My Big Fat Greek Wedding

• The Film: My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002)
• The Date: Saturday, 2/16/2013
• The Feast: Greek food! Homemade and Zorba's!



WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DON'T EAT NO MEAT!?

Ah, that's okay. I make lamb.

This, by far, is our favorite, most meaningful romantic comedy. The movie came out the year we started dating, and at the time completely represented our relationship. We came together at a time in our lives when we were moving out of insecurities and into being young adults. We were supportive and nurturing of each other, but our families couldn't be more different. My (comparatively quiet) family (Polish) seemed to be shrinking and spreading thin, his family was gigantic (Indian) and seemed to only be getting bigger and louder. True, my family was pretty religious, but no where in my house could you find anything like the shrine(s) that exist all over his family's house. Neither of us really had the flamboyant nationalist pride exhibited by Toula's family, but there certainly were light-hearted conversations about India and Hinduism being around far longer than Poland or America and Catholicism.

Meanwhile, we were all too ready for Greek fest. We made slow-cooked chicken shawarma in pitas with hummus, tzatziki, cucumber, tomato, and feta. The hummus was home made, as was the baba ghanoush. For the purpose of saving time, we ordered in spanokopita and dolmathes as well as a baklava dessert from Zorba's (sadly not Dancing Zorba's as in the movie, but Zorba's was close enough).


• chicken shawarma (very loosely based on / inspired by this recipe)
• the best hummus ever
• pretty awesome baba ghanoush
• Spanokopita (3 per order) – Sautéed spinach and moist feta wrapped in light layers of filo dough. Baked until crispy. ($5.25)
• Dolmathes (6 per order) – Grapevine leaves stuffed with rice, ground beef, tomatoes and secret family spices. ($7.99)
• Baklava – Layers of filo dough and crushed walnuts soaked in rosewater and honey, topped with cinnamon. A classic Greek dessert. ($2.50)

As for the beverages, I drank water for the first half of the movie, and then with dessert I had some of that Thorin's Viking Mead left over from the bottle we took home from the Hobbit Feast in December. Still fantastic. He had a little of that, but he had started the evening with a bit of chocolate stout, and with his meal he had picked up a growler of Anchor Steam beer from the bar at Whole Foods.

This was actually something we thought about doing for Valentine's Day, but we went out to eat instead. Then it was going to be something we were going to do on Friday night, but being Lent, we opted to bake fish instead, and to do Greek feast on a day when we could enjoy some great marinated chicken. Because of the cultural significance in the movie, I really wanted to order lamb as well, but I knew we would be far too stuffed for that and never even brought it up. We were practically vibrating with excitement all day, regardless.

Great second iteration of Our Drafthouse!

xo 

January 2013 Wrap

Well that's a wrap for January!

Cypress Grill takeout was a real hit with our showing of the Rescuers! We ate so fast that we weren't even out of New York yet when we finished our Louisiana food! By the time we were in the Bayou, we were already stuffed and sipping on our beverages (yes, I did make the cocktail, but I skipped the vodka and used club soda). And there was chamomile tea with our delicious bread pudding. I'm so glad we did the takeout, because on short notice it really helped with the authenticity of the experience.

We were enjoying ourselves so much that we went ahead and continued by watching The Rescuers Down Under! So our very first drafthouse night was a Disney Double Feature! Amazing what 13 years can do for film quality, with the bright and beautiful lighting, coloring, and linework, the introduction of some 3d elements, and the tighter pacing of the story. And damn I love that eagle. I still can totally feel it when the boy gets thrown off the cliff, plummeting to his would-be death, and then the eagle dives down to rescue him. I forgot that was in the very beginning, and what an opener! Instantaneous love. The Rescuers is great, but it's definitely old-fashioned, which I totally enjoy and it has its place, but wow, Down Under is such a huge leap in the emotional, adventurous journey and spectrum of empathy presented. Love, love, love it. Totally brings me back to my childhood, feeling connected to nature and the idea that we can communicate with animals. Love the story, and the animation is beautiful of course.


See you at the next Drafthouse night!

xo

The Rescuers

• The Film: The Rescuers (1977)
• The Date: Friday, 1/25/13 at 8pm scratch that, RIGHT NOW.
• The Feast: Cypress Grill Takeout

This was a great Disney film from my childhood. I love the worldly Manhattan mice that go for an adventure down south to save a little girl. It has been forever since I've seen it, so I don't recall any particular foods the characters ate offhand, but the film is set first in New York and then in the Bayou, so it seemed appropriate to take dinner cues from (where else) The Bayou Restaurant in New York, ha!

Of course the first thing we imagined was crawfish. I'm a little funny about prepping my own, so I considered running over to our local Louisiana style eatery called Cypress Grill. We've been there once and liked it a lot. In fact I don't know why we haven't been back there. We both had the Crawfish Delight – Half Etouffée, half crispy battered crawfish tails, served with white rice. $13.99. It was really delicious.

After a few IMs back and forth, we decided that rather than cooking up our own food, for this first installation of Our Drafthouse, we would go ahead and order up some delicious dishes from the Grill. We also decided we couldn't wait to do this tomorrow just to make it a Friday night date.

So it's tonight, a Thursday date, 1/24/13 at 8pm. Pickup at the Grill is at 7:20. We have ordered the following:

• Crawfish Eggrolls – Our signature starter! Tender crawfish tails, cheddar jack and zesty jalapenos in a crispy egg roll wrapper, served with our homemade chipotle ranch. ($8.99)
• Creole Blackened Catfish – Fillet of domestic catfish, seasoned with our blackening seasoning and seared on a hot skillet and topped with Gulf shrimp in our zesty Creole sauce, served over dirty rice with a choice of one side. Which, for us, will be Fried Okra. And Garlic Bread. Yum. ($13.99)
• Bread Pudding – Uncomplicated bliss served with bourbon sauce. ($5.49)

As for beverages, I'm going to see if I can whip up a cheap version of Bobby Flay's Raspberry Basil Limoncello Cocktail using the ingredients currently in my kitchen. The real deal calls for raspberries (I have frozen), basil (I have fresh), a lemon (I have juice), simple syrup (I can boil some up really quick), Limoncello (I have some from a party several months ago, think it's still good? LOL), vodka (I do have some unopened that I won at a Halloween costume party last year – I attended as Leslie Knope 2012), ice (duh), and sparkling rose wine (I don't think I have any, but I probably have some club soda that could work fine). As an alternative, we do have one or two bottles left of Blackberry Pear Fox Barrel Cider, which would probably be just as good if not better, and not as boozy. That's probably the way to go, children's movie and all. ;)

Sooo excited...

xo

Our Own Private Alamo Drafthouse!

It begins..

"Should we go to the Alamo Drafthouse this weekend?"
"What's out?"
"Nothing.. well there's that awesome-looking Back To The Future marathon on Sunday at 4pm."
"All three movies? I love BTTF, and I love the Alamo events, but three movies back to back is a long time, especially on a Sunday night."
"Hmm. What if we make our own Drafthous-esque Feast Night at home?"
"Oh @&$^%# yea. We're doing that."

..like this.

I am so excited to start this at home movie night tradition. I think we should shoot for 1-2 times per month and see how it goes, taking turns picking movies and creating a relative-themed menu for the evening.

Stoked!

xo