Ha ha – these were fun to make.  I think I over cooked them but they were amusing little fellows while they lasted.

What a lovely surprise.  Queens of Vintage magazine are running my piece about Silver Screen Sandwiches again.  You can read it here: Silver Screen Sandwiches

If any readers of the article drop by – hello and welcome!  I blog about all my adventures in cooking the favorite fodder of my favourite movie stars right here.  Please sign up to the newsletter for a film star recipe of the month – and / or “like” the Silver Screen Suppers Facebook Page… if you are so inclined.

I’m having a very busy time at the moment as I seem to very suddenly have some romance in my life.  Strange but true.

I am hoping to get it together to make some Jackie Cooper’s Gingerbread Men tomorrow though.  Will post pictures if I do…

Just sent out the monthly newsletter, a bit late this month as it’s been busy, busy, busy.  I’m running a competition for the best Gingerbread Man – should be fun.  Recipe is here if you are not a newsletter subscriber, I’m excited about the prospect of getting some pictures of crazy Gingerbread Men and am really looking forward to having a few minutes in the kitchen to make some of my own…

Happy men making!

Aw these were cute!  I made them before work as I knew making dinner would be a scramble.  I had the ladies of the book group to dinner and it was lovely.  We drank lots of wine and talked about the book a little bit, but seemed to talk mostly about my adventures on the dating scene.  I have woken up this morning feeling as though I totally hogged the conversation.

All of the ladies are in long term marriages so haven’t been on the loose for many years and we talked a lot about how it has all changed thanks to the internet.  I think that the biggest change is that these days people seem much more up front about what they are looking for.  The site I am using at the moment – OK Cupid – has a neat way of showing how compatible you might be with someone by a vast list of answerable questions.  You can answer as many as you like and when you find someone you like the look of, you can see how they answered the same questions.

For example, “Could you date someone who was really messy?” is quite an important one for me to check – ha ha!  But you can also get a heads up about stuff that is REALLY important. There are questions that reveal how people feel about abortion, homosexuality, racism -  which actually reveal quite a lot about the type of person they are.  If you answer a lot of questions like these very differently the OK Cupid robot will inform you that “you two have issues” which is good to know so you can hit DELETE immediately.

It is very addictive when you start, and quite interesting if you are in a self reflective mood to be challenged by questions like, “How often do you keep your promises?” and “How open are you with your feelings?”  Ooh, yes, that was a good one…

So all of that to say, I am having FUN on the dating scene and being pretty selective about who I meet up with.  I wonder why it took me so long to get back out there?

I think it would be nice to have these cakes after Barbara Stanwyck’s Leg of Lamb in Wine Sauce and watch her and John Boles in Stella Dallas.  I loved that film the first time I saw it and I’m sure it is around the place somewhere on DVD.

That doesn’t look anything like Barbara!  This is more like it…

I’m loving the hairdo.  After reading Lauren’s post on Dark Victory yesterday and seeing Bette’s bob I’m seriously considering getting my hair cut to this length so I can get the heated rollers out again…

But we are forgetting about John…

My fungi phobia is abating and I was quite surprised about how much I liked these.  Even though the little critters looked WEIRD, they tasted good.  I made them with something quite funky I found in Morrison’s.  A jar of “mixed mushrooms” in oil.  I tried to find a picture of them on Google to no avail.  I fear they are the kind of thing you find once by chance and then never, ever see them again.  I loved the label on the jar – really old fashioned.  If I ever find them again I’ll post a picture.  Other ingredients were spinach, tomato and french dressing…

Vic, Corinna and Kieron came round for another Mad Men night but due to my last minute Annie antics I didn’t have episode 3 and only episode 4.  I spent most of the day trying to download episode 3 to no avail.  I even spent £20 on a month’s subscription to some site I thought would allow me to do this, but alas no.  So I’ll have to think of a few things to download instead to get my money’s worth.

I made Roast Duck with Orange Sauce from my chum Alastair Hendy’s Home Cook cookbook.  I do so love his recipes.  And I always think fondly of his mum when I read the instructions as she appears so often as his inspiration in this book.  The duck was lovely and Corinna made a delicious Marble Cake for pudding.

And now, Claire Teal on R4 – bliss…

Thanks Cary!  Your canapes were great!

I’m just back from my folks’ where I have had a lovely time. They have moved to Suffolk and are in the perfect, perfect spot.  I spent a gorgeous couple of hours with my mum as she took me on a tour of Sudbury.  All the shopkeepers and market traders were so chatty.  We had a good chin wag with the wool shop lady, the fabulous chick on the herb stall drew me a picture of a sorrel leaf and told me how to forage for it and the fishmonger seemed most amused that I was so annoyed to find some beautiful Kings Lynn brown shrimp for my Gracie Fields potted shrimp and wasn’t able to buy any due to living in LONDON.   Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarg.

I am not the kind of person to covet things (apart from Cathy’s fish plates which I have mentioned before) but I have always been inordinately fond of my mum’s charm bracelet which I remember her wearing in the 1970s.  And today she gave it to me, I am so thrilled.  She says that she never wears it and would like me to enjoy it.  So I am wearing it right now.

