Parfaits.

 
"You know what else everybody likes? Parfaits. Have you ever met someone, you say, "Let's go get some parfait" they say "Hell no, I don't like no parfaits"? Parfaits are delicious."


I made some desserts for my dear Lindsey's wedding shower this weekend. I wanted to make some light and spring-like things, and was inspired by this month's food club theme (spring) to make some lime parfaits. For food club, I made this recipe, and while they were good, I wasn't too thrilled with the lime mousse layer.

For Lindsey's shower, I made my standby strawberry cupcakes (so good) and changed the mousse to a version I had been given by a friend. I found it much less punch-in-the-face sweet, and a nice light texture. Piped into the little mugs I bought at Dollarama, I was rather impressed with myself.

Lime Parfaits:

1/4 C butter
2 T brown sugar
1 C graham cracker crumbs

1 container Cool Whip
1 can sweetened condensed milk
3/4 C lime juice
zest from 2 limes
(I added a little bit of food coloring to make it look "limey")

Melt butter in a sauce pan over medium heat. Add brown sugar, and stir until bubbly. Mix in graham cracker crumbs, and stir for a few minutes. Transfer to a bowl to cool, breaking large chunks into a fine powder.

Combine Cool Whip, sweetened condensed, and lime juice. Chill until ready to use.

Using a large piping bag, fill all containers (this filled 18 2 oz glasses really nicely, with a little leftover. Each cup was about a half portion) a third full of lime mousse. Add a spoonful of graham cracker crumbs, and top with another layer of mousse.

Chill until ready to serve.

I love that the lighting makes this picture look retro.

Melt butter in heavy small skillet over medium heat. Mix in brown sugar and stir until bubbling, about 1 minute or less. Mix in crumbs; stir until color deepens, about 3 minutes. Turn out onto plate and cool. - See more at: http://foodfashionandflow.blogspot.ca/2012/09/key-lime-parfaits.html#sthash.zVnXRqtD.dpuf

Melt butter in heavy small skillet over medium heat. Mix in brown sugar and stir until bubbling, about 1 minute or less. Mix in crumbs; stir until color deepens, about 3 minutes. Turn out onto plate and cool. - See more at: http://foodfashionandflow.blogspot.ca/2012/09/key-lime-parfaits.html#sthash.zVnXRqtD.dpuf

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

2 tablespoons white sugar

1/4 cup powdered sugar

1 tablespoon light brown sugar

1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs

1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk

1/2 cup fresh lime juice

1 tablespoon grated lime peel

1-2 cups chilled whipping cream 

Pure Vanilla Extract

- See more at: http://foodfashionandflow.blogspot.ca/2012/09/key-lime-parfaits.html#sthash.zVnXRqtD.dpuf

• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons white sugar
• 1/4 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon light brown sugar
• 1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs
• 1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
• 1/2 cup fresh lime juice
• 1 tablespoon grated lime peel
• 1-2 cups chilled whipping cream 
• Pure Vanilla Extract

Directions

Melt butter in heavy small skillet over medium heat. Mix in brown sugar and stir until bubbling, about 1 minute or less. Mix in crumbs; stir until color deepens, about 3 minutes. Turn out onto plate and cool. 

Stir condensed milk, lime juice and lime peel in large bowl to blend (mixture will thicken). Set aside while you make whipped topping.

- See more at: http://foodfashionandflow.blogspot.ca/2012/09/key-lime-parfaits.html#sthash.zVnXRqtD.dpuf

• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons white sugar
• 1/4 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon light brown sugar
• 1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs
• 1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
• 1/2 cup fresh lime juice
• 1 tablespoon grated lime peel
• 1-2 cups chilled whipping cream 
• Pure Vanilla Extract

Directions

Melt butter in heavy small skillet over medium heat. Mix in brown sugar and stir until bubbling, about 1 minute or less. Mix in crumbs; stir until color deepens, about 3 minutes. Turn out onto plate and cool. 

Stir condensed milk, lime juice and lime peel in large bowl to blend (mixture will thicken). Set aside while you make whipped topping.

- See more at: http://foodfashionandflow.blogspot.ca/2012/09/key-lime-parfaits.html#sthash.zVnXRqtD.dpuf

• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons white sugar
• 1/4 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon light brown sugar
• 1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs
• 1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
• 1/2 cup fresh lime juice
• 1 tablespoon grated lime peel
• 1-2 cups chilled whipping cream 
• Pure Vanilla Extract

Directions

Melt butter in heavy small skillet over medium heat. Mix in brown sugar and stir until bubbling, about 1 minute or less. Mix in crumbs; stir until color deepens, about 3 minutes. Turn out onto plate and cool. 

