every food in: redwall
Redwall by Brian Jacques
Originally published 1986, using original 1986 edition
This post encompasses books 1 through 3, and was originally published on my now defunct Tumblr blog in 2018. As such, I don’t have the same amount of research I’d do now in this post, nor are there recipe links as readily available, so I apologize for the drop in content quality.
I’ll be doing these mostly in published order, unlike Narnia - this is the order in which I read them, originally.
I don’t have too much commentary on this one, because there’s so much food in it and this is already quite a long post. Redwall was a pretty common book to have read if you grew up in the 90s, and most of the food is fairly historically accurate British-inspired dishes. Or foraged food from the forest. There’s plenty of dishes in here with unusual flavors that are good candidates for a future recipe test, especially the apple and mint ice cream.
Also, having not read this series since I was fairly young, I was surprised how … violent it was for a children’s book. It’s essentially Game of Thrones with mice. Brutal.
BOOK ONE
Chapter 1
A basket of hazelnuts
Chapter 2
Grayling a la Redwall (white gooseberry wine, lots of cream, rosemary, thyme, beechnuts, honey, mint leaves)
Raspberry cordial
Peach and elderberry brandy
Apple and mint ice cream
Cheddar cheese
Chapter 5
Hazelnuts, cheese, bread, cakes
Chapter 9
Cabbages, sprouts, marrows, turnips, peas, carrots, tomatoes, lettuces, onions
Honey
Raspberries, blackberries, bilberries, apples, pears, quince, plums, damsons, wild grapevines
Nutbread, apples, and a bowl of goat’s milk
Chapter 10
A bowl of honeyed milk
Chapter 11
A jug of nutbrown ale
Chapter 13
Nuts and preserved berries, apples, pears
Nutbrown ale, strong cider, stout, elderberry wine, mulberry brandy, blackcurrant port, wild grape sherry
A bowl of fresh milk, a hunk of wheaten loaf, and goatsmilk cheese
Chapter 17
Fennel and oatcakes
BOOK TWO
Chapter 2
A bowl of milk and honey
Chapter 4
Nutbread, salad, milk, quince pie
Chapter 6
October ale, summer salad, quince pie, goatsmilk cheese with hazelnuts
Chapter 7
Blackberry muffin, red-currant tart
Chapter 8
Barley wine
Chapter 9
Warm milk
Chapter 12
Barley wine
Chapter 13
Candied chestnuts
Chapter 15
Vegetable soup
Chapter 16
Candied chestnuts, water
Berries and fresh dandelions
Chapter 17
Bowl of milk
A wedge of cheese
Quince and elderberry pie
Apple cream pudding
Chapter 21
Two bowls of gruel
Half a dozen boiled eggs, some crisp summer salad, two loaves of hot bread, two hazelnut cream junkets, four oven baked apple pies, medium sized quince tarts
Chapter 22
Sweet berry juice, a loaf of rough nutbread, and foraged roots
BOOK THREE
Chapter 1
Half a wood pigeon, some cheese, and St Ninian’s barley wine
Chapter 4
Toasted wheat cake and a bowl of herb tea
Hardtack and a canteen of water
Chapter 5
Oatmeal and oven bread
Vegetable soup, fresh bread, and goat cheese
Chapter 9
Trout salad with mustard and cress
Chapter 11
Foraged celebration feast, with truffles
