Hippogriff Cookbook in iBooks
One 99¢ universal app runs on iPad, iPhone and iPod touch. Requires iOS 3.2+. Designed for iOS 4.3+

Hippogriff Cookbook

Lost Recipes and Forgotten Delicacies from
The Manchester Folio of 1528.


Two charming and bewitchingly handsome wizards discover (and bring to Apple’s magical touchscreens) medieval recipes for hippogriff and other enchanted beasts.


  • Featured by Apple: “New & Noteworthy App” for both iPad and iPhone
  • 22 authenticated recipes and dozens of rare cooking tips from The Manchester Folio of 1528
  • Discovered by wizards of the Tadcaster Institute of Practical Thaumaturgy and LED Assembly
  • Recommended substitutes (in case hippogriff hunting is restricted in your region)
  • Also happens to be the first work of classic literature written exclusively for the iOS platform
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Twenty-two recipes, including hippogriff entrées, light fare and desserts. Plus Sectioned Meats and notes from the chefs.

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Authenticated historic illustrations by master of the drawn sword, Sir Justin Owens, Esq.

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Real recipes for real witches and wizards! Including substitutes for hippogriff, where appropriate.

What exactly is a hippogriff?

A hippogriff is a magical flying protein source with an eagle’s torso and a delightfully horsey posterior. Medieval English sorcerers were the first to capture hippogriffs for field labour, for food, and for puppet shows (though this is disputed by Persian poets, and by the Wisconsin Governor for obvious reasons). In 1780 Manchester magicians successfully mapped the hippogriff genome, finding that the hippogriff is the inter-species product of a griffin (an eagle-lion hybrid) crossbred with a mare. No one knows what became of the lion’s share. Still, the hippogriff is the only known livestock that provides steak, poultry, dairy and eggs.

Are there substitutes for hippogriff?

Yes! Not that you’d need them, but every recipe includes tested substitutes. Got a rack of lamb or sphinx shoulder to roast? Leftover osprey, or maybe a greylag goose? Even with no hippogriff in sight our recipes are sure to enchant. Vegetarian? Discriminating gourmands love our suggested meatless alternatives, from sustainably-raised mock duck to the ever-popular tofunicorn. Precise quantity conversions are listed throughout.

Did it really take you four hundred and eighty-three years to write the book?

Pure myth, that is.

I’m from the States. Do you use teaspoons and cups and stuff?

Yes. Conversions are in parentheses. We display quantities and volumes like this:

1 ml (1/4 tsp) salt
metric ( US measurement ) ingredient

When we’re counting food items (i.e. “2 Meyer lemons” or “6 cloves garlic”)–we just count on our stubby little British fingers. If you have elongated New-World-type fingers, then where [x = # of objects counted on British fingers], and [y = # of objects you’ll need in the recipe], the conversion is roughly: [x = y].

Why isn’t it available for my first-gen iPhone/iPod Touch?

We wish it were. It’s fairly simple for an app, but we had to use custom fonts, and for now, those aren’t available on your first-gen device. The typefaces we used—visible in screenshots above—were designed in 1497 and 1743. But if Apple releases an iOS 3.2 update for those early devices, you’ll be in luck!

Doesn’t J.K. Rowling own everything?

Who?

Any sample hippogriff recipes?

Sure! Visit Hippogriff Tacos on tumblr.

I’m confused. Are the hippogriffs doing the cooking, or are they being cooked?

Guess.

Did you really test all these recipes?

Yes! Twice! Sure, we tell a joke or two, but when it comes to cooking, we’re the serious type. From the timing to the temperatures, from the tongue to the tri-tip, the Manchester Folio of 1528 delivers more than just a medieval sense of humour. This is real food for real witches and wizards.

I can’t afford a dollar. Can you give me the cookbook for free?

Yes. Just send a stamped, self-addressed first-class envelope to Manchester Folio Wizards c/o Dr. Ben Leeds Carson, Music Center Faculty Services, University of California, 1156 High Street, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, with a photo and a brief hand-written essay on the practical topic of your choice, and we will return to you a signed photo of your beloved editors. If the essay is grammatically correct and thoroughly argued with citations, we will also send you an analogue copy of your chosen recipe, along with your next essay assignment, with which you might earn the privilege a second time.

