Category: Movies

October 2002 – My Big Fat Greek Feast – 20 Years Ago Today

Greetings from 2002!  This month I am cooking from the October 2002 issue of Australian Table.   Instead of cherry picking recipes from all over the mag, like I did with September 2002, this time I have cooked three Greek inspired dishes from an article called Acropolis Now.  Nice pun Australian Table.  At least they didn’t run with “It’s all Greek to Me”.  So, what is on the menu?

Greek Menu 221022

 

Broad Beans with Grilled Haloumi Cheese

OMG…these were AMAZING!!!!

I love a broad bean.  And you know who doesn’t love haloumi?  With all due respect to vegans and the lactose intolerant, people who are dead inside.  If you cannot find some sense of joy in the very prospect of grilled cheese?  We can’t be friends.  And you probably need to sign up for years of therapy.

Broad Beans with Grilled Haloumi Cheese

 

I totally botched the gorgeous grill marks you are meant to get on the haloumi but I didn’t do too bad a job of recreating the recipe as it appeared in the mag.  I wonder though, if this recipe appeared in a magazine today, would we need to have the word “”cheese appended to the haloumi?  I think not.  Apart from that though, this is a delicious dish that could appear on any table today without it feeling like a recipe that was 20 years old.

Here’s the recipe.  And…can I just say…I don’t think I did too bad a job at recreating the look of the magazine picture in my version!

Broad Beans with Haloumi Recipe

Keftethes and Greek Salad

I love how 2002 has to explain these as being Greek “Rissoles” .  Not even meatballs.  Rissoles.  The word rissole reminds me so much of this scene in the utterly brilliant Australian film The Castle.

These were great!  The mint was really nice and it made a very tasty yet simple weeknight dish! I was a bit worried about coating the keftethes with flour before cooking but it kept the meat from drying out and gave it a really nice crust!

Kefetethes

The keftethes paired really well with a Classic Greek Salad!

Kefetethes and Greek Salad

The recipe for the Greek Salad per Australian Table had no lettuce.  My local Greek restaurant, The Paradise of Lindos, always includes lettuce in their Greek Salad so I added some to mine without even realising it was not in the recipe.  Go your own way on this!   None of these dishes are breaking the mould when it comes to flavours or techniques.  But they were all flavourful and easy to make.  They would be a perfect weeknight dinner!

Here are the recipes:

Keftethes and Salad Recipe

For those of you with a sweet tooth, the article also contained a recipe for those lovely crescent shaped Greek shortbreads which I am very keen to try making!  If you would also like to try, here is a recipe for Kourabiethes.

The Film Event of October 2002

So, you know what else happened in October 2002?

If I told you that the film that Wikipedia  reliably informs me was “the highest-grossing romantic comedy of all time” was released would you have any idea what I was talking about?  Take a guess.  Then take another because you were probably wrong.  Then, look at the title of this blog post and take another because who knew that?

My Big Fat Greek Wedding was released (in Australia) on 24 October 2002.  Starring Nia Vardalos and John Corbett (who was riding high on his role as Aiden in Sex and The City) it was a rom com about the cultural confusion that occurs when a Greek girl falls for an all American boy.

I remember being delighted by this film when it came out.  It was so funny and John Corbett was so handsome!   My clearest memory though is this one:

I fear that My Big Fat Greek Wedding might not stand up well to the test of time.  I was tempted to rewatch it for this but did not want my memories of a film I really enjoyed back in the day to be spoiled.  Was has stood up to the test of time are the recipes in the article on Greek cooking.  Acropolis Now?  I say Acropolis Wow!

I’ll show myself the door on that one!

Have a great week everyone!

Signature2

 

 

Vegeree

Hello friends and welcome to the best of February!  The nicest thing I made this month was a vegetarian kedgeree (vegeree geddit) from Jamie Oliver.  This recipe is from his Everyday Superfoods book and it is a belter!   Kedgeree is a dish of spiced rice, usually made with smoked fish which grew to prominence in Colonial India.  Traditionally, Kedgeree is a breakfast dish but I had mine for dinner. And as much as I love a bit of smoked fish, this was so delicious I am not sure if I will even bother to try the classic version after eating this one!

