83rd Academy Awards

I wasn't sure what to expect of Academy Award hosts James Franco and Anne Hathaway, but they did okay with the opening montage. Using "Inception" as the concept for the montage made it really easy for the two to seamlessly mention every movie in the best picture category. Alec Baldwin and Morgan Freeman's cameos were very amusing. The best spoof was that of "The Fighter," in which Anne Hathaway channeled here inner Massachusetts rough girl and then socked James Franco.

Anne Hathaway's play on "On My Own," seemed only to be a way to lead into a joke with James Franco in a dress with a Marilyn Monroe wig on. It might have been worth it for his jab at Charlie Sheen who has lately been off his rocker more than normal.

Overall, the skits with Anne Hathaway and James Franco weren't all that funny. About 7:30 p.m., I was really ready for it to be over, but I stuck it out to see the top awards.

Now a bit about the winners in some categories:

Art direction
Alice in Wonderland takes home for the best art direction. Though I didn't like the movie all that much, it did look pretty cool.

Cinematography
"Inception" won and it is deserving for the crazy, upside down dream world the cinematographer caught on camera.


Supporting Actress
So it seems that the Academy does like to honor women who make themselves look awful on screen for the sake of their art. Melissa Leo wins for her turn in "The Fighter," as mother/manager of boxer Micky Ward (Mark Wahlberg). For the movie she looks 20 years older with frosted blond hair and a trashy '80s wardrobe. She did a good job since there wasn't much likeable about her character.

Animated feature
The other films in this category never really had a chance. "Toy Story 3" has a history with it as the final chapter in a franchise that many film goers grew up with. It has a feeling of nostalgia that appeals to adults while the Buzz Lightyear and Woody characters certainly appeal to kids. Any movie - especially if its animated - that can make grown men cry deserves an award.


Adapted screenplay
No surprise that Aaron Sorkin won for best adapted screenplay for "The Social Network." The screenplay is based on a book about Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook. I'll give him credit for turning a movie that is essentially about lawsuits into a tense movie that was interesting to watch. Who knew computer geeks could have such intense lives?

Best original screenplay
I would have guessed "Inception" would take the win with its crazy dreamscape, but "The King's Speech," actually won. It is great to see David Seidler win for his screenplay since he waited so long to make the movie. He joked that he might be the oldest person to win the award. He had the idea for a film about Kind George, and his struggled with stammering, decades ago. But he held off until the King's wife passed away because she said it was too painful to relive the memories in her life time. The movie is a great watch, and my favorite of the year.


Supporting Actor
I said a couple months ago that if Christian Bale is nominated for an Oscar, the other actors should just bow out. Bale deserves the win for his turn as Dickie Ecklund, a former boxer who became a drug addict before getting clean. While the movie is focused on Micky Ward, Dickie's half brother, Bale really made it. It was great to see Bale get joked up as he accepted his award since he is such a great actor - it was a just to see him as himself. A testament to what a great actor he is - when he started speaking in his natural British accent, my mom said, "He's English? I didn't know that."

Visual effects
"Inception" takes home the prize over such movies as "Alice in Wonderland," "Harry Potter," and "Iron Man 2." It's not a surprise since the movie includes plenty of effects, what with the multiple layers of dreams in it. They deserve the award for the slow-motion fighting scene in the hotel hallway.

Directing
Tom Hopper takes home the award for "The King's Speech." He drew out some great performances from all of the actors with whom he worked. During his speech he talked about how his mother was actually the one to discover the movie and recommended it as his next film.

Best actress
I only saw two of the five performances in the best actress category, but Natalie Portman got my vote. Even though I didn't really enjoy Darren Aronofsky's take on Swan Lake, I though Portman did a great job in "Black Swan." She stretched herself for the role, losing tons of weight and practicing ballet moves for months. She balanced the vulnerable role of Nina with a dark decent into madness.

Best actor
First off, Sandra Bullock was the best presenter of the night as she introduces the nominees for best actor. She had a natural way with the usually canned banter that the presenters read off the teleprompter. Her jokes her funnier than anything else on the show and better delivered than anything the hosts had to say all night.

Now for the winner, Colin Firth won for "The King's Speech." He was nominated last year for "A Single Man," and while his performance was good in that movie, he was even better as the king with the stutter. He showed the restraint that is required of a royal, but had enough depth to play through the occasional outbursts. He made a movie about a man with a stutter exciting to watch.

