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BooksDoctor Who

Doctor Who: The Official Cookbook by Joanna Farrow (book review)

‘Doctor Who The Official Cookbook’ was just what I needed in the middle of a heatwave. This book involves some practical involvement in a nice steamy kitchen. For your benefit, I have sampled the book and tried to reproduce some of the least and most technical recipes. I’ve included pictures here which you can compare to the rather more skilled version by the author and I apologise profusely if any offence is given!

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This book is a rather good example of providing some recipes that might get more people into the kitchen. It’s not just sweet items but has proper main course dishes with healthy snacks and plenty of party recipes including a couple of impressive cakes for your little or large Whovian. It is a nice size with some good photographs and 40 recipes. It also includes some pictures of recent Doctors and there are some useful templates at the end which can be traced to make different patterns for recipes.

Not everything looks ‘Who’ related, some recipes are themed such as the Impossible Girl’s Soufflé. Some of the recipes require more skill than others but they all seem worth attempting. I was a bit disappointed that the fish fingers and custard wimps out and provides a cheese sauce instead. I attempted an easy and a couple of slightly more involved recipes and here is a little summation.

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Cybermelt was a relatively simple recipe to assemble. I only made one as there was only me to eat it. I didn’t toast it neither, so you see it in its uncooked form. I made it with Jarlseberg and therefore my cyberman is a little holey, therefore it must be the 1960 sock puppet version. Its add-on parts were made of Mexican cheese. Cyberman can be Mexican and a little bit spicy. Reader, I ate it and it was good.

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The Ood Head Bread. This was a little trickier and took me about a half hour to assemble after making the bread using a mixer. The result isn’t bad but I’m no food artist. I think it looks a bit more Sea Devil than Ood. It tasted very nice, particularly the added Marmite glaze. I did get some Ood looks from my family though.

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Jammy Dodger. Obviously, these must be made even though I didn’t have the question mark cookies cutter. The mix was easily made in the food processor as instructed but would be fairly simple to make with hands instead but not suckers. I also managed to make giant ones rather than those tiddlers proffered by the 11th Doctor, as eaten by Daleks. I nearly attempted the Atraxi eye but at this point I melted.

This is a nice addition to the amount of merchandise that comes out for ‘Doctor Who’ as it has a practical function and I hope it is used. It would make a good gift as it has some excellent recipes and they do stand up to testing.

Sue Davies

July 2016

(pub: BBC/Ebury Books/Penguin/Random House. 153 page illustrated hardback. Price: £14.99 (UK). ISBN: 978-1-785-94052-1)

check out websites: http://www.eburypublishing.co.ukand www.penguin.co.uk

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