 

Vegeree1

This is a dish to eat with your eyes before shovelling it down.  It is so pretty and bright.  I can see why it became popular for breakfast – those bright reds and greens and yellows would put a smile even on my totally-not-a-morning-person face.  I used normal basmati rice, not brown and beans not peas for my vegeree.

Vegeree – The Recipe

I apologise for the state of this page.  It is more than somewhat food splattered!!! (but the sign of a good recipe I always think).

Vegeree (2)
Vegeree via Jamie Oliver

Other Favourites of The Month

Reading

The Best book I read this month was Fuzz: When Nature Breaks The Law by Mary Roach.  I loved learning about the different interactions between humans and animals. Not as fun but also fascinating is the book I am partway through – Going Dark: The Secret Social Lives of Extremists. As someone who mostly reads fiction, it was good to have two non-fiction recommendations this week!

Feb Faves

Cookbook

Our theme for our Tasty Reads Cookbook Club this month is Charity Shop book and we spent a lovely Saturday morning having brunch and then shopping for our books.  I bought three books during our shopping which was quite the haul.  The one I am cooking from is a massive tome called Australia’s Favourite Recipes. From the photography in the book, I initially thought it was from the 1970s or 80s but I later found out it was published in 2010!  Unfortunately, I am somewhat regretting my choice – not because of the dated photos but the book is so tall that it does not fit into any of my bookshelves!

Australia's Favourite Recipes

I was intrigued to find within its pages a recipe for a chicken dish called Shakuti.  This is possibly a recipe for the Chicken Xacuti mentioned in the Tim Key episode of the Off-Menu Podcast.  I had never heard of this curry before.  And now I have a recipe!  The Baader-Meinhof effect at work!

Watching

We saw Death on The Nile which I LOVED. The scenery was spectacular and made me want to go to Egypt to see the sights myself.  The Dining with the Dame for this will be later this year.

Listening

I’ve started listening to the Twin Flames podcast and am very much enjoying the current series of Rabbits.  The Rabbits novel is also great!  I’m devastated that the shipping for Path Cards outside the US is so expensive.  I would buy a pack for sure if it was anywhere near reasonable!

 

 

Moving

Along with my beloved Zumba classes, I am now doing Sh’bam classes at the local gym and LOVING them!  I love an exercise class where it feels more like fun than hard work and this certainly fits the bill!  Looking forward to shifting some of those covid kilos through dance!

vegeree2

Tomorrow is a public holiday here to celebrate Labour Day.  I will be celebrating the introduction of the 8-hour workday with a sleep in, a trip to the gym and some baking which hopefully will feature here shortly!

Have a wonderful week!


Signature2

 

A Murder on The Orient Express Collab

All aboard!  Welcome friends to a cooking and murder collab between Silver Screen Suppers and Retro Food For Modern Times.   Jenny and I have been tallking about doing this literally for months!  I am breaking my usual Dining with the Dame Format to cook recipes by the stars of the 1974 version of Murder on The Orient Express and half a world away in London Jenny is doing the same.  Jenny provided the recipes and we agreed to watch the film on the same day!

Murder on the Orient Express1

Murder on The Orient Express 1974 – The Film

As with the Kenneth Brannagh 2017 film, the 1974 version of Murder on the Orient Express is a star-studded affair!  The rather schlocky trailer describes it as the “Who’s who in the whodunnit”.

Albert Finney stars as Poirot  Agatha Christie herself gave Albert the thumbs up in his portrayal of Poirot.  (He was excellent, and his denouement at the end is amazing – he had to learn 8 pages of script off by heart to do it – but for me, David Suchet is, and will only ever be, the true Poirot).

Others in the cast include Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Bergman, Jacqueline Bisset, Sean Connery, Sir John Gielgud, Anthony Perkins, Vanessa Redgrave and Michael York to name but a few!   Ingrid Bergman won an Oscar as best supporting actress for her role in this.  Albert Finney was nominated but missed out to Art Carney from Harry and Tonto.

The film follows the story of the Agatha Christie novel with the luxurious Orient Express train stuck in a snow bank with no one being able to get on or off the train.  One of the guests is stabbed to death in the night.  It is up to Hercule Poirot to discover whodunnit!.  He soon learns that the victim is connected to the kidnapping of Daisy Armstrong 5 years before.  And the group of seemingly disparate strangers on the train may not be all they seem!

The stroy is based on two true events, the first being the very famous kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby i n 1932, the second was an incident when the Orient Express was trapped for 6 days in a blizzard in Turkey in 1929.

