Fancy Dinner and a Movie

Any celebration with my family or friends always involves food. The food ranges from big home cooked dinners, to vast quantities of take out, to giant piles of hors d'oeuvres to nibble on throughout the event. For us, there really is nothing better than sharing food with the people we love.

John and I have been having movie date nights recently, most of which have been spent watching the Lord of the Rings films. I have been reading the books, so it's been a lot of fun to watch the movies together and discuss all the ins and outs of putting such an epic tale to screen. For our most recent date night, we continued our Tolkien obsession and had a fancy dinner to start the date off right.

We picked up a smoked turkey leg, a Brie, and Ciabatta baguette for a fancy nibbly dinner.

I baked a brown sugar coated Brie for about 10 minutes in a 350°F oven. John made an oil and spice mixture for the bread, and toasted slices of it while the Brie cooked. We both cut pieces off the turkey leg and sampled as we did so. Then we grouped the food festively on a serving tray and were really excited to get eating.

 

We even made a salad to go with it, so we weren't just eating meat, cheese, and bread.

We paired our fancy dinner with The Hobbit: Extended Edition. It was hard to focus on the movie at first, as my mind was completely taken over by the Brie. Once we finished most of the food, we were able to pay more attention to the movie.

The movie was fantastic. We've seen the theatrical release about a thousand times already, and this version was even better. Most of the extended scenes added welcome back story, or more depth to the characters. The entire Rivendell sequence was greatly enhanced by the extra scenes, some of which were really important to the plot. The LOTR extended editions are miles above the original theatrical releases, and I'm glad to see The Hobbit is too.

Take Out Turkey Dinner #FoodPicFriday

To add to the festive week I've been having, my mother-in-law treated us to some turkey take out from The Kozy Kitchen in Elmvale. It's a small town greasy spoon type restaurant, full of comfort foods and home style cooking. As I love preparing a big homemade turkey dinner, I wasn't sure what the take out version would be like. All in all it was quite good. It didn't come with stuffing (what?!), but there was a whole heap of turkey (far more than I would normally eat, as my plate is usually loaded with too many sides to fit a lot of meat). The gravy had a nice light flavour and the potatoes were fresh and yummy. Even the peas and carrots tasted good!

NFLD French Fries

My sister-in-law is from Newfoundland and recently shared a photo of how french fries are sometimes served there: covered with stuffing and gravy. I'm always open to new toppings for french fries, and I had a feeling I would like this one (I love stuffing).

As I haven't made a turkey recently, I had no stuffing and gravy leftovers (but having said that, I usually don't, even when I do make a turkey). So I relied on my packaged friends to help me out. The gravy packet I bought was 'poutine', as this dish seemed poutine-esque.

We always make homemade french fries, as we are working away at 50lbs of farmer potatoes, and they are just so cheap and easy to make.

Next we prepared the stuffing and gravy.

And added it to the cooked fries.

And obviously it tasted amazing. This version was pretty salty, but that could be cured easily by making my own stuffing and gravy. Next time. Because, of course, I will have to try these again.

Everything is a Photo Opportunity #24

It's been a pretty festive week around here. I got the tree up on the weekend, and last night I spent the entire evening reading by the tree lights. We put an additional string of lights around the tv, so there was lots of ambient light to read by. The mellow light was really relaxing. To take this photo I used the "High Sensitivity" function on my camera so no flash was used. Festive!

Influx of Snowmen in the Living Room

The Christmas tree went up on December 1st and I decorated the house with the various winter/Christmas themed items I've collected over the years. Once everything was set out, I noticed that I have a snowman theme, as they dominate every free surface we have. I didn't intend to collect snowmen (most of these items were gifts), but these little dudes make me happy. They are always smiling!

And because we have a nice blanket of snow outside, I thought I'd showcase my snowmen chilling in the snow.

Snowman tea light

Tea light with snowman scene

Tea light with multiple snowmen

Snowman figurines

Snowman wine glasses

Snowman stocking

And last but not least, what would this season be like without the abominable snowman? This year Bumble is gaurding the candy dish, though he's doing a pretty bad job so far (we will need to refill it soon). Bumble is the only snowman I can happily say I picked up myself. I just love him.