Warm up with Goulash and zombie Christmas movie

Since it’s been a cold winter this week in Los Angeles---it’s gotten below 60 and I’m FREEZING---it’s been a treat that Liv made goulash for my next episode. The warm mish-mash is keeping me warm as I try to write from a cocoon of blankets.

If you are also feeling a warm-up, give this dish a try. Although, I have to say, it would be better without the brains...errr crabmeat. It’s a bomb vegetarian dish if you choose to make it that way.

Here’s how I made it.

First you chop up vegetables…way more vegetables than you think you should even need. Then you put them aside in a bowl, or leave them on the cutting board if you don’t have a bowl big enough for all those frickin vegetables.

Choose any vegetables you like, though I recommend squash and zucchini for a more wintery feel. Squash is very fun to cut...especially if you have no idea how to tell whether or not it is ripe. If you suspect it might not be ripe, you can microwave it for 1-5 minutes so that it is partially cooked and soft enough to cut.

I decided to use lentils instead of macaroni, which I think added to the mystery stew aesthetic quite well. It looks like what the word goulash sounds like. Goo-slosh? Anyway, Cook the lentils until the water is absorbed. Then set aside.

Now, or well the lentils are cooking, you can sauté the vegetables. Don’t completely cook them, because you’ll cook them in the stew afterwards, but it does add to the flavor if you burn them. You can also brown some garlic in the pan that you cook the vegetables into. I don’t think I used enough garlic because I can’t taste it in the final product, but if you like garlic, go for it.

By the way this picture is blurry because of the STEAM not because I can't take a photograph. It's important to me that you know that.

Add the vegetables to the lentils, along with a couple of cans of tomatoes, vegetable stock and spices. Paprika and Thyme. Then cayenne pepper if you’re feeling more of a kick.

Cook in a large pot for 15 minutes or until desired thickness.

I would also recommend dumping in too much spice so that you’ll need to chop up a few more vegetables to add to saturate it. But I feel like the fun part about this recipe is that you can add in anything you want to satisfy your tastes-----or maybe that’s what cooking is. Wow.

The Episode:

Ahh, the death-obsessed magician. This is a fun episode for several reasons, but you know them. You watch the show. I don't need to make you read my fan girl thoughts and how everything Major says is lovely.

However, if you did not recognize Fiona Gubelman from Wilfred, you should definitely give it a try. It is full of both crude humor and mind games, but to call it a stoner comedy is underselling it. It's about a depressed man who finds meaning in his life by befriending his neighbor's dog....more or less.

---

Recommendation corner:

Speaking of recommendations, I watched a spectacular film this weekend. So I did a short blurb. I think I'll recommend a new thing each blog post.

Scottish Zombie Christmas Musical.

Edit: After listening to the soundtrack ALL WEEKEND, I am a fan. The mix in the theatre was bad I think, if it was better, I may have walked away remembering the songs.

I’m glad I didn’t know anything about this movie when before I chose to go see it, because I would have been way too excited about it. I knew comedy/horror...I thought I read musical. Scotland and zombies were a pleasant surprise.

It was a pleasant surprise. As a musical, it’s perfectly fine. I didn’t walk away from the movie singing any break-out hits, but I didn’t dislike----okay, I disliked ONE song and singer, but it was only one song and you’re supposed to hate the character. The character sings a blatant rip-off of “Don’t Stop me now” to either homage or rip-off the iconic scene from Shaun of the Dead. But everyone else was a fantastic singer. And listening to the soundtrack again, I do enjoy it---especially the one actor who sings in a scottish accent.

As a zombie movie, it’s kick-ass and has some surp---many surprising moments. And when I’ve seen everything zombie, it’s so nice to be surprised.

Okay, the more I’m thinking about this movie, the more I love it. It’s just pure fun. It doesn’t need to be anything more than that.

Go see Anna and the Apocalypse. Support one of the most original female-driven zombie movies.

---

Story corner. Here's where it gets weird.

Of course. Of course they would show up right when I found a decent girl. I wouldn’t say ‘The One’, because let’s face it, I don’t think I’m ever going to say that. But someone clever and smart who actually saw me as the person I thought I maybe could be. She believed in me and thought at this moment anyway, that I was as smart as she was. And this could be good for me.

And then the birds started showing up and I knew it was only a matter of time.

