Have you ever wanted to learn how to cook your favorite prison meal (that is, if you have a favorite prison meal)? If you're a fan of the popular Netflix series Orange Is the New Black, you'll be excited to hear that book publisher Abrams has teamed up with the producers of the series to create The Cookbook: Bites, Booze, Secrets, and Stories From Inside the Big House, according to a press release from Abrams.
The book has recipes of beefed-up versions of the food being served on the series, as well as the inmates' favorite foods from outside the prison walls. The book's publisher says the purpose of the book is to give fans a glimpse into the lives of the prisoners before they became prisoners.
The Cookbook will include Red's versus Gloria's kitchen, Daya's pregnancy journal and Lorna's prison glossary.
"The show has a really rabid fan base, and since Jenji was involved, we wanted to make everything as authentic as it could be," said Abrams editor Samantha Weiner. "People want more and more and more of the show, [so we] used food as [an] entry point to give more about the characters."
Below is a sample recipe from the book:
PENNSATUCKY'S FAMILY BEER CAN BIRD
BY TIFFANY "PENNSATUCKY" DOGGETT
Makes 1 big-ass turkey
My mama's brother's daddy Marvin was the inventor of the beer can bird, although no one give him credit for it and everyone says he stole it from his stepsister Susie. Back then beer cans was bigger and he'd have to really shove it up there hard. That's what they tell me, anyway. He passed before I was born. I do remember the first time my uncle served me some of his beer bird. We were out on the fall hunting trip when I was five- deeeelish. 'Course, he was more of an Old Milwaukee man and everybody knows a good can of Bud is the way to go. But he was from a different generation. They didn't know about things like that back then.
RUB:
2 teaspoons dry mustard powder
2 teaspoons smoked paprika
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cayenne
One 12- to 14-pound (5.5- to 6.25-kg) free-range turkey
1 medium chunk of smoking wood, such as apple wood
One 24- or 25-ounce (740-ml) can of beerFire up a smoker or grill to 325F (160C) on one side.
MAKE THE RUB:
In a small bowl, combine all the rub ingredients.
Remove and discard the neck and giblets from the turkey. Rinse the turkey under cold water and pat dry with paper towels. Rub the cavity with about 1 tablespoon of the rub. Using your fingers, gently separate the skin from the meat underneath the breasts and around the thighs. Spread about 1 tablespoon of the rub under the breast and thighs. Open the beer can and pour yourself about one third of the beer. Make a few more openings in the can using a can opener and leave the rest of the beer in the can. Add about 1 tablespoon of the rub to the beer can. Sprinkle the remaining rub into the cavity of the turkey and all over the turkey, inserting it under the skin.
When the grill comes up to temperature, add the wood chunk. When the wood ignites and starts to smoke, place the beer can on the grill over the unheated portion. Carefully lower the turkey onto the beer can, legs down. Adjust the legs so the bird is stable on the grill. (If it's hard to get it to stay stable, you could place the bird, beer in butt, in a roasting pan before placing it on the grill.) Cover and smoke until an instant-read thermometer registers 160F (70C) in the thickest part of the breast, 2 to 3 hours.