Friday, April 29, 2016

Season Six: DEATH POOL UPDATES

Valar Morghulis

All Men Must Die


There was much debate among our band of thieves about this during the premier party - who will meet their end?  Here is how our board turned out:
  































Poor Jorah - everyone has you pegged for a dead man...

After much thought and discussion we decided that each of the five of us would get 7 guesses.  On the back of their unique "flag" they had to write the order that they chose each character, the name of the character and the episode in which they met their demise.  Whoever gets the most right wins!  The order and episode are only used in the event of a tie breaker.  This was the easiest way we could come up with it and avoids the whole points mess. 
So far, no one dead yet but - we are only on episode 1, after all... I feel a little morbid saying this but.... here's to hoping it's a blood bath!



SEASON 6 EPISODE 2 UPDATE:  DEATH TO ROOSE!  

What the bloody hell kind of a name is Roose anyway?  Oh well, who cares, he got killed by a bastard.  House Courtade is in the lead!

I have to also mention that where as most of us put a lot of thought into our choices, House Courtade just chose people at random and as a result, you know she's going to win the whole thing...  Murphy is an ass.



SEASON 6 EPISODE 5 UPDATE:  NOT HODOR, NOOOOO!

Seriously you guys, I WAS JUST KIDDING!  I didn't mean for him to... I didn't want him to.... STUPID GEORGE!  STUPID BRAN!  STUPID CHILDREN OF THE FOREST!  STUPID MIRA!  I HATE YOU ALL!   WHY?  WHY HODOR WHY!?!?!?

Ok, my tantrum is over for the moment.  No guarantees for later though when someone asks me to hold the door in the elevator... I just might start sobbing uncontrollably again like everyone else did last night.
Hodor hodor hodor, Hodor hodor, hodor hodor hodor.  Hodor hodor hodor hodor hodor hodor hodor - HODOR. 

I think I need a minute guys.




Wednesday, April 27, 2016

Season Six Premier Party: RECAP

Season Six Premier Party: RECAP


Overall, our little get-together was a booming success!  After all, the Direwolves didn't accidentally eat anyone and there were no major brawls in the mead hall.  I may have had one (or 6) too many white walkers, but I digress.  HBO is amazing in that when you're too drunk to follow along in the show when it's happening, you can shamefully watch it again the next day as you recover with a cup of strong coffee.  

I did lose the nipple bet by 1 though - counting the nipples we did see as FOUR SEPARATE SETS OF NIPPLES.  Spoilers - technically they belong to the same person, however, they are two different sets of boobs - time is fickle bitch.

Our guests LOVED their direwolves and were raving about the amazing stories that came with them.  Ghost and Gmork were fought over but gladly, all of them found good and loving homes.  My seven year old (who does not watch the shows, by the way...) loves his Ghost and tucks him in to his blankets before he leaves for school every day, it's adorable.

Another big hit was the food - no surprise there.  The crown roast was a HUGE hit and it really wasn't that tough to make!  Both the pork and the beef roasts were amazing though it seemed that the preference fell to the pork roast.  Personally, I preferred the beef  but both will be on my repeat list.  The vegetables were also amazing. I'd say that if I could re-vamp anything for the evening it would have been the stuffing.  I used a quick cooking steel cut oat, and as a result, it came out kind of hard - extra crunchy.  There are times when this is good but in this instance, there wasn't enough soft moist stuffing to balance it out.  In the end it was a bit on the gritty side for our liking.   Good flavor though!

For the crown roasts I actually rubbed them down with yogurt, turmeric, and curry seasoning then chilled them overnight.  I've found that a good yogurt marinade holds in the moisture to your meat so it doesn't end up like shoe leather.  You wouldn't have to use these types of spices in with your yogurt if you don't want to, it would be just as well to use pepper, herbs and lemon juice, for example.  It can be very versatile and easy to customize to your liking.

Had Robert Baratheon known he would be entertaining the likes of... a vegetarian... he probably would have taken her out back and fed her to the wolves but - I am nothing if not a hospitable wench and was easily able to accommodate her - even if her meal was looking at her.  Lucky for me she allows herself fish from time to time so it was a piece of cake.  What you see here is a rainbow trout stuffed with fresh thyme, rosemary and butter with a light lemony glaze on the top broiled in the oven for about 15 minutes or so (inner temp 170).  To be honest, I was a little jealous... it looked incredible.

Everything turned out wonderfully and now the planning has begun for the finale party... Death Pool updates will be coming soon!

Valar Morghulis!










Saturday, April 23, 2016

S6PP: Engines on...