Now I’m realizing that’s gotta be why the birds showed up. I found a sliver of happiness and they came to remind me that they own me.

Only one simple favor, they asked, just one. And I knew I couldn’t just walk away.

"You’re just going to cut a wire for us", the smallest bird crowed. And I followed it into the darkness. We walked for miles. I feel like it’s longer every time they call on me. That’s part of their torture. Thinking there’s an end to it when you’re only going further.

We arrived in a different part of the city. Maybe a different city entirely. With smog-stained buildings and cracked sidewalks.

"Alright, where’s this wire?" I was impatient and my feet were getting sore. I’d have to catch the bus back from wherever the hell I had walked to.

We turned the corner and the light was almost blinding. In the middle of the dinginess, there was a light that glowed at all hours. Fluorescent against white. It was a hospital I didn’t recognize, not that I frequent them, and the birds steered me closer. I started to shake my head, to trudge my feet, slowing down. Maybe I could sink into the darkness and they wouldn’t notice.

You have a choice, they crowed.

I choose ‘no.’

One hopped to my shoulder, one beady eye locking with my own, and it clarified. “You have the choice between clipping the wire to the back-up generator or one measly little wire inside.”

In days past, the answer would have been easy. I wouldn’t have to drudge up thousands of pages of moral philosophy to think it through. I would have done whatever would have taken less time. But now I knew someone who would expect me to drudge up thousands of pages of moral philosophy, because she had expected that I had read them all in college. I did go to college, and that was about the most I could say for it. I was damn near top of my class, and I never read a single book. One possible explanation was that I cheated. But that’s not the explanation my girlfriend believed.

Girlfriend. She actually got the title. And now, fuck. I found myself climbing the stairs. The back-up generator meant a possibility of every machine going down in one fell swoop. And I was sure with a flap of their devilish wings, the birds could evoke lightning. Why they didn’t do their damned business themselves I had never thought to ask. That wasn’t the arrangement.

The generator seemed like the wrong move. Whoever was in the room I was going to would die with both moves so it wasn’t like I was saving anyone. I had never considered saving anyone before.

I found myself on the 9th floor. The light ricocheted all over the walls, the paint reflecting it back, but dimmer. There was something different now, and given the glare of the lights it took me a beat to realize---the walls were no longer white. As I stepped down the hall, I saw the purple, the red and blue balloons painted across the walls. A nurse looked my direction as I found my way to the room, but she didn’t see me.

Through the tempered glass, I could see the shape of a figure in bed. The bird clucked their impatience and I slipped through the door. A young doctor adjusted a breathing tube in the nose of a tiny, frail child. She looked thin and weak, as if her bones might snap in half if she tried to sit up or get out of bed. But her nails had been freshly painted, her hair brushed and braided. Someone cared about this child. The doctor recorded on her sheet, sighed heavily and exited.

"It’s her first real week on the job." A bird cawed. "She was the bottom of her class in med school and she’s afraid she doesn’t have what it takes to be a real doctor. She fought tooth and nail to get through her residency and now she has her first patient.

Cut the cord to her ECG."

I stepped towards it. The green line showed a steady, strong heartbeat. I removed the wire cutters, but hesitated.

She was much too young to die, but it had already been decided. Whatever she was plagued with was eating her up. If there was a cure, there wouldn’t be such a novice doctor looking after her. It would happen anyway, but my feet were locked into place.

What’s the hold up, David? Have you lost your touch? The father, he’s been praying every night. He can’t sleep anymore, so he prays. His faith is still strong so he’s expecting a miracle. We’re going to show him what miracles are made of.

My feet could move again, but I turned away from the machine, away from the girl.

I had gone soft. But I had someone now who expected more of me. Who expected I earned my degree, my living and everything else honestly. And I liked that explanation, that story. And I didn’t like this. This destroying of lives.

You know what happens if you don’t do this, David.

But I didn’t know. I had never tried to defy them before. I just knew I couldn’t do this tonight.

I threw the wire cutters in the middle of the flock. They threw open their wings and scattered. I had a beat to run through the door and I took it. I flew down the hall. I could hear the fluttering of wings as they regrouped, adjusted to the sudden change of plan.

I ran, and kept running after they called out: “Belphegor plans to collect. And he will take what he is owed.”