Californication Dinner

As we watch the final episodes of Californication, the biggest question is… will Hank and Karen end up together??!?  Oh, and what will we eat!?

This was a tough one folks.  Since this show is about David Duchovny's on and off again relationship with Karen… and sex, drugs, and alcohol, it wasn't easy to come up with a menu,  let alone an appropriate one.  I think we toe the line admirably.

The dinner consists of New York Strip Steak, Marcy's Lobster, Runkel's Noodle Kugel, The Hank Moody Cocktail, and Sex in a Pan.

New York Strip Steak
Tim sprinkled Lawry's seasoning and some butter over the steaks. 

Marcy's Lobster

Ingredients:
2 Lobster tails
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of pepper
1/4 cup of olive oil

Directions:
1. Combine salt, pepper, and olive oil in pot of water
2. Bring to a boil
3. Drop lobsters in until red. 

Runkel's Noodle Kugel
Found the recipe here.

Ingredients:
10 cloves of garlic
Olive oil
16oz of egg noodles
1/3 cup of vegetable oil
4 eggs
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of pepper 
1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 250 degrees.
2. Peel garlic and drizzle with olive oil
3. Cook for 15 minutes 
4. Meanwhile, cook egg noodles until tender (8 minutes)
5. Drain noodles and toss with vegetable oil.
6. When garlic is done, mash garlic.
7. Increase oven heat to 350 degrees.
8. In a large bowl, beat eggs, salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper. 
9. Add garlic, then noodles.  Mix thoroughly.
10. Put in a cupcake tin and bake for one hour. 

The Hank Moody Cocktail
Found a recipe here and adapted it. 

Ingredients:
2 oz of tequila
1/4 cup of frozen mango
1/4 cup of frozen pineapple
Brown Sugar
1/4 oz of agave nectar
1/4 oz of grenadine
1/4 oz of lime juice

Directions:
1. Rim the glass with brown sugar
2. Mix all ingredients over ice in shaker
3. Pour with strainer

Serves one. 

Sex in a Pan
Adapted this recipe.

Ingredients:
1 cup of pecans, chopped
3 Tablespoons of white sugar
1/2 cup of butter
1 cup of flour
8 oz of cream cheese
1 cup of powdered sugar
8oz of cool whip
1 package of instant vanilla pudding (5.1oz)
5 cups of milk
1 package of instant chocolate pudding (3.9oz)
1/2 chocolate chips

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Spray 9x13 pan with cooking spray.
3. In your blender, combine, pecans, white sugar, butter, and flour.  Brush mixture in the pan and press mixture into the pan.  
4. Bake for 20 minutes
5. Prepare the vanilla pudding: combine instant mix and 3 cups of milk and let it sit for 5 minutes until firm.
6. Prepare the chocolate pudding: combine instant mix and 2 cups of milk and let it sit for 5 minutes until firm.
7. In a mix, combine cream cheese, powdered sugar, and 1 cup of cool whip. 
8. Let the crust cool and spread the cream cheese layer on top.  Then add the chocolate pudding layer.  After that, add the vanilla layer.  Top it off with the remainder of the cool whip and the chocolate chips.
9. Refrigerate overnight. 

Cheers Hank! It's been real!

Interested in this?  Check out our other TV show inspired dinners: Breaking Bad and Parks and Rec!

The Lorax Dinner

For Earth day we did a Lorax themed dinner!  

For our meal we had Seuss Pasta, Humming Fish, Brown Barbaloot Snacks, Truffula Seeds, Mango Orange Sunrise, and Truffula Tree Cupcake. 

Seuss's Whimsical Pasta: Got the idea from this site!
Ingredients:
15oz of pasta
Yellow, Pink, Orange and Blue food coloring
Alfredo Sauce
1/2 bundle of Broccoli
1/2 bundle of Asparagus
1/4 cup of butter
5 teaspoons of salt, separated
2 Chicken Fillets 

Directions:
1. Cut up chicken and begin cooking over medium heat with one teaspoon of salt and olive oil. Stir occasionally until golden brown. 
2. Cup up broccoli and asparagus.
3. Heat butter until melted add broccoli, asparagus and 1 teaspoon of salt. Cook for 5-8 minutes (until desired tenderness), Set aside
4. Fill three pots 3/4 full with water.  Add in 1 teaspoon of salt in each pot along with 4-5 drops of a either yellow, pink, or orange.  (each pot is a different color)
5. Once water begins to boil, divide 3 ways and distribute between the pots. Cook for 7 minutes.  It looks really cool BTW.

