoes
4 tbsp/60 ml olive oil
1 tsp/5 g salt
1 tsp/5 g pepper
1 tsp/5 g garlic powder
Krillitane Oil:
4 tbsp/60 g mayonnaise
1 tsp/5 g dijon mustard
1 tsp/5 g curry powder
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 green apple, peeled and cored
¼ yellow onion
½ tsp/2.5 g salt
6-10 drops green food coloring.

When Anthony Stewart Head is in charge of your school, it’s reasonable to expect a combination of fatherly lectures, world changing fights, and singing. This episode delivers one of those three things, and sadly, it’s not the singing.

Let’s clear up a little terminology first. What UK readers call chips, American readers call steak fries, or at perhaps thick cut French fries. To make it even more exciting, what American readers call chips UK readers would call crisps. At least everyone is still talking about potatoes.

Since Doctor Who is the UK’s gift to the rest of the world, we’re following their nomenclature. The Deffry Vale School chips are delicious, thick cut potato wedges served in an addictive sauce.

Let’s be honest. You’re going to pick up some chips from a shop (if you’re in the UK) or a frozen bag of steak fries (in the US) before adding green dye to some catsup. I know it, you know it. However, since this is a cookbook, we’ll maintain the adorable pretense that you’re actually going to cook instead of taking the easy route.

The Krillitane would prefer you to eat deep fried chips, rich in delicious, brain enriching calories. However, since most people these days don’t own deep fryers and your average middle class westerner is probably on a diet, we’ll go with some nice baked chips instead. The dramatic part of this recipe is the Krillitane Oil.

To make the chips, start by preheating your oven to 425F/220C. While it warms up, scrub and peel some potatoes then cut them into long, wide rectangles. In a separate bowl, mix your olive oil, salt, pepper, and garlic powder.

Coat a baking sheet with aluminum foil and heavily spritz it with non-stick spray. Dump the peeled, cut potatoes into the olive oil mix and gently toss everything together until the potatoes are well coated in oil and spices. Spread the coated potatoes into a single layer on your baking sheet.

Bake your potatoes for 25-30 minutes, turning once in the middle for maximum crispness. They won’t be exactly the same as deep fried chips, but they'll only have half the calories and won’t leave your home smelling like fried food.

While the potatoes are baking, mix up your delicious Krillitane Oil.Put the onion, apple, and garlic into a blender or food processor and let it whir away until you have a nice paste. Next, add the mayonnaise, mustard, salt, and six drops of food coloring. Let it whiz away some more. If the color isn’t green enough for you, add more food coloring and process the blend some more.

You should end up with a strong, sweet, curry flavored dip for your baked chips. They won’t give you miraculous math powers, but they will make you grateful you no longer have to eat school lunches.

Fair warning: if you decide to just add some green dye to regular old red catsup, you'll end up with a dark green-brown paste with red highlights, somewhat reminiscent of a blood clot. While that can be cool in other contexts, you might be better off just making the Krillitane Oil dip from scratch.

The Doctor’s Accidental Banana Daiquiri (S2E5 - The Girl in the Fireplace)

1 cup/110 g of crushed ice
1 banana
1 shot/45 ml of light rum
1 shot/45 ml of Cointreau
juice of ½ lime
2 tsp/10 g sugar
1 cherry

Always bring a banana to a party - especially if that party is in 18th century France. If you’re The Doctor, you might use it to accidentally invent a banana daiquiri while partying with the future Madame du Pompadour.

Since your kitchen isn't limited to futuristic clockwork, simply put everything but the cherry into a nice, modern blender. Pulse it on slow for five seconds, give it a good stir, then crank it up to high and let it whiz away until your drink thickens up nicely. Yes, it's really that simple. No wonder he was able to invent one by accident. I expect he used one of the clockwork's innards as a blender after stealing its wig and coat.

In honor of the French, pour your banana daiquiri into a champagne glass and top it with a cherry.

