Rhapsodies

My First Puff Pastry

by wpmorse on November 14, 2014 at 9:01 am

Posted In: Test

Mushroompastrey2014-11-13-20.46

I’ve been trying to do more recipe’s lately mainly because even going to the cheapest restaurants add up quickly and to the other extreme while living on frozen chicken is technically a good diet it’s not what I’d call a great diet.

So I’ve been making a point of trying something interesting at least once a week as a way to improve my skills as well as I’ve found it’s easier to stock you refrigerator when your list is based around some sort of strategy as opposed to the usual impulse buys.

The challenge is to find something interesting while keeping things economical to spell that out one of my favorite shepherd’s pie recipe by Alton Brown calls for actual lamb, something I’ve yet to find for under eight dollars a pound in this town.

Anyway today I did Flaky Mushroom Pastries from the webpage Food Through The Pages a site that hypothesizes the recipes for food mentioned in all the books we love. I decided to try this one because first I really enjoyed the Gentleman Bastards series it came from and second because I love mushrooms.

I’d been putting it off because of the puff pastry but I happened to stumble over it while shopping at Trader Joe’s for a good price and grabbed it. Puff Pastry is something I’ve been avoiding because it seems overly complex like working with explosives but ultimately fairly easy. Even when the instructions in the recipe are rather vague on the details. But once I got over the initial panic it turned out to be pretty idiot proof. All in all other than burning the bottom it turned out quite well.

└ Tags: cooking, Mushrooms, Pastry, Recipe

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Wednesday Double Feature

by wpmorse on November 12, 2014 at 8:34 am

Posted In: Test

For this week I turned to to some vintage Hollywood comedies.

I first heard of My Man Godfrey when Rhapsodies took it’s first step from the real world by making it the break out film of Zeppo Marx’s solo career having him take William Powell‘s place. I only chose it because it was released the year after Duck Soup.

In My Man Godfrey Carole Lombard plays a rich debutant who meets Godfrey, played by William Powell, a “forgotten man” in the middle of the depression, during a scavenger hunt. She hires him as her family’s butler and hilarity ensues. My Man Godfrey manages to balance slapstick with social commentary about class relations and the effects of the depression on the country including just how easy it was for the rich to lose it all.

Godfrey is debonair dignified and competent providing a wonderful contrast to the utterly insane household he finds himself working for. Even funnier is the wonderful crazy hyperactive performance Carole Lombard provides. But for all the slapstick it’s the more subtler humor I like, such as when both Lombard and her maid discover they are both in love with Godfrey.

I still find myself picturing Zeppo Marx kicking ass in the role.

I was planning to spend this review dedicated exclusively to screwball comedies but I realized after the fact that Sabrina, while certainly a romantic comedy, does not really fall into the definition of a screwball comedy. I have to say being a big fan of Billy Wilder‘s films that I had never gotten around to seeing Sabrina. It’s a sweet little romance involving Humphrey Bogart, Audrey Hepburn, and William Holden in a Love triangle between two millionaire brothers and the daughter of their chauffeur. It’s sweet and funny and I certainly enjoyed it, but…. this was not my favorite Wilder film, or Bogart film or Holden film having said that, it still had Holden and Bogart and it was done by Wilder. I think my problem was with that talent list I wanted more.

I think my biggest problem was the title character herself. Much as I could watch Audrey Hepburn all day I didn’t think they followed through with the girl who had vowed to take control of her life and seize opportunity. I was taken in when she gleefully trolls William Holden’s character after being gone for two years I was enjoying this mischeivous pixie but then all of a sudden she stops and becomes merely a prize for Holder and Bogart to compete over.

Make no mistake I thought it was great… but my enjoyment was hampered by knowing it could have been so much better.

└ Tags: Audrey Hepburn, Billy Wilder, Carole Lombard, Comedy, Humphrey Bogart, Movies, Review, William Holden, William Powell

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Tuesday Rhapsodies

by wpmorse on November 11, 2014 at 8:55 am

Posted In: Test

I always like finding new pieces and this one is no exception. Akira Ifukube is best known for his Godzilla soundtracks but the rest of his music is just as amazing! Enjoy his Japanese Rhapsody!

└ Tags: Akira Ifukube, Classical Music, Godzilla, Music

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Friday Museum Sketch

by wpmorse on November 7, 2014 at 9:37 am

Posted In: Art

Well, Now that I finished the Halloween Challenge I can get back to doing this.

One of the current exhibits at the Seattle Art Museum “City Dwellers: Contemporary Art From India” a selection of contemporary art from all around India. Most of it’s photography but all of it is a fascinating commentary about the fusion of progress and tradition in modern Indian society.

What has been the figure head of the Exhibit is “India Shining V” of “Ghandi with an iPod by Debanjan Roy. I think what can be perceived as tacky (it’s virtually shellacked in a bright Red) was done on purpose to shock the viewer as a less than subtle commentary on the “India Shining” marketing slogan… it does grow on you after a while.

└ Tags: Debanjan Roy, Ghandi, Indian Art, sculpture, Seattle Art Museum, Sketches

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Wednesday Double Feature

by wpmorse on November 5, 2014 at 8:15 am

Posted In: Rhapsodies, Test

For this week’s selection I learned why you need to plan ahead when going to Scarecrow’s. I had decided to do Swashbuckler films this week but it had been a long day so even though I had a list of recommendations I pretty much stuck to what was on the Swashbuckler shelf… all two shelves of it and none of the films on the actual list there.

The first film I watched “Seven Seas to Calais” I picked just because I liked the name. It’s pretty much a highly romanticized cliff notes version of the career of Francis Drake starting with his famous voyage and ending with the Spanish Armada. With the plot to rescue Mary, Queen of Scots, thrown in for good measure. It wasn’t bad but hardly memorable either. Being a fan of Elizabethan history and having seen better and more serious versions of these events frankly it was hard to take the whole thing seriously.(For example they never said WHY any one was supporting Mary, Queen of Scots.) For the most part it was a matter of sitting back and enjoy the fight scenes… Also trying to find humor in the history of the potato. (apparently it was the name of a Native American princess that our point of view character found himself with. )

The next film, Cutthroat Island, I heard of in fact I’d seen bits of it at some of my favorite video stores after it came out. I had heard it was one of two movies trying to bring back the genre (now that I think about it, I’m a little hazy about that second movie, even if it existed or not) with no success. While I had heard it was a failure I had not heard just how much of a colossal flop it had been. I went in expecting something I could enjoy far more that i enjoyed slogging through Seven Seas. Instead what I got was a by the numbers attempt at a blockbuster involving a standard Pirates hunting for gold plot that is about as predictable as it sounds. The numerous action scenes and gorgeous location shots really couldn’t save the film from it’s painful script, bad acting and flat characters.(though to it’s credit I thought the cinematography was pretty decent)