So we had a themed movie dinner night last week. This is where I pick a movie to watch and then come up with some type of themed meal to go with it. Weird, yes, but it beats popping a bucket of KFC on the table and announcing that the grub is ready, for the third time this week. At least it is for us, I know others’ opinions on that subject might in contrary.
This last movie dinner night I went with Monty Python. A courageous and risky choice, yes, especially since we’d be viewing not just the Hollywood Bowl live show, but Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life, too. This was not the originally planned playbill, but when I went to pull the DVD’s out I discovered much to my surprise and dismay that I didn’t actually have a copy of Monty Python and the Holy Grail, my first choice. I was much puzzled and distressed, sure that someone dastardly had absconded with my copy of this beloved and silly classic. Then Mary reminded me that during the years we lived in San Diego, the local PBS station made it their habit to air the Holy Grail during pledge week, year after year, so there was never any need to buy a copy of the movie since I got to see it several times each year for frees. Now at least I got that DVD added to this year’s Christmas list where it will languish unfulfilled and I’ll get another three dozen pairs of socks.
Notwithstanding that, my back-up movie gave me a little bit of a problem in the themed dinner department. With the Holy Grail I could have gone with something vaguely medieval (as let’s face it, the movie is only vaguely medieval), like trenchers with roast mutton and mugs of mead. Well, faux mead, which you might refer to as beer, because really, who wants to drink an alcoholic beverage distilled from honey? Bleah. And yeah, probably roast lamb rather than mutton, because where are you going to get mutton in the middle of the U.S. of A? And Mary probably wouldn’t let me use trenchers either because they’d be leaking meat juices all over the carpet, so I’d have to use the FiestaWare. But it’s the thought that counts, right?
The Meaning of Life, though is a whole different kettle of fish. In the movie there are only two scenes that deal even indirectly with food. The first is a skit in a restaurant that is without a doubt one of the most tasteless, disgusting, revolting and incredibly funny things I’ve ever seen, but alas, totally unsuitable for meal ideas. The second scene is problematical also, involving as it does, the Grim Reaper and a dinner party that have all expired from consuming spoiled salmon mousse. Mainly because I don’t much care for salmon mousse. Therefore, I had to fall back on an old favorite, Grilled Chicken with Thai Red Curry Glaze and Vegetable Skewers. The very, very tenuous connection here is that the Thai Red Curry glaze was made with coconut milk, and coconuts feature prominently in the Holy Grail. If you have to ask how coconuts come to be such an important element in the movie, well, you’ll just have to rent or buy the movie and find out for yourself.
Movie Theme night was, after all was said and done, a big success, again. I got to see my favorite scene with the best movie line ever written, wherein the mill worker has to tell his astounding large brood of children that he’s been laid off from the mill and that he’s “going to have to sell them all for medical experiments”. Rumors that I myself wanted children only so I could use that line on them, are patently untrue. Possibly.