But now, we would like you to head over to the buffet car to sample today’s menu,

The Menu

Trout in Cream Saice

For your dining pleasure on today’s journey from Istanbul to Caiais, we are delighted to be serving Trout with Cream Sauce, a recipe by Ms Ingrid Bergman.

Murder on the Orient Express2

This was delicious!  Trout is such a delicate fish and the lemony cream sauce was a perfect accompaniment to it.  I served mine with chips (very un Orient Express), beans, broccolini and some cherry tomatoes.  It was also incredibly easy to make!!! Without the chips, it is an elegant and light dish which would be worthy of the Orient Express!

The whole time I was making the trout I was singing the Billy Bragg  / Wilco song :

Ingrid Bergman, Ingrid Bergman
Let’s go make a picture
On the island of Stromboli
Ingrid Bergman
And I deft anyone who knows this song to do otherwise!

Ingrid Bergman Trout (1)

Ingrid Bergman plays Greta Ohlsson in the film and she won the Academy Award for best-supporting actress for her role. I would give her an Oscar for that trout recipe because it was chef’s kiss mwah!!!

Prune Fool Syllabub

To end your meal, we are serving  Prune Fool by Ms. Wendy Hiller.   Wendy plays Princess Dragomiroff  in Murder. I feel that the Prune Fool, despite its name has the hint of gravitas equal to such a grand dame!

Murder on the Orient Express3

I LOVED the Prune Fool!  The prunes and currants (I didn’t have sultanas in the red wine combined beautifully with the cream and shortbread.  Eating this made me feel like a grownup.  for something that is so simple to make, the end result is sophisticated.

I feel both of these dishes would meet Poirot’s approval!

Just as an aside, it appears as if, whilst on the Orient Express, Poirot has eschewed his normal tisanes and sirops for a little glass of…creme de menthe? Drunk via a straw no less.

Murder on the Orient Express4

But, I digress, back to the Prune Fool.  Murder on the Orient Express5
I know I am biased but how pretty is it?

Here’s the recipe:

Wendy Hiller Prune Fool (2)

 

Cooking for this was so fun!  I loved the film as well!  And it is always fun to have a shared project.  Thank you Jenny for the recipes and for joining in particularly on one of the big hitters like Murder on The Orient Express.  (Let’s not wait 6 months before we do another!!!)  And if anyone else would like to Dine with the Dame and me, please let me know!!!

If you would like to see what Jenny cooked and how she celebrated Murder Sunday, head over to Silver Screen Suppers for a look!

I’ll be back next week with a more traditional version of Dining with the Dame – Murder on the Orient Express 2 (Electric Boogaloo).

Have a great week and happy watching!

Signature2

 

 

A Rosemary’s Baby Collab – Satan and Silver Screens

Mr. Castevet came in, holding in both hands a small tray on which four cocktail glasses ran over with clear pink liquid. “Mr. Woodhouse? A Vodka Blush. Have you ever tasted one? They’re very popular in Australia,” Mr. Castevet said. He took the final glass and raised it to Rosemary and Guy. “To our guests,” he said. “Welcome to our home.”

The Vodka Blushes were tart and very good.

The above quote comes from the novel of Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin.  Roman Polanski turned the novel into a classic horror film of the same name in 1968.  Here’s me joining in the toast with Rosemary, Guy and their neighbours, The Castavets. Unfortunately,  due to lockdown rules, I can’t welcome anyone into my home at the moment.  But I can toast absent friends.  So when I raised my glass, not only was it to join in the fun of the movie, but also to Jenny of Silver Screen Suppers because, despite being many miles apart we are doing a recipe collab around Rosemary’s Baby!

Vodka Blush

Rosemary's Baby Collab

 

Opening Credits – The Vodka Blush

The film opens with an unseen woman singing what sounds like a creepy lullaby over city street noise and these gorgeous hot pink credits!  Believe me when I say that there is barely a second of this film that has not been poured over by film critic and fan alike – even the credits have been their own article!

I chose to begin my Collab with the paler pink of a vodka blush and utterly agree with the phrase that they were tart and very good!  Sweet / sour is one of my favourite flavour profiles so the Vodka Blush suited my tastes perfectly!  And it was so pretty as well.  I added a little sprig of Rosemary to mine for obvious reasons!

