Delicious in Dungeon #52: The Breakfast Menu

 Umm.. Deja Vu? I think Ryoko Kui likes breakfasts...

hmm it came to me in a dream... a nostalgic inspiration for another cooked breakfast. I suppose this is the closest thing we get to representing laios and farin's hometown cuisine? It's quite north european sounding with the rye bread and sausages.

This ones... pretty simple, even simpler than senshi's pancakes. Hippogriff sausages, wyvern omelette, walking mushroom soup and rye of the beholder... no im just kidding, its regular rye bread.

For the hippogriff sausages I got some nice venison sausages, are deer more horse-like than cows? discuss. I'll just put them on the grill till they're done, its rocket-shaped science.

For the rolled wyvern-egg omelette, its time to practice my tamagoyaki once again. For seasoning we got mirin, soy sauce and since its breakfast, I like a bit of pepper too.

Will I make a better omelette than last time?

Uh, you know.. I just might... this is looking pretty good!

Sausages are cooked, eggs nearly done, so we can pop the soup in the microwave and the bread in the toaster.

Wow! This is the neatest looking tamagoyaki i've made to date!

This rye is so thinly sliced and delicate, even more when its toasted. I have to be really careful not to obliterate it while i butter it and put it on a plate.

*****

I think this came out great! I don't really care for mushroom soup but it was a fairly nice one, the sausages were great, the bread was great. I'm really pleased with how the omelette looks, though I keep forgetting I don't really like that mirin balance in it so much... i think id prefer it with salt and vinegar or something. Still, you get this great variety of 4 very different things that don't clash and it was easy to put together since I only made one thing from scratch.

Delicious in Dungeon #51: Hot Succubus Milk

A succubus can become whatever you most desire to seduce you, it's pretty dangerous...

What am I into? Well that's a very personal question. You know, normal stuff.. not weird. 

Since the ingredients are milk and "a mysterious white powder", I initially was going to use sugar.. but.. i happen to have some instant white hot chocolate powder that I think is pretty mysterious. Well, not that mysterious.. the ingredients are listed on the back.

Instead of simmering it on the hob I'm taking the easy road and blasting it in the microwave. 

Once the milk is hot, I will stir in a bit of the white powder.

***

It's very sweet and cocoa butter-y. I guess its what I would imagine a fresh, full-fat monster milk would be like. This instant drink is designed for hot water, so its a bit overkill. On some days it hits the spot, other days its a bit sickly and I'd prefer the bitterness of regular chocolate.

Delicious in Dungeon #50: Stewed Dullahan's Horse Head

This friggin horseman he got no head (just trust me bro)

I got his horses head definitely real definitely happened.

This ones a weird theoretical recipe, they don't end up cooking it in the manga but I'm going to cook it for them! Well, I can't get real horse head meat... but I have managed to get ox cheek, which comes from the face so I thought that could be a pretty good substitute.

First im gonna sear it with a bit of leftover lard (animal fat) and, again there's no guidelines so ive decided to season it with salt, pepper, a clove and a bit of juniper berries for when we stew it in a sauce.

I should hurry up and add a crushed clove of garlic too before its done searing.

Once its ready to turn the heat way down and go into stew mode, I'm adding red wine, tomato concentrate and worcestershire sauce. 

It's coming along, it smells super garlicky... Now we can just cover it with a lid and leave it for a bit and play some zelda.. right?

Ah no! I checked in on it after like 15min and it had already burned! I guess my smallest hob on the lowest setting was still not low enough. I tried adding more hot water to try and recover some of whats on there... but i don't know, I might have just ruined it. Oh also I was gonna serve it on a bed of mashed potato, ill do that still.

**

Oof I know it looks nuked but actually the meat tasted fine, it was nice and tender and it didnt all taste too burnt. But... in rehydrating it what i managed to do was just burn all the flavourings and wash it off so it ended up just tasting like plain unseasoned beef. I feel like if I had done it right, maybe it would have been 5 stars. Shame.