Best motion picture
Of the 10 movies nominated, I saw eight of them. I had my own personal favorites, which I have blogged about before. "The King's Speech" was at the top of my list. I wasn't sure what to expect of it since I knew it was a movie about a king with a stuttering problem. But the movie is really about much more than that. Geoffrey Rush and Colin Firth portray two men who become unlikely friends, forming a bond that last the rest of their lifetimes. The movie was my favorite of the year and I've been recommending it to everyone who asks about it. I was glad to see a movie I personally enjoyed win for best picture.

A breakfast item from north of the border

After eating a whole pile of sweets - Valentine's day chocolates, cupcakes, homemade banana bread, lemon bars and slices of lemon tart - not to mention eating out twice in one day last weekend - I thought it might be a good idea to find some healthy recipes for the week.

I spent some time on the Food Network under the "heart healthy" link and found quite a few dinners that seemed appealing. But I also found one breakfast option that seemed perfect for a light morning meal and also offered a chance to try out another ingredient. The recipe, from Ellie Krieger, was for healthy breakfast sandwiches and the ingredient is Canadian bacon. Sure it's not really an exotic ingredient, but it is one I haven't used before so it counts toward Resolution No. 12. In fact, I rarely cook bacon at all unless you count tossing some bacon bits on a meal.

I don't really like the smell of bacon frying and the need to get rid of all the grease that is leftover after cooking it. But Canadian bacon offers a lighter option without all the messy clean up.

So Sunday morning I put the recipe to the test after my boyfriend and I went for a three-mile run in Campbell (despite the temptation to stop at a place called Psycho Donuts that is right down the black from the track.) The recipe is basically a healthy take on egg McMuffins. It called for one whole egg and one white egg per serving - I even used brown eggs that my boyfriend's mom gave us when we visited a couple weeks ago from her chickens (those eggs also went into some of the lemon desserts.) To give the eggs lots of flavor, I finely chopped fresh parsley, chives and basil, mixing the herbs into the eggs. I cooked the mixture in an omelet pan and then folded it over into quarters to fit on a toasted double fiber English muffin (Orowheat actually makes great double fiber wheat bread and muffins.)

To cook the Canadian bacon, all I had to do was add a little cooking spray to the pan and brown it up over medium heat. It was way easier than using regular bacon and I actually liked the way it added just enough saltiness to the meal. From there, the egg and Canadian bacon was topped with a slice of tomato.

I thought it tasted great and it was filling even after a long workout. My boyfriend liked it, too, though he admitted that the few ways he thought to improve the dish (like adding cheese) would only make it unhealthy. In the future, I might compromise and add a little Parmesan cheese in with the egg mixture.

Photo by MelissaFlores

Healthy breakfast sandwiches include an herb omelet, Canadian bacon and tomato on a whole wheat muffin.

Hot stuff - trying out a new ingredient

In between all the eating out, I have been cooking at home but I haven't devoted much time to those five new ingredients (Resolution No.12) I want to try this year.

I actually bought a bag of sunchokes at the beginning of the year, but I didn't get to cooking it that week and by the time I got to them they just didn't look that appealing anymore. Sunchokes are not much like artichokes, but more of a root vegetable. The recipe I had for them also called for saffron, which turns out to be about $20 for a couple strands so if I see them in a grocery store I might buy the sunchokes but find a different recipe.

The one new ingredient I have cooked with so far this year is one that is quite familiar, but one that I usually avoid. Last month, when I was on a healthy cooking quick I decided to make some chicken and vegetable fajitas. The key to the recipe was to marinate the chicken and vegetables for a few hours with a strong mix of ingredients. The marinade included a mix of green onions, cilantro, spices and jalapeno. Now usually when a recipe calls for jalapenos, I just leave them out because the pepper is a little too hot for my palate. But this time since I was cooking for a couple people who like dishes that are a lot spicier, I decided to put in a little bit of it. After roasting the pepper over the flame on the gas burner, letting it sit in a plastic bag for a few minutes and peeling off the skin, I tossed in about one and a half peppers into the blender with the other ingredients. Perhaps it was the mix of other items, including honey and chicken broth, but the marinade had the slight flavor of the jalapeno without all the heat. Of course, I didn't actually use any of the seeds from the pepper.