Vodka Blush2

You can find the recipe for a vodka blush here.  It is really easy to make – just three ingredients!

Act Two – Rosemary’s Baby Plot And Mia Farrow’s Yoghurt Gazpacho

Rosemary’s Baby centres around a young couple, Rosemary and Guy Woodhouse (played by John Cassavetes and Mia Farrow) who we initially meet searching for a new apartment in New York.  They decide to rent an apartment in the Bramford building despite it having a dark past.  They move in and Rosemary sets about decorating the apartment. (For an in-depth description of the inside of the apartment, click here). 

Guy and Rosemary meet their neighbours, an older couple, The Castevet’s who invite them round for dinner and vodka blushes.  Despite being initially reluctant to go, Guy hits it off with Roman Castevets and starts spending more time with him.   Rosemary has no such feelings about Minnie Castevets and even though you can tell she is too polite to say so, is annoyed when Minnie and friend pop over unannounced.  Minnie gives Rosemary Terry’s pendant, a supposed good luck charm containing a stinky substance called “tannis root”. 

Guy who had been up until then a bit part actor lands a leading role when the man who was going have the lead goes blind.  Buoyed by his good fortune Guy and Rosemary go full steam ahead with their plans to start a family.  On the night Rosemary is ovulating, the couple are having a romantic dinner when Minnie brings over some “Chocolate mouse”.  Rosemary eats very little of it but almost immediately starts to feel very ill and passes out. 

During this time she has a “dream” in which she is a raped by a demon while Guy, the Castevets and their friends watch on.  She wakes up covered in scratches.  Guy laughs off her concern saying he didn’t want to miss out on baby-making night (this scene is so gross and really cements out view of Guy as a self-centred narcissist not to mention rapist!).  

Shortly thereafter Rosemary discovers she is pregnant and here her nightmare begins.  Her pregnancy is not easy – she is losing weight and in constant pain.  Rosemary then comes to believe that the building is the home to a coven of witches lead by Roman Castevets. She becomes increasingly suspicious of Guy wondering if he is also in league with them. 

Rosemary tries to run away but Guy and Doctor Sappirstein track her down.  They return to the apartment and she goes into labour.  When she awakes she is told that the baby was stillborn.  However, over the following days she starts to hear a baby crying in the Casavet’s apartment.  She picks up a knife and sneaks into the apartment to find Guy, the Castevets and other members of the coven gathered around a bassinet over which hangs an inverted cross.  Guy confesses that in return for fame he gave the child to Satan who is, in fact, the baby’s father.  

Through all of this Mia Farrow as Rosemary is luminous.  She is so beautiful (even when she is meant to be looking gaunt and ill) and her clothing throughout is pitch-perfect!  More on the clothes can be found here.  

Also pitch-perfect is the recipe Jenny sent me for Mia Farrow’s yoghurt gazpacho!  I adore Gazpacho but had never tried one with yoghurt before.  It was delicious.  So refreshing and would be perfect for a hot summer’s day.  The gazpacho is so tasty and the yoghurt so soothing that I made it again a few days later when I had a stomach ache!  Confession – I ate so much of the gazpacho I could barely eat the second course!  But that just meant more leftovers.  Also, the recipe calls for parsley which I added for the OG version.  The second time I made it, I only had basil so I added that instead.  It changed the flavour but was also delicious!  

Yoghurt Gazpacho

 

The Final Act – John Cassavetes Minted Meatballs and Spooky Tales about Rosemary Baby

Jenny also sent me the recipe for John Cassavetes Minted Meatballs.  Before we get to them, you cannot believe the problems I have had writing Cassavetes and Castevets in the same post.  I don’t think I have written it correctly ONCE.  

I was quite prepared to hate these meatballs based solely on the fact that John Cassavetes character in Rosemary Baby’s is such a tremendous arsehole.  I’ll hand it to him though.  The meatballs were good.  I ate mine on cheesy bread.  I had filled myself up on three glasses of the gazpacho by the time I got to the meatballs so I only ate two on the night but they heated up really well for lunch during the week. John Cassavetes Minted Meatballs

The mint was really tasty in these.  I am thinking that the next time I make these, I will use lamb instead of beef because mint and lamb go so well together.  What I liked best about these meatballs though was, as they cooked, the grains of rice started to poke out, making them look like little spiky sea urchins in a sea of to tomato sauce!

