#orkus

This English edition of Orkus featured EA's "Mad Tea Party." It was printed in black and white, but colored versions have been floating around for a while. The magazine also included a Laced/Unlaced Poster.

Speculation: Because the scans I have are in German, I assume this also appeared in the December 2007 issue of Orkus Magazine.

Note: I typed out the German myself. Excuse any misspellings or weirdness; I don't speak German.

EMILIE AUTUMN: MAD TEA PARTY Taking time out from the madness to enjoy teatime doesn't mean you have to be sane...

Treue Fans wissen, dass Emilie Autumns Welt nicht hinter ihrer wegwelsenden Musik aufort. Mit ihrem Asylum hat sich die bildhubsche, arbeitssuchtige Victoriandustrial-Prinzessin einen ureigenen, geheimnisvollen und faszinierenden Kosmos kreiert, and dem man bisher nur auf ihren Live-Shows oder in den fabelhaften Booklets ihrer CDs teilhaben konnte. Nun jedoch offnet Emilie die Tore in ihre Welt und bittet die Orkus-Leser zu einer unvergesslichen Teestunde im einzigartigen Emilie Autumn-Stil. Kostliche Kuchen, unerwartete Dinge aus Marzipan, gar rosige Bonbonbs, Schoko-Schlemmereien... wenn Miss Autumn schon ze einer Teestunde ladt, dann aber bitte mit sehr viel Stil und Genuss. Und damit diese Teestunde im viktorianischen Asylum-Stil kein Einzelfall bleiben muss, hat Emilie gleich ihre Lieblingsrezepte mitgebracht, die wir fur Euch aufrgrund ihrer unvergleichbaren Sprache in unveranderter, englischer Form gesammelt haben.

Highly Doubtful Teacake with Very Suspicious Crème

What makes this teacake so very “doubtful” is the addition of fresh lavender, the historical meaning for which is “distrustful”. So be careful whom you share it with…

Teacake Ingredients:

1 cup milk

3 Tbsp. fresh chopped lavender flowers

2 cups all-purpose flour

1½ tsp. baking powder

¼ tsp. salt

6 Tbsp. butter, softened

1 cup sugar

2 large eggs

Instructions:

Grease and flour a loaf pan, and no, I won’t tell you what size because it won’t matter anyway. You’re going to use whatever pan you have, and I’m not holding that against you, I do the same. Half of my recipes were created entirely out of being on the road touring, and really needing to make tarts, but having not the proper equipment. Baking is an adventure, so do treat it as such.

In any case! After greasing and flouring, kindly preheat your oven to 325°F. In a small saucepan, heat the milk, adding the chopped lavender and bring almost to a boil, then remove from heat and let steep until cool.

Sift flour, baking powder and salt together in a bowl. In another bowl, thrash the butter about until it’s light and creamy and gradually add sugar, then eggs, one at a time, thrashing even more until the whole mess is light and fluffy and much prettier than you ever imagined raw eggs ought to be. Add flour mixture and lavender milk alternating between each addition, and mix until batter is just blended, no longer.

Spoon the flowery goodness into your mystery loaf pan and bake for 50 minutes, or until a wooden skewer inserted in center comes out clean. Leave your cake to cool in the pan 5 minutes, then remove to a wire rack to cool. When completely cooled, dust with confectioners’ sugar and garnish with sprigs of fresh or candied lavender. If you don’t know how to candy lavender, then read ahead on the section on candying rose petals and you’ll get the idea. Serve with a dollop of Very Suspicious Crème.

Crème Ingredients:

8 oz. cream cheese

1 Tbsp. heavy cream

½ tsp. fresh chopped lavender flowers

3 Tbsp. confectioners’ sugar

1 tsp. pure vanilla extract

Blend the cream cheese with the heavy cream until smooth and fluffy. Add in the lavender, confectioners’ sugar, and vanilla, beating until silky and very suspicious looking. Serve with Teacakes of all sort, but especially highly doubtful ones.

TEA TIPS: When serving tea to your guests, be sure to present a variety of sugars. Piping tiny frosting flowers onto heart-shaped sugar lumps and displaying rock candy sugar in various colours will set your table sparkling! Save some for the rats…

Cyanide Tea Scones with Clotted Cream

Ah, sweet cyanide…what can we say about cyanide? You surely know it’s historical impact as a popular ingredient of both murder and suicide. But did you know that cyanide is derived from almonds? Being my personal flavour, you’ll see a somewhat excessive if not altogether inappropriate use of it in the following recipes. And as for the clotted cream, well, that sounds bad enough. Doesn’t it?

Scone Ingredients:

4 cups all-purpose flour

4 tsp. baking powder

½ cup sugar

1 tsp. salt

8 Tbsp. very cold, unsalted butter, cut into ¼ inch cubes

1 cup milk

6 black teabags of the best quality you can find, I prefer Twinings

2 eggs, beaten

½ tsp. pure almond extract

½ cup sliced almonds

1 Tbsp. cream

¼ cup sugar

¼ cup finely chopped almonds

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 400°F. In a chilled glass bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Using your fingers if you know what you’re doing or a pastry blender if you don’t, cut in the bits of butter until the crumbly mess is the size of smallish bees. Set the bowl into you refrigerator or out in the snow while you carry on. In a small saucepan, bring milk almost to a boil. Add tea bags, cover, and brew 5 minutes. Remove tea bags and cool. Beat in the eggs, almond extract, and sliced almonds. Gradually add tea mixture to flour mixture, stirring until just combined, no more.