For the same meal, I made a side dish of chile-cheese rice. The rice called for chunks of poblano peppers. I bought the largest peppers available in my grocery store, a couple of light green Anaheim chiles. Since I cooked a dish at a different kitchen than my own, I had to improvise on getting the skins off the without a gas flame. Instead I cooked the peppers in the oven for a few minutes, then slipped them into a plastic bag. When I pulled them out, the skin slipped off easily on one side of the pepper, but it wouldn't come off on the side that was face down on the cookie sheet in the oven. It seems it needs to get a little cooked on both sides so I had to put it back in the oven for a little more time.

The Anaheim chiles were mild enough for me and they packed in a lot of flavor into the rice dish. It was a perfect compliment to the chicken and vegetable fajitas. Since these ingredients are so similar, I'll count the jalapeno and Anaheim chiles as one so I've got four more to go before the end of the year.

Photos by MELISSA FLORES

Chicken fajitas with guacamole sauce and chile-cheese rice.

An easy resolution - eat out more

So far this year, some of my New Year's Resolutions have been easier to keep than others. I'll be honest and say I've been more focused on the early stages of a relationship than on meeting those 14 goals I set for myself. One of the easiest, of course, is the one thing on the list that fits easily in with dating.

Resolution No. 13 is to eat at five new restaurants this year and just two weeks into February, I'm more than half way there. A few weeks ago I dined at Flames Restaurant in downtown San Jose. I was torn whether to include this visit as one of the "new" restaurants I had tried because I visited the Flames Restaurant on Winchester Boulevard more than 10 years ago. But I didn't actually eat there. I barely had a drink there. I was out on a date with a guy who had taken me to dinner at the Elephant Bar Restaurant nearby. We were to follow up the meal with a movie, but it wasn't quite time for the next showing. He asked if I wanted to hang out at Flames to kill a bit of time. I said okay, assuming we would order a drink or dessert. Once we were seated inside, he said we should just order water because he didn't want to spend anymore money. For anyone who hasn't guessed it, that was the last date for him.

But my companion on a recent Sunday was much better company. We originally planned to have lunch at Flames, on the corner of Fourth and San Fernando streets, before a trip to the Tech Museum. We arrived to a busy crowd and put in our name for the half-hour wait. But as the wait stretched to 45 minutes, and we realized we really weren't that hungry since we had a late breakfast, we opted to leave before our names were called. Instead we returned later in the afternoon, when the crowd had moved on.

We ordered a tri-tip sandwich with sweet potato fries along with an appetizer of asparagus fries. For anyone who is wondering what asparagus fries are, they are dipped in batter and deep fried into crispy goodness, served with a dipping sauce. The sweet potato fries were tasty and seemed a little less greasy than typical French fries. The sandwich was tasty and filling enough to split. Though the restaurant had a full display of desserts in a case near the entrance - including cookies that we decided were about the equivalent of five regular-size cookies - I opted against dessert. I am sure we will go back and try out some more things in the future. I'd love to go back in the evenings for one of the exotic drinks on the menu.

A couple weeks later, I dined at a Mexican Restaurant in Merced called La Nita's Restaurant. The reason for being in Merced is a long story, but we were there in the late afternoon and I'd developed a headache from not eating enough or drinking enough water throughout the day so by the time I arrived at La Nita's, it was more about sustenance than good food. I ordered a two-item combo with an cheese enchilada and a shredded beef enchilada. Those were pretty average. But the one thing I loved on the plate was the rice, which was fluffy and moist in a way I can never manage to get Spanish rice to behave at home. I also liked the warm tortilla chips that a dinner companion claims are made fresh. If I end up back in Merced, which is not too likely, I'd eat there again.

I'm not really counting this in the tally, but I did eat at Bill's Cafe in Willow Glen over the weekend. I'd already eaten at another Bill's Cafe a few miles away, but my boyfriend said the one in Willow Glen has a better atmosphere. When we arrived for a Sunday morning brunch, I understood what he meant. Despite a large crowd, we were seated in under 20 minutes. Prior to seating, we ordered drinks from the bar - a mimosa for me and a drink of beer and lime juice in a glass rimmed with salt for the boys. We were seated on the patio, perfect for the unseasonably warm weather.

Bill's menu is great and there are so many more things on it that I'd like to try. They offer half a dozen different takes on eggs Benedict, a bread pudding French toast and tons more. Last weekend I went with an egg white scramble which included tomatoes, Jack cheese and mushrooms. It seemed like a lighter option given the mimosas. The waiter was attentive and the service was quick, without feeling like we were being rushed out.

Photo by MELISSA FLORES

Enchiladas, rice and beans from La Nita Restaurant in Merced.