8 Kooky Cookbooks Inspired by Movies and TV

Orange is the New Black presents The Cookbook: Bites, Booze, Secrets, and Stories from Inside the Big House, by Jenji Kohan, Tara Herrmann, Harley Voss, and Alex Regnery
If you’re familiar with the Netflix dramedy (which is based on a memoir), or even the concept of prison in general, then you’re aware that prisons aren’t exactly known for their food, which ranks somewhere just above the gruel in Oliver Twist and below summer camp mess hall fare. Fortunately, this isn’t a prison food cookbook. The recipes are inspired by the inmates’ pre-prison lives, as detailed in the show’s flashback scenes, such as “Miss Claudette’s Coconut Cake” and “Red’s Chicken Kiev.” (There are no instructions on how to make jailhouse hooch, however.)

The Unofficial Recipes of the Hunger Games: 187 Recipes Inspired by the Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins
The Hunger Games is one of the biggest young adult series of all time, centered on Katniss Everdeen, a teenager from Appalachia who, like the rest of the dystopian former United States is starving. Well, she does hunt, and her friend Peeta is from a family of bakers, so there is some food to be explored from the books. This one focuses on the many indulgent treats the Hunger Games participants feast on during their trade rides to the Capitol (“Irresistible Hot Chocolate”) as well as homemade favorites from their home districts (“Mr. Mellark’s Farewell Cookies” and “Better Than Nothing Bread with Moldy Cheese and Mustard Sauce”).

Dining With the Doctor, by Chris-Rachael Oseland
Over the course of more than 800 episodes over 50 years, The Doctor on Doctor Who has been to hundreds of planets and various times and timelines. Yet the one thing he’s not been seen doing much of is eating. Perhaps the series’ most famous food moment is when Matt Smith’s Doctor arrives on Earth and is so famished he eats the two very British treats of fish fingers and custard…together. Among this book’s recipes (broken down by season) is one for fish fingers and custard that manages to make that particular combo not revolting.

True Blood: Eats, Drinks, and Bites from Bon Temps
HBO’s Southern gothic vampire series (based on the Charlaine Harris novels) was just as Southern as it was gothic. If anything, this book provides a great introduction to classic Deep South home cooking…none of which the shows many vampires would or even could actually eat. Among the cleverly named, True Blood treats are “The Pearl in My Oyster Po’ Boy” and “Sookie Stackhouse’s Fried Apple Pies.”

The Unofficial Mad Men Cookbook: Inside the Kitchens, Bars, and Restaurants of Mad Men
The stark human drama of Mad Men was often balanced out by the 1960s cultural sightseeing. The fun on that show came from spotting kitschy and campy cultural relics. Don Draper and the other ad guys frequently went out to dinner at some of New York’s most influential restaurants of the ‘60s, and the receipes for those distinctively ‘60s items are gathered here. Highlights include “Sardi’s Steak Tartar,” “Oysters Rockefeller”…as well as “Pat Nixon’s Date Nut Bread.”

The Portlandia Cookbook
As much a companion book as a cookbook, the Portlandia cookbook is just like the IFC show in that it somehow simultaneously celebrates and teases its subject. Portland is a food city and one with lots of quirks. The book plays like a Portlandia episode then, with more than 50 recipes and other stuff written by the show’s characters. The recipes themselves represent some pretty good Pacific Northwest cooking (“Roasted Wild Mushrooms With Foraged Greens”!), and a lot of it is vegetarian, vegan, freegan, gluten-free…

The Sopranos Family Cookbook
Big surprise: It’s a bunch of Italian food recipes. The Sopranos Family Cookbook was ostensibly “compiled” by Artie Bucco, the character on the HBO mob drama who runs Vesuvio, the show’s frequently featured Italian restaurant. In addition to recipes for incredibly Sopranos-sounding dishes like “Zita Al Forno,” “Quail Sinatra-Style,” and “Sunday Gravy Spaghetti Sauce” are in-universe Sopranos extras, like the “original” 1926 menu from Vesuvio and little A.J. Soprano’s school essay titled “Why I Like Food.”

Aunt Bee’s Mayberry Cookbook
Even in black and white, the food Aunt Bee cooked up for Andy and Opie on The Andy Griffith Show must have looked delicious, because since it was published in 1991, this cookbook has sold a staggering 900,000 copies. Be sure to try “Hope for More Chocolate Cake” and “Barney Fife’s Cock-a-Doodle-Doo Canapes.”
What are your favorite television-inspired cookbooks?