The sedan chair charm was always my favourite but I also vividly remembered the charm with the yellow stone, and the fish.  I absolutely love it and it makes a wonderful tinkly sound whenever I move my wrist.

Mind you, someone sitting in front of me at the cinema when I’m eating popcorn might not find it as lovely as I do…

I was craving Mae’s salad for lunch when I was at the supermarket today so I tried to remember what was in it on the hoof.  So this is basically Mae’s recipe with the addition of a few things I had knocking around the fridge – lettuce, rocket, some beetroot and a few cubes of avocado.  It was bloody delicious.

I have just checked the recipe and I wasn’t far off: tuna fish, hard boiled egg, gherkins, mayonnaise and olives – all of these I remembered.  I forgot lemon juice and celery…  But I think Mae wouldn’t mind a little variation on the theme.

For dinner I had a Vincent Price meal in a pineapple.  More about that over at the Vincentennial Cookblog!

A lovely surprise via Facebook this week.  Rebecca in Wisconsin posted two pictures of her version of the recipe of the month – don’t they look cute?  Rebecca added some cocoa powder to the icing sugar which I thought was a genius touch.

The Silver Screen Suppers Facebook page is a very new thing for me and I’m not sure how it works but if you are a Facebook user please drop by.  I post links to all my Silver Screen Suppers posts plus all the Vincentennial Cookblog posts.

It’s Sunday and I am being very lazy.  But later today I’m planning to make some Gracie Fields Potted Shrimps and a Vincent Price chicken dish that is served in a pineapple!  I have a feeling that Claire would love a dinner served inside a pineapple…

Next – Steak Teriyaki:

These were really, really delicious.  Mmmmmmmm.  I served these with Vincent’s Peanut Sauce.  When Heather saw that the recipe called for 6 tablespoons of butter she said she knew why it was so delicious.

Main course was Pineapple Glazed Double Pork Chops and Shrimp Fried Rice:

Both yummy.  It cannot be denied that Vincent never lets us down (well apart from once, Cathy’s birthday cake).  We had a brilliant time.  My chums all entered into the Polynesian party spirit:

We all got absolutely smashed on beer and rather than slumping in front of a movie as we intended, took our Polynesian selves down to the Maid of Muswell.  We  made a right racket taking photos of ourselves eating sausage rolls and posing in Nathan’s hat.  I’m surprised we weren’t asked to leave.

And there is only one thing to do when you find a large carboard box in the street…

Thank you Vincent, your “International Cooking Course” party suggestions were spot on.  Which one shall I do next?  I have the following to choose from: Dinner at the Casbah, Exotic Delights of the Far East, Delights from the Sultan’s Pantry, Classical Spanish Cuisine and The Wok.  Mind you, my wok is a bit worse for wear as I made Dorothy’s chutney in it!

Whose idea was it to start making a chutney at 9pm in the evening?  I blame the bottle of sherry I bought today for my Vincent Price Teriyaki sauce.  I used 1 tablespoon of it for that, and seem to have drunk just about the rest of the bottle this evening preparing for tomorrow’s VP Polynesian extravaganza.  No matter!  It is Saturday night!

Here’s a picture of the WAMPAS baby stars of 1932.  Dorothy is in there somewhere…

I wanna corsage…!

It’s been a strange couple of days in the Palace of Solitude.  My Good Friday fun was cancelled so I’ve been more or less solo for two whole days.  I’m wondering if this is such a good thing on a regular basis.  There is a tendency for introspection.  Is that good?  I don’t know.  But I am VERY proud of the leis I made myself while I watched the splendour of “9-5″ with Dolly, Lily and Jane because I’m too much of a skinflint to pay £20 for four at the fancy dress place in Camden…

The ladies’ leis have flowers, butterflies and hearts.  The gentlemens’ leis have trucks, cars, trains and ships.  That is nothing to do with me, that is Tesco’s decision about what little boys and little girls might like in their little craft kits…  I must admit though, that I did use straws with red stripes for the girls’ leis and straws with blue stripes for the boys’.  Thanks to Jamie for the inspiration for these…  God I love the internet.  Not only did I save about £15 but I also MADE SOMETHING.

This afternoon I discovered a small cache of CDs in a box bound for eBay and I have been revisiting a specific moment in time.  I am carbon dating it to 2004-2006 – definitely stuff I was listening to when I lived on the boat and earlier.  So cooking my chutney I’ve been listening to the Kaiser Chiefs and doing my special dance right here, on my lonesome.  Also listening to Nick Cave and thinking about what I would like played at my funeral.  And remembering my birthday buddy Conor (probably about 8 years old at the time) entertaining me by knowing all the words of Morrisey’s “First of the Gang to Die” and singing it with gusto in Portugal when a huge bunch of us went to Euro 2004.

Someone over 20 years my junior contacted me today on the dating site full of bravado suggesting that they can offer everything a man more around my age can.  Really?  Jesus!  I have been through so much since my 20s it’s not even worth thinking about.  Divorces, death, suicide, heartbreak, health problems…  My goodness me, these young boys have no idea!