6. Pour 15oz jar of Alfredo sauce in a bowl and add 6 drops of blue food coloring.
7. Combine chicken, all three colors of pasta, broccoli and asparagus.  
8. Drizzle blue Alfredo sauce over the pasta to look like a river!

Brown Barbaloot Snacks
A mixture of Thin Mints, Teddy Grahams, and Marshmallow

Humming Fish
(just Goldfish crackers)

Truffula Seeds 
(just skittles)

Mango Orange Sunrise (liquored up this version)
Ingredients:
2 Mangos
4 Oranges 
4oz Rum

Truffula Tree Cupcake: 
http://www.meettheshannons.net/2012/03/cupcakes-unofficially-inspired-by-lorax.html
I was really nervous to make these but I thought they turned out great!!!!

I got the idea for this on Pinterest where they used cotton candy but oddly enough, it was pretty hard to find cotton candy… so we had to improvise.  We dyed cotton balls different colors instead- obviously just for looks!  Also, the recipe was vegan so I used different recipes..

Truffula Fluff
Ingredients:
Cotton Balls
2 drops of gel magenta food coloring
1/2 of water

Directions:
1. Combine water and food coloring in a small bowl.
2. Dunk all of the cotton balls in two at a time for 5 seconds.
3. Let dry on a plate for three hours- sporadically blotting with a paper towel.
4. After it has sat for a while, begin to pull apart and fluff out and let sit overnight to dry. 


Cupcake (I found a chocolate cupcake recipe here and adapted it but any recipe will do)
Ingredients:
1/2 a box of devils food cake mix about 7.5 oz
3.9 oz box of dry instant chocolate pudding mix
1/2 cup of chocolate chips
2 eggs
1/3 cup of canola oil
1/3 cup of hot water
4oz sour cream 

Directions: 
1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees
2. In your kitchen aid mixer, combine cake mix, pudding, and chips.
3. Then stir in eggs, oil, and water.
4. Last add the sour cream.  
5. Scoop into the cupcake liners about 3/4 full
6. Bake for about 25 minutes until the top of the cupcake has some bounce to it. 

Frosting (I adapted this recipe)
Ingredients: 
1/2 cup of unsalted butter, softened
4oz of cream cheese, softened
3/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon of pure mint extract
Green Food Coloring 
2 cups confectioners' sugar

Directions:
1. In an electric mixer, whip the butter until creamy
2. Add in cream cheese, vanilla, and mint extract until combined.
3. Add in 5 drops of food coloring
4. Slowly add in 2 cups of confectioners' sugar
5. Mix on medium until combined. 

Truffula Cupcake Directions: 
Once all parts are completed then assemble.
Pipe the frosting on the cupcake
Insert Chevron Stick in the center
Place Cotton Ball on the stick and ta-da!!

It was all really good!  And SO colorful!!! 

"Unless someone cares a whole awful lot, Nothing is going to get better.  It's not." - The Lorax, Dr. Seuss


Interested in this?  Check out our dinner for Groundhog Day!

Breaking Bad Dinner

After a few months of watching Breaking Bad, we are finally finishing it tonight! We had an excellent theme dinner AND we tried to make some of "Walt's Blue Sky" but it's actually supposed to be like rock candy. 

Our dinner was awesome!  

We had Los Pollos Hermanos Fried Chicken, Pepperoni Pizza on the Roof Dip, Funyuns, Breaking Bad Cocktail, Beaker Cookies, and Walt's Blue Sky.

Los Pollos Hermanos Fried Chicken

To save time, Tim went to Suds Hut and picked up some yummy, yummy broasted chicken.

Pizza on the Roof Dip
I adapted this recipe: http://modernmartha.com/2011/05/pepperoni-pizza-dip/

Ingredients:
4oz of cream cheese, softened
1 teaspoon of basil
1/4 cup of fat-free sour cream
1/4 cup of fat-free mayo
1 1/2 cup of mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup of parmesan cheese
1 cup of Ragu Homemade Style Pizza Sauce
Pepperoni

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven 350 degrees F
2. Mix cream cheese, basil, sour cream, mayo, 1 cup of the mozzarella cheese and 1/4 cup of the parmesan cheese
3. Spread mixture in the bottom of a casserole dish
4. Pour Pizza Sauce and spread it over cheese mixture.  
5. Top with remaining cheeses and pepperoni..
6. Bake for 20 minutes

We heated up some store bought garlic bread to go with it.

