Today’s 30 Oscar Worthy Recipes post comes to us from our resident movie fanatic / FoodieCrush contributor / queen of the Academy, Hayley Teater, who every year schemes over Academy Award fétes with the same passion that Southern belles plot and plan their dream wedding. On with the show…
While many people were getting wrapped up in Super Bowl Sunday mania, I was busy scheming over the menu for our annual Academy Awards dinner. It may be un-American of me to say it, but I just can’t seem to get myself pumped up over the Super Bowl. The Academy Awards on the other hand? That’s my Super Bowl.
Ever since I can remember I’ve been obsessed with movies. I’d find one I liked and watch it over and over again and was equally fascinated with celebrities and everything having to do with them—particularly awards shows, and even more particularly, the Academy Awards.
I’d stay up as late as I was allowed on a school night to see them, as we’d camp out across the living room floor with a blanket and some dinner. I’d watch, mesmerized, and savor every red carpet interview and every sentimental, teary-eyed speech.
About seven years ago, my family started having special Oscars dinners, with a menu centered around puns on the Best Picture nominees (like “Into the Wild Salmon,” with “Crashed Potatoes,” or “The Wrestler’s Mussels, ” and a “Winter’s Bone-in Pork Chop” with “The King’s Peach Compote”).
Still today, we have just as much fun planning the menu as we do watching the awards. And of course, plotting the party…
Here we sit. Straddling the edges of winter’s crustyiness and the cheery hopefulness that this past weekend’s gorgeousness delivered.
This weekend was a blink of spring that had all of us who’ve been shuttered inside heading to the great outdoors to stretch our legs, breathe in deep and realize that summer is just one hopscotch jump away.
But, there’s still a bit of cozy comfort food I’m craving, that I’ve yet to have my wintertime fill of. I’m not quite ready to put away my braisers, or break out the grill. Yet.
Which leaves plenty of room for a thoroughly decadent dinner. Comfort food with a swath of luxury. Lobster Mac and Cheese. It’s what’s on this girl’s menu.
I spend a lot of time looking at recipes. I read cookbooks like most read from books from the NY Times bestseller list. My bedside is littered with layers upon layers of food magazines from across the world. And man, of course I look at a lot (a lot!) of food blogs for crazy good inspiration.
But one of the biggest traps I find myself getting into when I’m creating a weeknight dinner or Sunday breakfast, is I end up cooking to create content for this blog, instead of for fun or frivolity.
Yes, cooking is creative and yes, I love it. But sometimes, I don’t want to think about composing photos of ingredients or taking photos of the finished product or swatting hungry hands away from the hot goods before they can dig in.
Sometimes I just want to recreate something delicious I see from a food blogger online. To be inspired by someone else’s recipe. To take it for a spin and give it a go. Just because it looks so. dang. good. rather than having to work for it.
Chicken Pot Pie could quite possibly take the lead in the race for my favorite meal ever. Three different times I’ve started a blog post to share my favorite comfort food, to cook and photograph my traditional Chicken Pot Pie recipe.
And each time it doesn’t happen.
Because it just isn’t perfect enough to take a picture of. Or I’m my family is too dang hungry to wait for a picture to be taken of the final result and we end up destroying the flaky crust with our digging for pot pie gold forks. Those are the reasons I’ve yet to post my Chicken Pot Pie on the bloggity blog.
I’m going to have to make an extra effort to work on that. And that’s why this traditional recipe just found a brand new vessel to take for a test drive.