Delicious in Dungeon #49: Crispy Mushroom And Egg Sandwich

As you can see, this is a horse-like creature with two horns. It's quite obvious really, but I thought I would just say.

So the bicorn, a kind of bisexual unicorn, their thing is that they only go for badboys and badgirls. And non-badnerys. So we have to lure it over by enjoying a sinful and decadent sandwich.

Got a big round loaf of fresh bread, butter, cockatrice eggs, mandrake leaves, and some dried changeling mushrooms. Doesn't sound all that badnasty. Oh and syrup? Ok maybe a little.

Since we have the butter out, lets cook the egg in butter.

Yeah got my little tiny pan. We wanna have the whites cooked but the yolk slightly runny.

I'm gonna lightly toast the bread, seems right to do that for a sandwich with fried egg and extra butter.

Even on hot toast my butter doesnt spread that well.. anyway we're also adding salt and pepper.

Then the mandrake leaves, which i decided today can be watercress and rocket. And the fried egg, which ive shaved a bit off to fit on the decidedly not-round bread. I tried my best to squish it into a rounder shape!

Now these are interesting. I was originally gonna try and grill/fry some mushrooms to death, but I was gifted this bag of already dried mushrooms! Unlike mushrooms dried for stock, these seem to be freeze-dried or something so they're light and airy. Seems perfect!

And lastly, as mentioned in the manga... they add a bit of syrup on the sandwich as well. I'm just adding a light drizzle, because it sounds a bit intense.

****

Really tasty! Nicely balanced, savoury with a burst of sweetness, with wet and crispy textures. A good rich sandwich, and none of the unusual ingredients were bad. But I have to ask myself... would I go out of my way to make this again? Probably not. I think the bar for sandwiches is very high, you can make a lot of good things with bread and butter and eggs.

Delicious in Dungeon #48: Hamburg Steak With Changeling Sauce

Is it me... or are dungeon mushrooms getting bigger these days?

The popular japan-german dish is back! It's a dungeon twist on the HANBAGU or Hamburg Steak which we seem to have visited quite a few times in other challenges.

This time we've got the monstrous ingredients of mixed leftover griffin/hippogriff (im using a beef&pork mince mix) and a changeling-based sauce with a bit of mandrake and frog skin.

Big load of mince, nice. And then i'm adding onion chopped as finely as I can manage, breadcrumbs, and an egg.

It says I can add whatever seasoning I want, so im adding my trusty paprika salt, pepper, mild chilli powder and ginger powder.

Now for the messy part... theres no way around it i have to knead it with my hands. Its cold and getting pork fat off your hands is SO WEIRDLY DIFFICULT. The mince seemed slightly dry and crumbly so I decided to add another egg as I went.

Now I can bust out my new MEGA ULTRA DELUXE FRYING PAN!! I could make paella in this someday.. hmm.. anyway, throw in a slightly generous portion of butter because we'll use the rest for the sauce.

These brown quite fast, so we might have to turn my overpowered hob off and on again to cook it slower. I'm not taking any chances with pork mince.

For the mandrake... in the past its been parsnips or ginger... its really whatever root vegetable we need? but i saw some whimsical looking radishes that I thought would be perfect. they come in 2 kinds!

What a nice pink and purple, very changeling.

For the changelings, I got a mix with 2 types of mushroom: shiitake and oyster, and can chop them up roughly.

For the "frog skin".. well, i don't have frog skin. but I was wondering... whats it there for? Is it to add brothy, collagen-y flavours and thicken up the sauce maybe? So I thought a good substitute would be a concentrated chicken stock.

These are getting somewhere, a bit longer and then I take the patties out and use all that oily meat juice as the sauce base..

Adding in the mushrooms and stock.

It says I can use whatever seasonings I want... so as a nod to the hanbagu recipes i've done in the past, im adding a bit of sake and soy sauce.

At the end I sprinkle in the grated radish as well. I was hoping it might add a pink sparkle, but it just looks brown and oily.

*****

Delicious! I think this came out perfectly. The mushrooms go really well with the beef and pork, and the oilyness of the sauce balances out the dryness of the mince. It's hearty and satisfying.