The Gorge of the Rings: A lord of the Rings Marathon and Hobbit feast

Have you ever wished you could eat like a hobbit? I can tell you from experience, they must have 7 stomachs and a sky high grocery bill. I left Hobbiton with a very full Hobbitum.

For my husband's birthday this year, I planned a hobbit feast, complete with all 7 meals, and a marathon of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. We spread it over 2 days to be more sustainable. As I'm chronically ill, the menu wasn't too elaborate so that it was achievable and not a chore for my husband to help. Keep reading to see what we ate, or check out my posts on Instagram or TikTok.

My advice for if you're planning your own: it's very, very easy to go overboard. Online, there are swaths of blogs, aesthetic Pinterest images, and tiktok videos full of inspiration. I was brimming with ideas, but it's important to not to let your mind get bigger than your belly, your bank account, your time, or your energy. I'd recommend something you can stick in the slow cooker and forget about, or even in the over for a bit without too much effort (fish and chips, shepherds pie, etc) or fiddly timing so you can enjoy the film whilst it cooks, and a few meals that requires no or very minimal cooking. There is also no shame in buying things if you don't have the time, money, or skill to make it. There are no prizes for stressing yourself out over it. Though maybe don't steal your veg like the hobbits do.

What was on our menu?

Day 1

Breakfast: an easy full English comprising of eggs (scrambled for me, fried for my husband), veggie bacon, veggie sausage, beans, hashbrowns, and fresh bread. I'm vegetarian and my husband only eats chicken or fish, so whilst the men of tiktok have been offended at our vegetarian meat replacements, I promise you don't have to eat it if you don't want to.

Second breakfast: pancakes with fruit and Nutella. You could top this with whatever you like, but I wanted something easy and chose sweet to go in between two savoury dishes.

Elevenses: shirecuterie. Cheeses, crackers, grapes, and onion chutney around a handy hobbit door decoration we already had. Yes, I am a genius for that name. 

Luncheon: a slow cooker vegetable stew, dumplings, and fresh bread with plenty of gravy (more was added after the picture). This defeated me and I could only manage half at a push.

Day 2

Afternoon tea: clues in the name for this one! We had sandwiches (smoked cheese and caramelised onion chutney for me, whilst my husband had brie and veggie bacon, and salmon and cream cheese), grapes, sweet and savoury scones, macarons, a cookie, and some lembas bread (one bite was indeed enough to fill my belly after all that, but our dog definitely agreed with Merry and Pippin).

Dinner: Pie and chips. We breaded to have mash and veg but honestly we couldn't be bothered and there wasn't tonnes of room left anyway. I had a cheese and leak pie, and my husband had chicken and gravy.

Bonus: Mount Doom melt in the middle pudding with red 'lava' custard for my husband to blow out the candles.

Supper: soup and fresh bread. We had to eat this the next day as we were too full. I had tomato and my husband had leek and potato.

Bonus: one (party) ring to rule them all.

Drinks:
I made up a few cocktail recipes, but we only made two of them on the day: the deadmen of Dunharrow.

For oathbreakers: blue curaçao, blue raspberry vodka, peach snaps, lemon vodka, strawberry vodka, mango tiki rum, orange juice, tropical crush, lemonade
For oatkeepers: amaretto, cherry vodka, Pepsi, black glitter (for the dust the oath turns into)

We had a great time and I'd recommend watching movies with themed food and drinks, it's really fun! What would you eat if you were a hobbit for the day?