Lusciousity

Yes, luscious ones, this editor had a birthday today. I officially turned old (I’ve actually officially been turning old every birthday since my twenty-first, but this one seemed older than most. Well, all.) Fortunately and lusciously for me, I did not have to go it alone, but instead had Daniel, Diego, and Frida by my side to celebrate. Daniel got the day started off right with a multi-lingual serendade of happy birthday tunes, and advised me that I was allowed to take the entire day off from doing anything. Alas, my Melvile syllabus begged to differ, so I swung by Starbucks and headed to the library. It’s incredibly dorky to admit this, but I actually enjoy having a couple of hours to devote to traipsing through Ishmael’s slightly kooky pronouncements about the white whale and the human condition. Today, I had real motivation to concentrate, because I knew that a fabulous evening awaited in which I would want to think about Melville not at all. Tonight, Frida and Diego hosted us for a luscious birthday celebration. Celebrate we did, conquering two delicious broccoli, mozzarella, and olive pizzas fire roasted to perfection, a couple bottles of red wine (including one whose label I have always loved, with lady bugs running up and down), and a rich, gooey chocolate cake, petite and perfect to split four ways for a responsibily decadent dessert, because indeed I am old and it is time to start being responsible, even about decadence. My cup truly ranneth over when I was presented with a couple of very luscious gifts, which you might get to see if I get ambitious with the digital camera in the weekend to come.

After our dinner al fresco, the Wild Bunch relocated to the Parker Playhouse for the opening film of the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival (FLIFF, if you are in the know like that): Pedro Almovodar’s latest, Volver. The lusciousity factor of the evening threatened to take a turn for the worse as we arrived to be nearly turned away, as apparently they had oversold the theatre by a good 40-50 tickets. (Well, maybe only 20-30, but that is too many. And there was this brassy red headed cop lady who seemed to want to let everyone know that they weren’t getting in.) The FLIFF gods stayed with us though, and we even managed to find seats together. What we saw was definitely worth the slight stress. Where to begin? An ensemble of strong actresses in compelling roles, led by the luscious Penelope Cruz. A story of mothers and daughters in rural Spain that combines grief and regret with laugh out loud humor.  A haunting flamenco melody belted out in the midst of a mojito fueled party that you wish wasn’t fiction, because you wish you could go to it. Yeah, this one has everything, and it seems like it’s got enough critical mojo to get it to a theatre at least decently near you in the next couple of months if you would like to check it out.

All in all, quite a luscious way to spend a birthday, brought to me by the terrific people in my life. I am so spoiled sometimes… but I like to think that part of lusciousity is being able to enjoy the things the people do for you while taking notes so that you can give back just as much. Goodness me, it’s not over yet! There’s also an Anne of Green Gables inspired tea party planned for Sunday, which will put Snickerdoodle’s gift basket (the one that got October off to an early start) to use. I am feeling the love. Maybe this whole old thing won’t turn out to be so bad after all.

