Fishing for Dogfish at the GABF

let the craft beer revolution commence

The Great American Beer Festival (GABF) begins tonight at 5:30 p.m. and I'm getting there at 4:45 p.m. Am I VIP? Did I receive a special invitation from Coors? Do I have "Beer Geek" tattooed across my forehead?

Nope, just good ol' American volunteerism! The hubby and I are finally making our way to the GABF and what better entry than pouring beer for 5.5 hours, schmoozing with the brewers and getting a comp ticket to enjoy the revelry of Saturday night! In addition to our "brew crew" pouring duties tonight we volunteered to distribute event posters around Denver about a month ago (don't ask about the liquor store heist on West Colfax).

Our goal of the whole event is to stop by the Dogfish Head Brewery post and meet Sam Calagione (Dogfish Head's founder and President), who happens to be a major beer hero/entrepreneur mentor to the husband. It doesn't hurt either that he's a hunk. Sam recently co-wrote a book about beer pairings, too. Watch the clip on The Today Show (wow, great publicity!).

We discovered Dogfish after seeing the documentary "Beer Wars" which pitted the craft brewers' small business plight against the corporate brewers
- such as Anheuser Busch and Coors. A kind of David vs. Goliath story. It really sparked our interest in craft beers outside of Colorado and Minnesota and introduced us to high alcohol content suds like Dogfish 90 Minute IPA and Arrogant Bastard Ale, two favorites.

The GABF brings America's best brews to Denver and I couldn't be more excited and intimidated at the same time. We've got the pretzel necklaces made, maps marked up with must-stop booths and our palates prepped. Watch for updates following tonight's volunteering and then our attending on Saturday.

Cheers!

Becoming Julia Child

food in film!

This evening I saw an advance screening of "Julie & Julia", the film based on Julie Powell's book with the same title. I haven't read the book and I don't know much about Julia Child. But the thesis is this: Food is Happiness. (A la my "Gourmet Glee.")

Meryl Streep is Julia Child and Amy Adams is Julie Powell. Writer-director Nora Ephron may be familiar to those romantic-comedy watchers as she penned "When Harry Met Sally", "You've Got Mail" and "Sleepless in Seattle" among others. So combining the two stories of these women was bound to have that warm, comforting feeling, like a Mom's hotdish.

Learning about Julia Child and her carefree, "eat what I want" attitude was inspiring! When she asked her husband what hobby she should take up he responded "Well, what do you enjoy?" To which she said, "Eating! Look at me, I'm growing in front of you." This wasn't followed by a scowl or reaffirmation, instead they giggled and shared in her passion for relishing the food. And Julie, the down-trodden New Yorker who hates her job but loves coming home to cook. Her self-disciplined quest is to cook 524 recipes in Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" in a year's time.

I'm part of the generation that learned about cooking from Home Ec 101 and the Food Network. BAM! and Emeril, right? As my interest in cooking increased my Mom noticed and one Christmas I received three paperback cookbooks: "Mastering the Art of French Cooking," a Pillsbury baking book and something else. Through the several moves and downgrading of materials I've seemed the keep one of those cookbooks, Julia's.

Though I haven't done the in-depth job that Julie Powell did, and the closest I am to that is having done maybe 20 out of hundreds of Rachel Ray's recipes, I am LOVING food blogging. Like Julie, and hopefully some day Julia, I will follow my way through volumes of gourmet recipes to feed my family, feed my cooking bug and find my own style in the kitchen.

See the movie, it's out Aug. 7 and seriously made the entire theater laugh out loud at least 10 times!

Food in Film: "Simply Irresistible"

gourmet food + love = magic

In addition to playing with food in the kitchen, I'm a big fan of watching chef movies and food-themed flicks. One such movie is the 1999 romantic comedy "Simply Irresistible".

Although it is incredibly predictable and at the same time confusing where the story line comes from, I love watching the passionate cooking and that the main theme is gourmet food + love = magic.

Hint: Don't expect the husband to sit through the whole movie without eye-rolling and groaning at the corny situations and phrases, "This food is the perfect poem I never wrote".

One of my favorite parts of the movie is when Sarah Michelle Gellar's character goes on a riff of words to describe "delicious".

My other favorite foodie movies: "Woman on Top", "Chocolat", "Spanglish" and "Ratatouille". The TV series "Kitchen Confidential" with Bradley Cooper is also awesome! (Available here on Hulu.com.)

And some notable films with fun food phrases and motifs: the song 'Be Our Guest' from "Beauty and the Beast", "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", the prison garlic cutting in "Goodfellas ", it's a bundt cake in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding", "French Kiss" as Meg Ryan yells out 'Lactose intolerant!' and another Meg Ryan one, "When Harry Met Sally" with the Pastrami sandwich orgasm and pecan pie playfulness.

I'm definitely going to see "Julie & Julia" this August when it comes out in theaters, too! In the trailer the guy says, "Well, write a blog about cooking." ABSOLUTELY!

What's your favorite food-related flick?