Cybus Brain Cleansing Cocktail (S2E6 - Rise of the Cybermen)

3 shots/135 ml ginger beer
1 shot/45 ml vanilla vodka
1 shot/45 ml hazelnut liqueur
½ shot/23 ml butterscotch schnapps
thick grenadine syrup
aluminum foil ball

Between Jackie Tyler’s birthday party and the invasion of the Cybermen, any survivors in Pete Tyler’s alternate Earth would probably want a good brain cleansing to help them forget.

Pour some grenadine syrup into a saucer. Carefully dip the rim of your martini glass into the syrup so you have a nice bloody red line. Drop a quarter sized aluminum foil ball into the glass. You want it to be just large enough no one will swallow it by accident.

Fill a cocktail shaker with ice. Add the vanilla vodka, hazelnut liqueur, and butterscotch schnapps. Pound it like you’re futily beating against a Cyberman’s chest plate before you’re carved into parts.

Carefully strain in the contents of the shaker. Top that off with the ginger beer. You should now have a tasty drink that looks like you carved open a skull and found nothing but metal inside.

The first time I made this, I tried dropping some edible ball bearings into the glass. The contents turned an angry brown and all the dye instantly fizzed off and a somewhat extended, slightly volcanic effect. I didn't end up with cool looking but harmless metal parts in my drink, but for a couple of minutes, it looked wildly dramatic. Sure, you can achieve the same effect with pop rocks, but the ball bearings didn't significantly impact the flavor of the drink. Use this knowledge wisely.

White Chocolate Cyberman Heads (S2E7 - The Age of Steel)

12 large strawberries
6 oz/170 g white melting chocolate
6 oz/170 g dark melting chocolate (optional)
black icing pen
large metal paper clips (optional)
edible silver spray paint (optional)

The first time I realized a white chocolate dipped strawberry looks like a Cybeman’s head, I giggled like the voices that whisper messages via my dental fillings had just given me next week’s lottery numbers. Those simplified faces make this a delightfully easy, instantly recognizable dessert.  Making your own is also a heck of a lot cheaper than buying chocolate dipped strawberries and drawing faces on them. Honest.

This recipe will require a trip to your local craft store.

There, you’ll find all kinds of melting chocolate, edible spray paint, precision sizes of icing pens, and all the tools needed to bake the amazing cakes that are so trendy these days Luckily, you can use these for the far simpler process of decorating Cyberman heads.

Most people will tell you to put the melting chocolate in the top part of a double boiler and stir slowly and constantly until you reach your desired texture. However, my local craft store has a huge aisle of microwavable melting chocolate. If you don’t have a double boiler, this stuff is magic. Just put it in a microwave safe glass bowl, nuke it for a few seconds, massage the bag, nuke some more, and within minutes, those of you who don’t own double boilers can achieve the same effect. Modernity is awesome.

However you choose to do it, melt your chocolate. You want to get it just runny enough to stick to your strawberries. Too hot and it’ll burn, which results in all kinds of nastiness.

Cover a baking sheet with aluminum foil or wax paper then spritz it with nonstick spray. Hold your strawberries by the green stem and dip them in your melted chocolate. Roll them around a little to make sure you have good coverage. Lay each strawberry gently on your baking sheet to cool.

Flavor-wise, I personally like to dip my strawberries in a thick layer of dark chocolate first, let them cool, then dip them in white chocolate to finish. If you’re a big white chocolate fan, feel free to just dunk them in the white stuff.

Regardless of what's underneath, once they have a nice, white surface, gently draw on a circle for the eyes. If you’re good at drawing, you can use a toothpick to tug some of the icing down in the corner of each eye to make the fake tear effect on our sad Cybermen. Draw a diagonal line under each eye for the cheekbones, then a straight line down to the mouth. For the mouth, just draw a simple rectangular box. Connect up your top lines so they form a bridge over the eyes.