Stir condensed milk, lime juice and lime peel in large bowl to blend (mixture will thicken). Set aside while you make whipped topping.

- See more at: http://foodfashionandflow.blogspot.ca/2012/09/key-lime-parfaits.html#sthash.zVnXRqtD.dpuf

Musicals.

The school that I work at puts on excellent drama productions. And I mean excellent.

Tonight's production of Thoroughly Modern Millie was no exception. Although I managed to go on the night that most of my students were not on (darn double casting!) the show was phenomenal. So proud of all my students who were involved.

Thoroughly Modern Millie is my mother's favorite musical. I don't know that I have a favorite musical... but this is probably my favorite musical number to ever appear on stage/screen.

Kevin Kline. 'Nuff said.

Talented Friends III.

Poster seen in the Remedy Cafe on Whyte.

Life is good.

On Thursday night, I headed to Metro Cinema in the old Garneau Theatre to catch a screening of part of my dear friend Jamie's documentary. So exciting to see her vision realized on the big screen! A twelve minute segment on bison played before a screening of Avatar as part of the U of A's Educated Reel film series.

It was mind-boggling to see footage we shot together at Elk Island Park of Plains Bison, and hear us giggling like school girls over a particularly fuzzy buffalo wiggling his ears in the outtakes. Equally crazy to see my name roll across the credits.

So intensely proud of J and all she's accomplished so far. Things only look up from here!

Bond.



Picture from here.

James Bond.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of the release of Dr. No and the start of a cinematic dynasty.

James Bond movies are so formulaic, and it's part of their appeal. They smack of "guilty pleasure" (or they would if I did guilty pleasures... I instead shamelessly enjoy things) because you can sit back for 2 hours, grab a bowl of popcorn, and watch a suave British spy predictively outshoot all the bad guys, charm the pants off all the ladies he meets, and continuously twart the world domination plans of Blofeld, SPECTRE, SMERSH and who knows what other megalomaniacs.

(To be honest, the only un-predictable Bond movie was On Her Majesty's Secret Service. I really didn't see that coming. Any of it. An allergy clinic would be the best cover story.)

I enjoy watching old Bond movies... it's almost worth it just to see the hilariously out-of-date technology. (Pretty much the only thing Bond gets to play with in Dr. No besides his new PPK is a Geiger counter the size of a bread box. Not very subtle.) My personal favorite comes in From Russia With Love, when we witness some Soviet spies sitting in a surveillance bush with a "cellular walkie talkie", trying to be covert except for the 2 foot antenna sticking out of the top.

It's also interesting to watch how the nationality of the Bond villians has changed over time. The majority of the early villians are Soviets and Eastern Europe (although SPECTRE is not very discerning in who it hires), and gradually the focus changes to Asia (China, Korea). Sound like any other countries we know?

Some Bond movies are better than others (personally I found Die Another Day to be painfully bad...) but my favorites are those that aren't afraid to be funny. Initially, all the sex and violence was considered too scandalous for the censors, so they would include the funny one-liners and campy moments (I don't know how this helps get by censors, but hey?) that have become part of the genre.

Favorite moment in Dr. No? The scene where Bond and Honey Ryder need to be "decontaminated" of radioactivity. The henchmen are told to "scrub them down", which involves spraying them with some soap, and being rubbed once with a broom. Surprise, surprise - it doesn't work!

Oh, henchmen... There's a reason you take orders from someone who is criminally insane.



Snow.

Ahhh... The first snowfall of the season! (Those of you who are unfamiliar with the Edmonton climate... this is unseasonably late.)

Come February, I will probably be complaining about the snow, but right now the world is coated in a fluffy white layer that makes everything seem magical. As long as you are inside with a nice cup of tea, and not out driving on the roads.

Here's a snippet from my favorite holiday movie, featuring the wonderful Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, and Bing Crosby himself singing about snow snow snow snow snow!

Lion King 3D.

So... last night I went and saw The Lion King in 3D.

And it was glorious.

One of the neat things about watching a movie you've seen many times before in theatres is that you pick up on details that you've somehow managed to miss the umpteen times you've watched said movie in the comfort of your own home.

Most of the things I noticed were small... but I did pick up on a bit of an error in the "science" of the Lion King...

Let me set the scene.

Simba and Mufasa are surveying their kingdom, facing the rising sun from the top of Pride Rock. Everything in view that the light touches is part of their kingdom. (We know the sun is rising, because they just made a big deal of how early it is.)

