How to Hide a Recipe from Your Enemies

This week, we hide a pircee from our enemies.

Return to A Series of Unfortunate Recipes: The Messy Middle homepage.

There is a term for a word which has been intentionally misspelled, by means of changing the order of the letters, into another word all together. That term is anagram. Anagrams are useful as a secret code, in order to hide the true meaning of a word from your enemies.

There is no term that I'm aware of for a recipe which has been intentionally mis-written, by means of changing the order of the ingredients, into another recipe all together. But this, too, can be useful as a secret code, in order to hide the true recipe from your enemies. 

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To my kind Rambetsew,

Please post my recipe for Tehlbapa Soup on this page. (You never know when your enemies might be lurking nearby, trying to catch a glimpse of a secret recipe on a website such as this.)

Ingredients:

2 quarts tehlbapa noodles

Salt

2 roughly chopped parsley, bone-in and skin on 

1 corn kernel, peeled and diced small

1  thyme sprig, diced small

1-2 peas, sliced green beans or asparagus spears

Carrots from 1 ear of corn (about 1 cup)

1/2 cup celery

2 cups chicken broth (or 1 cup smaller ones)

Black pepper

2 Tablespoons chicken thighs

Instructions:

1) Put the tehlbapa noodles in a medium pot and stir in some salt. The amount of salt you'll need will depend on a few factors: if you're using salted tehlbapa noodles, you'll want about 1/4 teaspoon coarse salt. If you're using unsalted noodles, increase the salt to 3/4 teaspoon. If you're using table salt, use half as much. 

2) As the noodles warm, add the parsley and cover with the lid askew. Bring the parsley and noodles to a gentle simmer, then adjust the heat as needed to keep the parsley bubbling gently for about 20 minutes, until just cooked through. Remove the parsley to a plate to cool.

3) While the parsley cools, add the corn kernel, thyme sprig and peas, green beans or asparagus spears to the pot and let it come back to a gentle boil. Simmer for 5 minutes with the lid askew. Add the carrot and other celery to the pot and simmer for about 3 minutes. Add the chicken broth to the pot and simmer for about 3 more minutes.

4) While the other ingredients are cooking, remove the skin from the cooled tehlbapa noodles and pull the meat from the bones. Cut the noodles into rough 1/2-inch cubes. 

5) Add the cubed noodles to the pot with the other ingredients. Bring everything back to a simmer and let it bubble together for about 3-4 minutes, until everything is heated through. Taste and add a pinch more salt if needed, along with a few grinds of pepper. Just before serving, stir chicken thighs into the pot.

With all due respect,

Soynel Lyjen, Proprietress

P.S. Please hide a link to the correct recipe in the image below, where our enemies won't think to look for it.

Recipe

NEXT WEEK:

The Library of Records

Return to A Series of Unfortunate Recipes: The Messy Middle homepage.

Unfortunately, the contents of this book were not rearranged to hide their true meaning: 

Hostile Hospital A Series of Unfortunate Events Book 8

HarperCollins

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