You can try to finish the CyberBerry by unfolding a metal paper clip and rearranging it into the shape of the squared head antenna. In theory, you should be able to just plug the paperclip into each side of your Cyberman’s head. In reality, paperclips are a lot sturdier than I anticipated. You're likely to squish a lot of berries. Worse yet, the antannae have an annoying habit of refusing to stay in position. Feel free to try. If you can pull it off, it looks fantastic. If you can't, don't stress. The painted berries look great.

If you’re feeling extra schmancy, after your chocolate dries but before you decorate the face, you can spray the berries with edible silver paint. I can never decide which effect I like better. People giggle more at the silver berries, but they’re also less likely to eat them. If you want to have tasty strawberries left after your party, go for the paint. If you made too many and just need to get rid of them all, leave them unpainted. Either way, you'll still get compliments for their cuteness.

Coronation Chicken (S2E8 - The Idiot’s Lantern)

2 baked chickens
1 tbsp/15 ml cooking oil
4 tbsp/60 g onions, chopped
2 tsp/10 g curry powder
1 tsp/5 g tomato paste
1/2 cup/110 ml red wine
¼ cup/60 ml water
1 bay leaf
2 lemons
6 dried apricots
2 cups/450 g mayonnaise
3 tbsp/45 ml whipping cream
1 tsp/5 g sugar
1 tsp/5 g fresh ground black pepper
1 tsp/5 g salt
paprika and parsley for garnish

One of the best things about Doctor Who is the fact that it provides you with a glimpse into recent history. For the UK target audience, their parents or grandparents lived through this time. For Americans and other foreign creatures, wartime Britain is as alien as the Ood.

So keep in mind, World War II was horrible in subtle ways as well as the big scary ones. People stoically suffered through years of food rationing and deprivation almost impossible to imagine in an era of 24 hour McDonald’s. When they were allowed to loosen their belts just a little bit to celebrate the coronation of a new queen, this is what they ate.

You don’t have to be a living wire hiding in a television signal to appreciate the sheer caloric richness of this dish, or how remarkable so much cream and fat must have tasted after so many years of rations and austerity.

First, bake your chickens. Since you’re living in the 21st century, you can always pick up a pair of pre-cooked rotisserie chickens from your local grocery store. Once the chickens are cooked and cool, pick off all the meat. Toss everything else in a crockpot with an unpeeled quartered onion, a couple bay leaves, and a couple sticks each of celery and carrots. Fill it up with water, set it to low, and leave it alone for the next eight hours. You don’t need this for the recipe, but if you have a couple of chicken carcasses lying around, you might as well make fresh broth out of them. It's dirt simple, freezes beautifully, and is more delicious than anything you'll get out of a box. In 8-12 hours, strain out the solids and enjoy your liquid gold.

Now for your coronation chicken.

Add your oil and onions to a medium saucepan. Cook the onions until they’re softened but not yet brown. Add the curry powder, tomato puree, wine, water, bay leaf, and a healthy squeeze from half a lemon. Simmer, uncovered, for 5-10 minutes, then strain. Leave it to cool. Meanwhile, put the apricots into another pan and add just enough water to cover them. Simmer the apricots until they’re tender enough to fall apart.

In a big bowl, mix your mayonnaise, simmered apricots, and onion mix. Add the sugar, salt, and black pepper. In yet another bowl, get out your blender and whip your cream until it magically transforms from a liquid to a solid. Once it’s nice and firm, gently fold it in with the mayonnaise mix.

Now it’s finally time to add all that shredded chicken. This was meant to be a rich dish, worthy of a queen. Mix everything until the chicken is downright sloppy with sauce. Arrange it neatly in a serving dish, then garnish the edges with neatly sliced lemon rounds and sprinkle your choice of paprika or parsley in the middle. Being an American, I think it tastes nice when topped with coleslaw and served in a tortilla, but you're welcome to just ladle it onto a plate and soak up the extra sauce with bread.