During this time of social distancing and quarantine, many of us find ourselves having to cook from home, whether we like it or not. We at Geek Girl Authority decided to take some inspiration from some of our favorite video games. Even if you don’t try the exact recipes, maybe some of these mouth-watering picks can give you home-chefs a few ideas?
Fereldan Turnip and Barley Stew (Dragon Age: Inquisition)
I enjoy video games. I also enjoy cooking. So needless to say, when a recipe appears in a video game, I feel compelled to try it. This has had mixed results. The pig oat mash (also called “Hanged mash”) from Dragon Age: Inquisition has great flavors, but *awful* texture. And of course, the last verdict you want to hear from your dinner guests is, “Meh.” Fortunately, Fereldan Turnip and Barley Stew is a vast improvement and an excellent dish for those colder autumn and winter months. As Alistair describes Fereldan food in Dragon Age: Origins: “We take our ingredients, throw them into the largest pot we can find, and cook them for as long as possible until everything is a uniform grey color. As soon as it looks completely bland and unappetizing, that’s when I know it’s done!” This stew definitely does not look as unappetizing or dull as advertised, and it has a lot of rich and soothing flavors too. I knew it was good when I served it at a holiday dinner party, and my guests asked to take home the leftovers! You can find the recipe along with about a dozen others (some practical, others humorous) in “The Whole Nug” cookbook section of Dragon Age: The World of Thedas, Volume 2. We encourage you to buy the original book (if only for the cornucopia of writing and art from the Dragon Age development team), but if you’d prefer an online version, there’s a fairly accurate recipe at the Foods of Thedas blog (the four kale leaves being the only major change). So before you set off with your party to lead the Inquisition and defeat the Elder One, maybe take a hot bowl of Fereldan Turnip and Barley Stew to go?
Sea Salt Ice Cream (Kingdom Hearts series)
A favorite summertime snack of numerous characters in the Kingdom Hearts series (most notably Roxas and his friends in Kingdom Hearts II), sea salt ice cream is a salty-sweet treat reminiscent of Italy’s gelato al fior di latte (which I do not mince words when I say it is the best ice cream on the planet). Allegedly Tetsuya Nomura (Square Enix game director and character designer) based his digital version off of a similar ice cream available at Tokyo DisneySea. It’s a great recipe for you to try at home: it’s simple to make. You don’t even need to churn it in an ice cream maker! For the best possible version, I recommend Binging with Babish’s recipe. If you lack a proper Popsicle mold, but you want that traditionally-square ice cream bar shape, simply use a paper or plastic cup as your mold, and then cut off the excess until you get the desired shape. You can optionally add some vanilla for flavoring, but if you’ve got the right mix of milk and sea salt, there’s no need. What else can I say? It’s creamy, it’s easy to make, and it is (to my knowledge) the only entry in Babish’s “Clean Stick Club”. Try it yourself and see!
Yeto’s Superb Soup (The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess)
There are so many recipes from The Legend of Zelda we could choose from. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild alone features fruitcakes, mushroom risotto, baked apples, Monstercakes, and more! Pumpkins feature very prominently in The Legend of Zelda series, going all the way back to the villainous Pumpkin Head of The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages in 2001. In 2006, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess took the pumpkins to a whole new level. Not only do pumpkin seeds take on increased importance as the primary ammunition for Link’s slingshot, but one quest involves Link becoming a sous-chef to help a giant yeti named Yeto cook a pumpkin-based soup. And Yeto’s Superb Soup turns out to be just that: superb! The seemingly random ingredients of pumpkin, goat cheese, smoked fish, and more work together surprisingly well. You can replace the pumpkin with another gourd like butternut squash, if needed. In 2016, Nintendo actually released a recipe for Yeto’s Superb Soup (well, Yeto’s *Good* Soup, since it only has two of the three main ingredients) to celebrate the release of Twilight Princess on the Wii U and the game’s tenth anniversary. If you want to be really authentic, you can add smoked salmon or even smoked mackerel. Hearty enough to nurse a yeti back to health in the dead of winter, this recipe is simple enough that you won’t need to scour the massive Snowpeak for all the ingredients!
LeBlanc Curry and Coffee (Persona 5)
We all know the classic food pairings: Cookies and Milk, Bread and Butter, Curry and…Coffee? In Persona 5, your home base is the quaint and classy Leblanc Cafe, home of the famous Leblanc Coffee and Curry. These two delicacies are what bring the people of Tokyo to the cozy cafe in Yongen-Jaya. For me, warm food is one of the most comforting things out there. So this combo of warm coffee and warm curry truly puts the comfy in comfort food! As you progress throughout the game, you eventually learn how to make the infamous coffee and curry yourself. Moreover, not only are these items delicious, but they also restore your Skill Points in the Metaverse! And if you’re like me, and are curious about what makes the “Leblanc Special Curry” so special, you are in luck! In honor of the release of Persona 5: Scramble, PlayStation Japan and Atlus teamed up for a fun cooking tutorial video, voiced by the Phantom Thieves themselves! You may not be able to change people’s hearts, but you will definitely be able to win them over with this curry and coffee pairing!
Cake (Portal)
How could we do a list of foods from video games and *not* include the infamous cake? The oft-memed cake is the promised reward by the villainous GLaDOS in Valve’s critically-acclaimed Portal. As the player later learns, “the cake is a lie” and GLaDOS has no intention of allowing you to leave the Aperture Science Enrichment Center alive. Despite being a homicidal artificial intelligence, GLaDOS does provide a working recipe for a chocolate cake in the game’s final levels. In the years since Portal’s release, many home chefs and YouTube personalities have come up with their own recipes and versions of the cake. One of the most accurate recreations can be found on the YouTube channel Feast of Fiction. Or, you can try for a fancier version with Binging with Babish, who makes an authentic Black Forest gateau (which Valve’s recipe appears to be based off of). It doesn’t matter how much neurotoxin GLaDOS throws at you: now you can have your cake and eat it too!
Conjured Mana Buns (World of Warcraft: Legion)
When I think video game food, Conjured Mana Buns are always one of the first to come to mind. The sweet little biscuits are crafted by all mages on Azeroth and work to refill a caster’s mana pool. Something that always made me laugh while creating the mana buns during World of Warcraft: Legion was the few times I would hear Aluneth (voiced by the amazing Matthew Mercer) whisper, “The very powers of the ancient titans are at your command, and you choose to create…tasty treats?” There was nothing like being reminded that I’m only invited to a raid to make snacks. The Conjured Mana Buns recipe was included in World of Warcraft: The Official Cookbook. We highly encourage you to buy the cookbook when you try out this recipe, but if you need to find it online, Wowhead has a Blizzard-approved recipe and video. They remind me of the sweet child of little pinwheel type cakes mixed with cinnamon rolls. Perfect tasty treats to fuel my mana needs before heading out to slay the demons of the Burning Legion.
Any recipes that you want to try? Any recipes you wish we had included on the list? Let Geek Girl Authority know, and feel free to share your own geeky cooking with our Twitter and Instagram! Bon appetit, gamers!
Additional Contributors: Julia Roth and Emily Rose Jacobson
This article was originally published on 4/20/20
https://www.geekgirlauthority.com/take-another-cross-country-road-trip-inspired-by-video-games/
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