Simba walks a little to the right, and notices a shadow-y area, that is not a part of their kingdom.

If you are facing into the rising sun, you are looking East. By turning to the right, Simba is looking towards the South. With me so far?

"Everything the light touches is our kingdom"
from here.

A little bit later on... Simba is talking to his uncle, Scar. In an attempt at removing Simba as heir to the throne so he can become king, Scar decides to con Simba into going to the shadow-y area, which is in fact an elephant graveyard in hyena territory.

To do so, Scar asks if Mufasa showed Simba what was "beyond the horizon on the Northern border".

Wait. What? The elephant graveyard is clearly to the South.

Maybe there was a miscommunication between the animators and the dialogue people. Maybe the lovely backdrop someone handpainted got flipped around. Maybe someone fell for the old "things happen opposite in the Southern hemisphere" deal. (The sun still rises in the East down there...)

Let me clarify that this in no way hampered my enjoyment of the movie! (Although it might have bothered the friend next to me that I mentioned it too...) I just think it's funny that the same company that produced a movie with a song that clearly states "Rising in the East" could so badly botch the cardinal directions in another.

Film Snacks.

In a previous post, I mentioned that a friend of mine was working on the prelim for a wildlife documentary... well, there are updates!

The 4th Annual Film Snacks competition is hosted by Discovery Channel for amateur film-makers to create a 2 minute video on an environmental theme. Check out Jamie's submission!


I am also a butterfly whisperer.




Now, I didn't do any of the filming for this piece... it will be a little while before any of my stuff is seen. However, I have made my debut on the website! You can check out my funny biography, and try to guess which parts are real and which parts are fake. (I'll give you a hint... I can indeed make balloon animals! Don't ask why.)



And lastly, here is a really dodgy video I shot in the Taronga Zoo in Sydney, in the dark, of a platypus, while some annoying man talks in the background. Dodgy though it may be, I've never been so excited about 10 seconds of footage in my life.

Han Solo.

During last week's baking venture, Star Wars was my cooking movie of choice.

I love Han Solo. (let's be real, girls... who doesn't?)
He's good lookin', wise crackin', Captain of  the Millenium Falcon, a reluctant hero... the bad boy who discovers his compassion when confronted with a feisty princess. (As well as a scruffy-looking nerve-hurter...)

One thing Han is not, however, is a scientist.

Incredulous that Obi-Wan and Luke could possibly doubt that the Millenium Falcon is anything other than the "fastest ship in the galaxy", he says...

"You've never heard of the Millennium Falcon?…It's the ship that made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs."

"Ain't like dusting crops, boy."

Now. I should mention that I once took an astronomy-physics class, where the second question on the midterm was something to the effect of "explain why Han Solo could not have made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs."

Simply put, the parsec is a measurement of distance not time, much like the mile or the metre. Specifically, it is a distance of 3.0857x10^16 m. Now, this is a phenomenally large number; it is not practical or meaningful to discuss distances in numbers so huge. So scientists pretty much invent new units to make their math easier. For example, the average distance from Earth to the Sun is a 1.4960x10^11 m, which sceintists call an Astronomical Unit (AU). It is much easier to think of distances between planets in AU's rather than meters or kilometers. Another example is the light-year, which may sound like a unit of time, but is still a distance measurement - the distance travelled by a beam of light over the course of a year. One light year is 9.4605x10^15 m, which is still a gigantic number. It is much more convenient to use light-years when talking about the distance across solar systems compared to using meters.

A parsec, then, is 3.26 light-years, or a really big distance. So big that most of us don't encounter this unit of measure in our daily life, but it's useful when talking about distances across galaxies.

So, back to Han Solo.

"Making the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs" is like saying, "I made it to the grocery store in two kilometers yesterday" when you live three kilometers away. It just can't be done.

There are a few explanations for this strange phrase.

Han could be making stuff up to make himself sound way cooler than he already is and to justify the expensive price he demands of Obi-Wan and Luke. He could also have no clue what he is talking about, but that's pretty unlikely for someone with such awesome flying skills.

He could mean that he took a short cut (such as you usually take a three kilometer route to go to the grocery store, and you just found one that is only two) but that still doesn't make much sense. Grammar is not one of Han's strong points.

Another explanation could be poor research on George Lucas' part. Let's face it... Parsec is a pretty cool sounding word, (it sounds like a unit of time after all) and who among us hasn't been guilty of using words before totally knowing what they mean?


"These are not the droids you're looking for..."