For the rest of you, we offer a generous payment plan: skip your café beverages and pastries for two weeks, favouring instead the excellent “French Roast” at your nearest petrol station. This will save you approximately $49.99. Purchase The Hippogriff Cookbook for yourself and eight of your friends ($8.91). With the remainder, buy the ingredients for about a quarter of our recipes, and throw a hippogriff barbecue or holiday dinner for everyone you know in a 25-minute public transit radius (priceless). Repeat three months later: plan a party around other recipes and gift our app to a new set of 8 friends. After one year’s time you will have finished the book, transforming your culinary life, your sense of humour, and your regional popularity. (Hopefully for the better.) If not, at least you will have weaned yourself off those dreadful franchise baristas.

Can I print a recipe?

Sorry, not yet. That capability came out a month after we finished designing the app. However, we DO plan to add printing as a free update in the future. Meanwhile, you can print the recipes we’re posting to Hippogriff Tumblr.

Droid! Droid! Droid! Droid!

Please, it doesn’t help to shout. We’ll see what we can do. (P.S. if you’re an android developer with a healthy distrust of mythical animal rights organizations, please tap the ‘Contact’ tab and send us a note.)

The Hippogriff Cookbook: Lost Recipes and Forgotten Delicacies from the Manchester Folio of 1528

Conventional wisdom regards the hippogriff with a surprisingly naïve awe. In popular imagination, we dream of this exceptional creature as an enchanted guardian... a companion with whom we ride into the sky and beyond in search of magic and virtue.

Some of our readers may flinch at the thought that a steed of such caliber—in transport and warfare—would be sliced up for young wizards’ exam-week sandwiches and noodle sauces. Recent Hollywood accounts depict a noble (if a little stupid) member of the magical family of creatures. There is a certain sad seduction to this wrong-headed idea, so we understand if you’ve been taken in.

The Hippogriff Cookbook reveals what all other accounts of the creature have kept hidden for centuries: its taste.

Deep in the stacks of the Stein-Healaugh Transitional Library, we stumbled upon a long-buried record of witches’ and wizards’ everyday lives in the high middle ages. The pages of this cookbook were originally scattered through the manuscript’s last appendices (along with medieval rent-to-own contracts, lengthy passive-aggressive break-up letters, and masterfully composed fourteen-line sonnets). Some experts doubted the folio’s authenticity—notably as its pages made use of the phrase ‘Michelin star rating’ on five separate occasions—however, we are assured by historians that it is for the most part a genuine collection of medieval-sounding recipes.

The sorcerers who crafted The Manchester Folio saw the need for “A Compendium of Fare and Humbel Flavours to Accompanye Slaine Hippogryphe.” And so, after five centuries in obscurity we bring you their unconventional wisdom: The Hippogriff Cookbook.

The Team

iPad : Hippogriff Cookbook Screenshots

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iPhone (Retina Display) : Hippogriff Cookbook Screenshots

Hippogriff Cookbook 1.1

Released on March 29, 2011
  • Introduction to The Manchester Folio of 1528.
  • 22 authenticated recipes, tested with hippogriff and recommended substitutes.
  • Metric and American measurements for each ingredient.
  • All illustrations are high-res so you can zoom in for a closer look.
  • New LIGHTER FARE section, featuring ‘Griffin Salad Sandwiches,’ ‘Wild Horse & Fowl Tacos,’ ‘Pulled Hippogriff Sliders,’ and ‘Watermelon Salad’.
  • Updated PROLOGUE and CHEF’S NOTES with links to share recipes, cooking tips, and witchy brouhaha with the authors on Facebook and Twitter.
  • Diminution of numerous sentences, the better with which to humour you.
  • Corrections to typographical errors and modest refinements of language to improve clarity in recipes.
  • Notes added regarding our extensive testing with recommended substitutes.
  • Newly extended recipe for ‘Hippogriff Crispy Friends Preparation’.
  • Magical instructions hinted at, clarified, and expounded upon.
  • Revised layout and updates to ‘Sectioned Meats of Various Kinds.’
  • iPhone change: the back button is now a simple arrow.
  • A plethora of graphic updates.

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Want to get in touch?

Send us a message via email.

We’ve also answered some of your frequently asked questions (FAQ) on our landing page: Hippogriff Cookbook.

Bug report? Got a question? Just tweet @HippogriffTacos on Twitter.

Or start a new topic in the discussions tab of Hippogriff Cookbook on Facebook. We’ll get back to you quick.

Press and other fond admirers can reach us by mobile: 323.304.6232.

The Hippogriff Cookbook
Hippogriff Cookbook in iBooks

Written by Ben Leeds Carson & Perre DiCarlo. Illustrated by Justin Owens. Feel free to share contents of this site.

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