Two of my regularly checked online mags have recently felt the need to run pieces in which the authors come to defense of the much maligned Rachel Ray. Not that she needs anyone’s defense; as both articles point out, she’s on track to be the next Oprah thanks to her knack for cooking up economical and clutz-safe meals in 30 minutes. If you’re following, these articles announce the arrival of the RR backlash-backlash, in which we all stop being snobs (well, some of us never really started as our idea of an intense meal is anything involving using the food processor) and embrace the multi-tasked nutritional habits of Ms. Ray. I had not had that much personal experience with her work, so, this morning, to tempt myself onto the treadmill, I decided to time my workout to coincide with today’s episode of 30 Minutes Meals on the Food Network. The theme of the day was ballpark food, so the menu was Rueben sandwiches, sauerkraut, and paprika onion rings. (I’d give you the link, but the Food Network website is being funky.) I will be the first to admit that I have never had a successful encounter with sauerkraut, so I wasn’t too pumped about this round-up. Then again, by the time she got to the part where she added the juicy kielbasa to the swiss cheese and rye bread and letting those fresh onion rings cool off on a nearby plate, I was ready to give the stuff a second chance just to give this meal try. Did we? No. But now that the weather’s cooling down I may just be looking up a few RR creations to try in my very own tiny kitchen. Cause this stuff looked yummy, and one thing she definitely gets right is that a little time spent in the preparation can have a big pay off in the satisfaction department, which is the beginning of lusciousity. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Brownies were not a food that I had much acquaintance with as a child. You see, I was allergic to milk, so most things that contained chocolate were off the menu. This made for many awkward afternoons in the first grade forcing hapless moms to check the ingredient list on the cupcakes they had picked up at the Felpausch for their son or daughter’s class birthday party just to see if yours truly would deign to eat it. I’m sure I was a little obnoxious about it from time to time, but then again most first graders are not exactly subtle creatures. Also, I hated the ear infections that quickly resulted from consuming dairy products. By the second grade I had learned to politely pass on the birthday treats if there was any doubt as to their safe consumability. Somewhere along the line, my own mom tried to come up with dairy free alternatives for all the junk food staples, like vegan brownies, carob chip cookies, etc. These just plain tasted bad, so I never really missed the foods I couldn’t eat as I assumed I just wouldn’t like them.

This story has a happy ending, however, as I grew out of my allergy by the time I hit college, when I just happened to have the perfect group of friends to introduce me to the luscious wonders of dairy. There was the bagels and cream cheese in NYC visiting while visiting J, there was Snickerdoodle and her late night Brie, Daniel’s trips to the fromagerie in Paris, and our very own editor Steven is still fighting the good fight and urging me to just try drinking a glass of straight milk.

All of this brings me to The Brownies. The following brownie recipe was one of the few good things to emerge from our time working at the Online University Which Shall Not Be Named. I’m thinking of them today becauuse we made a batch to take down to the in-law’s for a Saturday afternoon ice cream brownie Sunday in lieu of the day’s third meal. V for Vendetta in the DVD player, brownie and ice cream in hand, life is good.

So, this recipe by Barbara Schmidt makes just about the yummiest straight chocolate brownies I have ever tasted. Have you ever had really good brownies, the kind that are still fudge in the middle and have surprising amounts of chocolate in them? This is the recipe for those brownies.

Barbara’s Brownies

 

2 Packaged Brownie Mix

     any of the following brands

Ghirardelli-double chocolate chip

Duncan Hines-double fudge

Hershey’s-triple chunk

 

Add what ever the mix calls for and then add the following:

 

2 heaping tablespoons of Smuckers, Special recipe Hot Fudge

¼ pkg. Ghirardelli semi sweet chocolate chips

¼ pkg. Ghirardelli double chocolate chips

Put into a  pan & sprinkle  the top with ¼ pkg of each of the chips

Bake at 25 degrees less the called for on the package

Bake for at least 10 min. longer then called for

Check with knife inserted in center, should be slightly

underdone not completely set.

 

Cool before cutting.

And please make sure you follow this last direction to the letter: 

DON’T WEIGH YOURSELF FOR AT LEAST A WEEK

Today, salon.com posted this article discussing our current “golden age” of television. It’s a fine insight into TV today, showing that it isn’t doomed to be cinema’s dumb younger brother. In fact, it has advantages over films, like the fact that 22 hours of showtime per season allows for much more character development than 90-120 minutes.

After reading this, I became inspired to do something I haven’t done since I was in Florida enjoying the 5th season of Six Feet Under. I desperately want an indulgent marathon of TV on DVD. Since the character development is so great over two dozen episodes, why not watch them all at once? (Preferably with ice cream, pizza, and wine.) While the feeling you have the next day might not qualify as luscious, the marathon certainly will be. After all, this is just one of many luscious activities that are well worth the hangover.