Halloween is on the way, and our favourite pair of Provisionally Prepared ratlings have been busy in the kitchen, teaching us all kinds of tricks for eating well in the grim darkness of the far future. Did you know that Vespid tails taste like prime Terran crustacean? We didn’t.*
Any self-respecting Ratling knows how to rustle up some quality grub back at the mess, but when you’re out in the mud and the muck because the Captain picked your boys first for recon again, you need to think on your feet. Good food is hard to come by at the best of times, so imagine how our lads on Volkus have it when a massive gun flattens everything for miles every time it fires.
Those tallboys are compensating for something, they are.
Never you worry, my love – turns out the best eating on the planet is coming to you, courtesy of the T’au Empire. See, our daredevil chute-droppers have been leaving plenty of them ‘Stingwing’ things lying around, and some silly sod had the bright idea of cooking one over a lasgun powerpack.
Turns out, they’re not half bad – supposed to be quite like lobster.** Naturally we shipped our staff cooks out to see what the fuss was about, and they’ve been testing all kinds of ways of making them tasty. Here’s our approved recipe.
You will need:
Mess tin
Clean(ish) water
Combat knife
2 freshly harvested Vespid tails (IMPORTANT: Make sure Vespid is dead)
¼ block Corpse Starch, ground
200ml milk or closest approximation
Salt
Local herbs
Splash of an officer’s best amasec (Cpt. Treshk, 5th company QM, has a new bottle)
Heat stove, or if unavailable, discharge a lasgun approx. 60-70 times into safe ground and remove power pack with care. Bring water to a boil and salt.
Using your service knife, crack along the hard shell of the tail until one side of the flesh is exposed. Rub in chosen spices and lower into the boiling water. Simmer for 12–15 minutes, depending on recency of kill. Remove meat from carapace and chop roughly.
Empty pot, add milk and starch, and stir until a roux forms. Pour in amasec and remaining herbs, and whip until light.
Mix cooked meat back into the sauce. Crack carapaces in half – if difficult, place them under an ammo crate and jump on it – and fill with Vespid mixture. Serve hot.
If you’re a particularly light-fingered sort who can get their hands on cheeses, cream, or any of that fancy dribble the robes from the Administratum have, add it in towards the end. Oh, and don’t let the T’au catch you chowing down on those xenos bugs they’ve taught how to act like people…
Got any more gourmet ideas for battlefield brunches?*** Let your local Fixer know and he’ll pass it through the wires.
Next week: Salmon on Kroot.
* And we’re not sure the Warhammer Design Studio does either…
** Ask your CO.
*** Stop sending us Ork recipes – we don’t care that they’re basically mushrooms.