Turn dough out onto a floured baking sheet and pat into a circle. Slice the dough into 16 triangular wedges. Alternately you can use heart shaped baking pans like the one I used here. Either way, brush dough with cream and sprinkle generously with sugar and chopped almonds. Bake 20 minutes or until golden, always best to sit right by the oven the first few times you try out a new recipe just to verify that everything’s going along as it should. Your oven is a unique creature you really should get to know, because no two are alike. Once done, cool scones on a wire rack. Serve with The Asylum’s Own Clotted Cream. Makes 16 scones.

Clotted Cream Ingredients:

½ cup cold heavy cream

3 Tbsp. confectioner’s sugar

½ cup sour cream

¼ tsp. almond extract

In a chilled bowl, beat cream until stiff peaks form, and don’t think you can’t do this by hand, because you can. As the cream begins to stiffen up, sift in the confectioner’s sugar. Gently fold in the sour cream, and almond extract, and voila! Clots galore! Chill until use. This fluffy topping for scones and crumpets is also called “Devonshire Cream,“ but it doesn’t quite have the same ring to it…clots clots clots clotty clots…

Marzipan Leeches & Plague Rats

Yes, more almonds…but that is hardly important when it is merely a delicious modeling tool for some truly gourmet bonbons. Marzipan rats will charm your guests, marzipan leeches will horrify them. Just let them wait until you’ve given them all names…

Ingredients:

1 package (8 oz.) Marzipan (baker’s almond paste, available everywhere)

¼ cup confectioner’s sugar

2 Tbsp. Amaretto liquer

1 tsp. unsweetened cocoa powder

1 thin-tipped paintbrush

To begin with, open your Marzipan and cover it with a damp cloth as it likes to dry out and then what have you got? Next, add a bit of the cocoa powder to a few drops of the liquer and mix it with the paintbrush, experimenting with ratios to achieve a palette of lovely browns that you can use to accent your rats and leeches. Sprinkle some sugar onto your hands and work surface and you’re ready to begin a life-changing adventure! 

Leeches:

Leeches can be sculptured in myriad ways, but I will explain my method as a mere example.

Roll a small ball of dough until it becomes a rope, then roll the rope between your hands until it is thinner at one end.

Curl the rope to make your leech, posing him in whatever manner you find suitable, keeping in mind his station and lineage.

Roll two tiny balls of dough for the eyes, and attach them to the top of your leech’s head, then make an indentation within each eye with a very small object.

After waiting at least 30 minutes to let the leeches dry, use your cocoa-liquer mixture to paint stripes and details onto your leech, and place him in a bonbon paper to be displayed proudly in your best leech jar.

Plague Rats:

Roll the rat’s body from a small ball of dough into an oval with one end pointed for the nose.

Roll two little dough bits into ear shapes and press them into the sides of your rat’s head in an appropriate spot.

Roll a thin snake of dough and attach to the rat’s body, curling it over his back for the tail.

Using the wooden end of your paintbrush, make the indentations for the eyes.

After waiting at least 30 minutes to let the rat dry, use your cocoa-liquer mixture to paint shadows and details onto your rat, and place him in a bonbon paper to be displayed proudly on your tea table.

Cucumber Hatred Tea Sandwiches

If revenge is a dish best served cold, then this is the dish they were talking about. The Historical meaning of basil is ‘Hatred’ and these delicate finger sandwiches are loaded with it…who’s cool as a cucumber now?

Ingredients:

8 oz. cream cheese, softened

3 Tbsp. cream

½ tsp. salt

¼ tsp. black pepper

3 Tbsp. fresh chives, chopped

6 slices wheat bread 

6 slices white bread

1 English (seedless) cucumber 

1 Bushel of fresh basil leaves (approx. 24)

Beat together the cream cheese and cream until smooth. Add salt, pepper and chives, blending well. Spread 1 slice of wheat bread and one slice of white bread with cream cheese mixture. Arrange a layer of cucumber slices on the wheat bread and top with basil leaves. Place white bread slice on top and smash sandwich down ever so gently with a rolling pin. Trim crusts, and cut into triangles. Repeat with remaining bread to make 24 hate-filled sandwiches.

Rose Petal Poison Sandwiches

Poison? Well, not if you go into your garden and pick yourself some fresh, chemical free petals. Otherwise, you’ll get sick and the sarcasm will be lost…

Ingredients:

6 oz. sweet butter packed in fresh rose petals1 overnight, softened 

¼ cup confectioners’ sugar 

1 cup fresh, clean rose petals (from your garden, pesticide-free) 

½ sliced almonds

12 slices white bread

To assemble one sandwich, spread two slices of bread with rose scented butter. Sift sugar over buttered sides of bread. Arrange a layer of rose petals, followed by a layer of almonds. Top with the other slice of sugared, buttered bread, and press down with rolling pin. Trim crusts and cut into triangles, hearts, rounds to suit your fancy. Sift sugar over sandwiches and top each with a candied rose petal (petals dipped in beaten egg white and rolled in granulated sugar, then dried until crisp). Repeat with remaining ingredients to equal 24 sandwiches.

Royally Mad Tea