Dinner and a Movie

The Dinner: Meat Ravioli in Mushroom Sauce

The Movie: No Country for Old Men

I was so happy with the way the meal turned out. Restaurant Quality, all done in under 15 minutes time including prep. I could not stop thinking about how good it was after we ate, and this remembrance lasting about 24 hours. It is really easy to make, let me guide you through it.

First you heat some oil in a skillet on the stovetop. Slice up some onion and press some garlic, and throw it in there once the oil is good and hot. Let that cook for about three minutes until it is all golden brown, then throw in a half cup of fresh mushrooms, quartered. Stir it all together until the mushrooms are lightly coated with oil, then throw in a couple tablespoons of flour and stir that until you can't see the flour anymore. Add a can of beef broth (14 oz) and a 1/3 cup of dry red wine - I didn't have any of that but I used red wine vinegar, same difference - and bring it to a boil over medium high heat. Add in some parsely, basil, and pepper. Once it is boiling, add some fresh ravioli. The recipe I was using (out of Easy Meals in Minutes) suggested a beef ravioli, but for some reason the store I was shopping in had none of that, and the only meat version I could find was a chicken and herb fresh ravioli. It was killer.

The movie...well, it won four Academy awards...and based on the content, I guess you could say it was killer, too. I was a little uncomfortable with all the bloodshed and I am not sure I like the ideas presented in the movie. It is actually quite dark. Some amusing parts of the evening, though - Tommy Lee Jones in the "extras" part stating that the movie "was a comedy really", and feeling like my mother for a a few moments. She says she always has to explain movies to my father, and sometimes it is wearisome for her. She has to choose movies for them to see that won't be over his head.

Well, first of all the end of the movie kinda snuck up on us. We had just readjusted ourselves and made a comment that it was a long movie, and then out of nowhere the credits are rolling. I was not expecting that to the be the last scene but it does make the point. Anyway my husband turns to me and says "So what happened to the dude?" I'm thinking that if he didn't catch the part where it shows "what happened to the dude", then how the heck did he make sense of the rest of it from there out? I ask him this and he says he has no idea what this movie is about. Rewind, catch up to what happened to the dude, and then there is the conversation with Tommy Lee Jones' character and his old friend he goes to visit. I tell my husband "THIS, this is what the movie is all about" and it turns out he had just tuned that all out. After all, it's just people talking, he is used to tuning out conversation. I mean, he lives with me for pete's sake! I'm trying to go back and explain to him how the conversation he has with the large cop in the coffeehouse, the old friend, and his wife are all connected to the main idea of the movie, which is just depressing really, and my husband is rewinding it all to catch the parts he didn't understand. I wasn't going to stay up all night for this, so I took a bath and read my book in the hour it took him to make sense of it all finally. The movie runs deep, with the statements about luck, life, faith, the frailty of human life, and the scenery, especially in the beginning, is interesting. Today, though, all I could think about when I thought of the movie is blood gushing from the dude's side. I did have the ravioli again for lunch, though.

Movie leftovers, not so good. Dinner leftovers....yummy.