Jesse's Funyuns

Breaking Bad Margarita
Adapted this recipe: http://hostthetoast.com/breaking-bad-blue-margarita-with-blue-salt-and-blue-ice-chips/

Ingredients:
Water
8 drops of Blue Food Coloring
1/2 c. Salt 
2 oz. Tequila
1 oz. Triple Sec
1/2 a lime's juice  
1 oz. Blue Curacao
Lime Wedges

Directions:
1. Fill an ice cube tray with ice and 5 drops of blue food coloring.
2. Put in the freezer to make blue ice cubes
3. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F
4. In a sandwich bag, put in salt and the remaining three drops of blue food coloring
5. Shake it up, place on a baking sheet, and put in the oven
6. Let it bake off the moisture for 10 minutes 
7. Rub lime wedge around the rim of the glass and dip in the blue salt pan to coat the edges.
8. Put Tequila, Triple Sec, Lime Juice, and Blue Curacao. Garnish with a wedge. 

It was deadly and amazing!

Beaker Cookies

These are the same cookies that we used in our Toy Story 2 Dinner. It's a great recipe!  And then we had some fun decorating!

Walt's Blue Sky
I feel 75% bad and 25% hilarious for finding this recipe for dessert with a Frozen dinner.  Here is the recipe I found: http://doitandhow.com/2012/08/22/rock-candy/

Ingredients:
2 cups of water
1 cup of white corn syrup
3 1/2 cups of sugar
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
3 drops of blue gel food coloring

Directions: 
Bring mixture to a boil.  I poured it into a tray to cool…. however it didn't set up like a thought…….  I thought I knew what I was doing but it was just kind of a sticky icky mess…
Luckily I had white rock candy that I dipped in mixture of water and blue food coloring.  

Tim has the BluRay barrel set of the show he was eager to show off.

I also had to get one shot of Walt in his underwear..

Ben-Hur Dinner

For our Easter celebration, we went to Bozeman to celebrate with Tim's mom, Cindy!  YAY!!

We watched Ben-Hur and made a real solid effort at a traditional Seder meal.  

We did create a Seder plate for the picture of course!

For our meal we had Beitzah, Maror, Zeroah, Karpas, Chazeret, Charoset, Matzah, Dates and Manischewitz wine.  I will explain each item individually!

Beitzah is a hard-boiled egg.  The egg symbolizes mourning and renewal.  It is hard-boiled to represent how slavery strengthened the Jewish people. 

Cindy's trick is to add the eggs to water and then put on the stove to boil.  Once boiling, turn the heat off and cover the eggs for 24 minutes.  Then transfer the eggs to cold water, but make sure it stays cold!

Maror is a bitter herb.  We used horseradish and is a symbol of the bitterness of life in slavery. 

Zeroah (Z'roa) is a roasted lamb shank bone.  This is used to represent the ancient sacrifice and the mark made with lamb's blood on the Jewish slaves' doorposts.  We made an herb roasted lamb dish to symbolize this.

Ingredients:

4 garlic cloves

1 tablespoon of fresh thyme

1 tablespoon of fresh rosemary

2 teaspoons of kosher salt

2 tablespoons of olive oil, divided

4 lamb chops

Directions:

Mix garlic, thyme, rosemary, salt and 1 tablespoon in a large bowl. 

Add lamb and marinate for thirty minutes

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a large skillet

Add lamb until browned about three minutes per side

Transfer skillet to oven to roast lamb chops for 10 minutes

Let rest for five minutes

Karpas is a green herb,  we used parsley dipped in salt water, to represent the tears of the slaves.

Chazeret, like Maror, is used to symbolize the bitterness of life.  We are using romaine lettuce.

Charoset is a mixture of chopped apples, nuts, wine, and cinnamon.  This is used to symbolize the mortar that the Israelites used to build the pyramids and the sweetness of their freedom.  I found and adapted this recipe: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/Traditional-Apple-Walnut-Charoset-234298

Ingredients:

3 Apples

1 tablespoon of brown sugar

1 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon

1 cup of walnuts

1/2 cup of Manischewitz

Directions:

Core, peel, and cube apples

Add all ingredients in a bowl and stir

Matzah/Matzo bread is unleavened bread.
Using the Matzah bread, which is more like a cracker, you can make a Hillel Sandwich.  Hillel the Rabbi created the original sandwich. (Earl of Sandwich was around much later! The more you know!)   He used Matzah bread, Charoset, Maror, and Chazeret.  It's a good way to incorporate these items into your meal and surprisingly it tastes pretty good!!!

Manischewitz wine

We bought some pitted dates to eat as dessert.  

It was a very tasty meal!   Happy Easter!