Qach: First seen when Commander Riker chose to honor the time honored ritual of a feast before transferring to another ship. Perhaps the most recognized of Klingon food choices, it comes in 51 different varieties, including torghud qagh, vIlDIng qagh, mIcha' qagh, etlhul qagh, and wIStng qagh. Each variety has a different flavor, and feels different squiggling down your throat as you swallow it. Shortly before her death, Jadzia Dax ordered a complete variety as a gift for General Martok's birthday. The shipment was delivered to Ezri Dax who does not appreciate (yet) the finer points of Klingon Kuisine. ("A Matter of Honor" [TNG], "Prodigal Daughter" [DS9])
Often misspelled as gagh, gargh, the CORRECT spelling of this animal is "qagh" is unless you want to dispute "THE KLINGON DICTIONARY". According to the Interactive CD ROM game, "Star Trek: KLINGON", qagh (pronounced "gackk," very heavy on the guttural) is a "worm-like creature native to the Klingon homeworld, a favorite Klingon delicacy. Rarely, if ever, eaten as a replicator dish, as it is properly and best served live." However, Earthers prefer their food dead. So...
This poses a problem, how do you make your food appear to be live? The best workaround I have found is:
According to "Star Trek: Klingon for the Galactic Traveler", qagh prepared in the traditional Klingon manner has starved qagh feed on 'Iw puj (weak or diluted blood). Just before being serving the qagh are placed in a bowl of ghevi' (a sauce). This sauce is laced with a flavorful herb that the worms eat greedily, despite the fact that the herb is toxic to them. The worms must be consumed in minutes, or else they will die, and we all know that "qagh is always best when served live".Here is another problem we have seen several different versions of qagh. In "A Matter Of Honor" [TNG] the qagh was a dark brown/green color. In the book "The Way of the Warrior" they have a picture that is labeled qagh, but looks more like some designer soap. One possible explanation of this is the 'Iw puj that the qagh feeds on prior to preparation for the table. Since just about any kind of 'Iw (blood) can be used there can be a great difference in the flavor of the qagh, and also a possible difference in the actual appearance of the dish.
Leftover's can be heated with the sauce to be made into qagh tlhIq (qagh stew)
According to the book "Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion" The ACTUAL recipe for qagh (used in "A Matter Of Honor" [TNG]) was long brown noodles and root vegetables.
In the past I had used linguini noodles that have been boiled with reddish brown food coloring, sprinkled with some spices. Or, you could boil them in soy sauce with some added red food coloring. Or, maybe bean sprouts stir fried in oil and then doused with food coloring. Recently, I found a variety of long green/string beans from China that would do QUITE well too. Use your imagination in getting convincing looking qach.
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