Minted Meatballs 2

And now here are some weird facts about Rosemary’s Baby – which has been called ” the most cursed hit movie ever made”.

  • Krzysztof Komeda, the composer fell off a cliff at a party and suffered terrible head injuries.  He was in a coma for four months before passing away (incidentally the same fate that befalls Rosemary’s friend Hutch in the film).
  • The year after the release of Rosemary’s Baby, Roman Polanski’s pregnant wife Sharon Tate was murdered by members of the Manson family. 
  • The Manson Family wrote “Helter Skelter”‘ in blood on the walls of the Tate crime scene.
  • Helter Skelter is a song off The Beatles The White Album.  Mia Farrow was in attendance for at least part of the recording of the White Album.  The Beatles song Dear Prudence is about her sister. 
  • The Bramford Building is, in reality, the Dakota Building.  MArk Chapman shot John Lennon to death outside this same building on 8 December 1980.

Little bit spooky no?

Huge thanks to Jenny for the recipes and for joining in !!! It is always nice to collab on something and this one was well and truly a breath of fresh air during lockdown!  You can read about her experiences with Rosemary’s Baby here!  Oh, and I hope she won’t mind me sharing this photo which was of Jenny doing her Vincent Price impersonation.  I will always think of it as the Rosemary’s Baby picture now! 

 

Have a great week and stay safe!

 

 

 

Bridget Jones’s Salmon

Hello friends! I made Bridget Jones’s Salmon as a nod to our latest film club event.  We are continuing to meet through iso.  Only now we meet via Zoom. It is a nice way to catch up and see each other. And  I am running out of things to watch so having a film club choice is always good!!!   Last meeting was my choice and the random category I drew was Rom-Com.   Now I am not a big fan of said genre so it actually threw me into a bit of a panic!

Bridget Jones Salmon 1

My first and initially only choice was Two Days in Paris, which is a film I absolutely love!  Plus I thought, by having a couple that are together at the start,  it subverts the whole boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl which is one of the things I find so formulaic and boring in most rom-coms.  Plus, you know…

Paris 😍

And Adam Goldberg 😍😍

And Julie Delpy 😍😍😍

Have you seen it?  It hits so many of the things I love  I feel like the makers tapped deep within my psyche to find all that was good.  And then turned it into a movie!

Turns out though that 2DIP is not currently available on any of the streaming services or for rental on the Googs, or YouTube.  And of course, my fine upstanding friends and I would never stoop to illegally downloading films (🙄) so as a choice it was null and void.  Which left me here…

Until I remembered Bridget Jones!  I loved the book and the film!  I was a bit worried though because I thought at half of film club would hate it.  But, even though parts of it have dated horribly, everyone really enjoyed it.  There is something about living in iso that I think makes people crave the familiar and watching Bridge was like wrapping myself in a warm and comforting blanket!

If you are looking for entertainment, I can heartily endorse you watching Bridget Jones Diary.  It was the perfect antidote to the bad news and gloom of the daily news.

I can also heartily recommend Yotam Ottolenghi’s Bridget Jones’s Salmon!

In the spirit of not going out to buy items I did not have and not wasting ingredients I do have I made two substitutions to the original recipe in my version:

  • I had no celery so I  left it out altogether
  • I had no currants so I subbed in some barberries I found in the back of the cupboard.  And yes, I am the weirdo that has barberries in the back of their cupboard.  I am actually very sad because the little shop I used to buy them from has closed.  I am treating the ones I have left like gold until I can find somewhere else that sells them!

Bridget Jones Salmon 2

When Life Give You Lemons…

So, in response to the virus and a big drop in revenue, my work has cut hours for most people.  So as of now, I am working four days a week.  I feel absolutely no rancour in relation to this decision which I honestly think was done to save jobs.  It sucks because I am one of those lucky people who actually love what they do, and I was actually had more work to do in response to the changing conditions.

Bridget Jones Salmon 3

But my loss sweet readers is your gain because I have been wanting to post more on here for ages. Having that one extra day where I am not working means I will have more time to spend doing this.  I also am in the process of making list of all those things I said I would do “if only I had the time”  and I am going to get cracking on that.  I fully intend to make my additional day off a blessing and not a curse!

Stay safe, stay indoors and take care.  And let me know what Rom-com you would have chosen!