Revolting Recipes
- Book Review,
by Felicity Dahl
Amazon.com
Feeling hungry? How about some Snozzcumbers for a snack, or a Fresh Mudburger for dinner? Or perhaps you're in the mood for Stink Bugs' Eggs. Fans of Roald Dahl will recognize his peculiar culinary inventions from his many books--now, these dubious delights are collected all together in Roald Dahl's Revolting Recipes, a compendium of dishes that sound worse than they really are. Stink Bug Eggs, for example, are really deviled eggs with some food coloring and a special, added ingredient (parmesan cheese or asafetida) to make them particularly aromatic. Mr. Twit's Beard Food consists of mashed potatoes, hard-boiled eggs, mushrooms, and cocktail franks cunningly arranged. Each recipe is simple to make, many are delightfully disgusting to contemplate, but all are easy on the palate. Roald Dahl himself would have been delighted to eat these ravishingly revolting recipes.
From Publishers Weekly
Hungry? Perhaps a serving of "Scrambled Dregs" or "Hair Toffee to Make Hair Grow on Bald Men" will hit the spot. Recipes for these and the additional delicacies mentioned in the late Roald Dahl's (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) work are hereby adapted for the home kitchen, thanks to the author's widow. Dahl, one suspects, would have been tickled: the offerings are heavily weighted on the side of sweets, and the order of presentation defies adult logic. True to the book's title, there are some recipes of questionable kid appeal (the green pea soup from The Witches; or cod, scallions and spices spread on bread and fried, identified as "Mosquitoes' Toes and Wampfish Roes Most Delicately Fried"). The graphics, meanwhile, are deliciously playful: Blake's inimitable, droll drawings interact cleverly with Baldwin's food photography. For example, cartoony characters clad in pajamas snooze on a silhouetted photo of "Eatable Marshmallow Pillows." Despite the child-oriented tone, a number of recipes require adult participation by virtue of cursory directions or tricky maneuvers (e.g., ensuring that mixtures boil to specific temperatures). All ages. Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
Grade 3-6?It had to happen: a cookbook based on the extraordinarily fascinating things that are eaten and served up by the characters in Dahl's children's books. Here it is, complete with Blake's zanily familiar illustrations creatively combined with full-color photographs. It features 31 recipes from 11 books?cakes, cookies, drinks, and main dishes?known by such names as "Snozzcumbers" (The BFG), "Wormy Spaghetti" (The Twits), and "Lickable Wallpaper" (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory). Some of the recipes, despite their titles, produce good tasting, recognizable dishes. Others are works of art. For example, "Mr. Twit's Beard Food" is a veritable portrait of himself, composed of mashed-potato base, mushroom-cap nostrils, hardboiled-egg eyeballs, with peas, cornflakes, and baked beans in a potato-stick beard. Many of the recipes are not for beginning cooks; indeed, cooking appears to be a secondary focus. The important thing is the association to a Dahl title, a reminder and celebration of his outrageously imaginative books that so many children love.?Carolyn Jenks, First Parish Unitarian Church, Portland, MECopyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Gr. 4-6. Kids will love the concept--recipes for confections mentioned in Dahl's books--and the book's design is super. There's just one problem: most of the recipes are too difficult for the intended audience. Take "Mosquitoes' Toes and Wampfish Roes," a dish mentioned in James and the Giant Peach. The instructions ask kids to blend cod, ginger scallions, and cornstarch in a food processor, and then, with the motor running, to add egg white from a previously separated egg. Other recipes call for a piping bag and nozzle, stem ginger in syrup, and--I'm not kidding--a blackbird, described as a black pastry funnel found in specialty cooks' shops. A note encouraging families to cook these recipes together and warning children to have an adult present when handling knives and other dangerous objects is hidden away on the verso of the title page. There are a couple of accessible recipes, like fresh mudburgers (hamburgers), but the draw will really be Blake's marvelous drawings, here combined with ingenious photos of food by Jan Baldwin. Larger collections may want this just because it's so much fun to look at. Like some adult cookbooks, this is probably more for browsing than for baking. Ilene Cooper
Book Description
Who but Roald Dahl could think up such mouthwatering and deliciously disgusting foods as Lickable Wallpaper, Stink Bugs Eggs, and Eatable Pillows? Now theres a practical guide to making these and other delicacies featured in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,James and the Giant Peach, and Dahl's other books, with easy, step-by-step recipes that range from the delectable to the truly revolting. Quentin Blake's illustrations combine with full-color photographs of the luscious results to perfectly capture Roald Dahls wicked sense of fun. "Deliciously playful.Dahl, one suspects, would have been tickled." -- Publishers Weekly The late Roald Dahl was one of the most beloved storytellers of all time. Quentin Blake has illustrated more than a dozen books by Roald Dahl.
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