SEASON SIX: PREMIER PARTY
ENGINES ON.....

I'm 4 years old and my parents have just told me that tomorrow morning we are getting on an airplane and fly TO DISNEY LAND!! I'm not going sleep tonight...

This, sadly, didn't ever actually happen but it's easy for me to imagine how this must have felt... I feel like I want to jump out of my skin suit.... 

I started this morning (at 6:30 am, mind you... Because that's when babies want food) making the stuffings - first a meaty stuffing you see here with the rib meat from the frenching adventure, bacon grease, bacon, onions, celery, apples, shallots and garlic.  One of my guests is a vegetarian (Robert Baratheon would highly disapprove.....) so I've made a vegetarian version that will roast on its own for a few hours on super low than it will hold up a fish for her... 


I also made my iced milk with honey and chopped up my veggies.  Because life is hectic I asked Safeway to deliver my groceries for me and in that ...experience... I had to educate them.  You see, this thing is not a leek.  

But it will be delicious alongside my leeks, carrots, garlic, onions and herbs roasted slowly in the juices of meat and awesome.  So while I crinkle my nose at the fact that they can't tell the difference between a parsnip and a leek, I'm fortunate that they flubbed up... My guests will be too. 

After I trimmed my ribs down and dried them off, I created a marinade with some plain yogurt, thyme, turmeric, garlic, and applewood smoked sea salt.  I have a beef rack and a pork rack that were both rubbed down and will be chillaxin in my fridge until I'm ready to stuff them tomorrow.  

Lastly on the docket today, 3 lbs of hatch chilies to be seasoned and roasted slowly in the oven until soft- they'll be chopped into little bits and added to the stuffing of our Dornish stuffed peppers.

I'm excited!!  I can't sleep when I'm excited!  This is going to be amazing.  24 hours left!!!  SQUEEEEEEE!!!!




 
 

 

Thursday, April 21, 2016

S6FP: The Plaid Wedding

Season Six: Finale Party (Whaaa?)

The Plaid Wedding


The Game of Thrones Death Pool has been a much talked about thing since it's inception.  Our guests have even decided to put their money where their mouth is and toss in $20 per betting person - this will give us some funds to get something freaking amazing for them at the end of the season, perhaps a Longclaw replica?  mmmmmmmm

One thing is for certain though, we will need to beef up the finale party to make it that much more awesome.  The voucher above is a rough draft of the one that will be given to the winner - I may just make this into a horrifying brochure for this made-up place complete with the "Hall of Faces" and picture of the assassins... oops, I mean specially trained masseuses. You know... for your SPA DAY.

I am also playing around with putting together a mini apothecary kit.  Of course, a wedding means we must serve a fantastic feast and, if George has a say, people must die... 

Better get to brainstorming on this one...






Wednesday, April 20, 2016

S6PP: The Hunt for Where My $&@#! Is.


SEASON 6 PREMIERE PARTY
WHERE THE HECK IS MY CRAP??


Part of the joy of moving is that even 6 months after you've moved you're still plagued by random boxes of stuff you don't use everyday.  In my case, it's boxes full of Game of Thrones party supplies that I scarcely use and now, ironically, I can't find anywhere.  I've already filled my swear words quota for the day so maybe the Lord of the house will have better luck in the box-jungle that is our garage when he gets home.  

On the plus side, I found my vials of salt, my kazoos of winter, my mustard jars and some serving ware so I'm on the right track!  Ugh.

So I've decided that I'm going to send each guest home with AN ACTUAL DIREWOLF.  See that cutie patootie there guarding what little of my gear I could find?  That is Sir Fluffy Feet.  He will accompany his fact sheet at the table and will go home with one lucky guest.  Each guest will have a plushie version of their advertised direwolf.  They'll get a kick out of it.  













The Dish Dilemma:

My regular table ware is... well... it's colorful.  I have square plates that have retro flowers on them and this will not do at all for a medieval feast.  In 2013 I had this problem and with 13 people to feed I was forced to settle for plain square black plastic plates - I HATED them.  On the plus side, it did make clean-up easy, but they were not at all in keeping with the theme.  I can legitimately say I have had a dish problem FOR YEARS.  It's not acceptable.


So this year, I did a little digging.  I turned, once again, to my friends Amazon and Ebay.  Amazon had a great option in "sizzling plates" - a search popped up lots and lots of options but these ones seemed to be the most economical at about $10/each.  These also do double duty for Fajita night too!  I was lucky enough that in my search through eBay I was able to find a better deal - and something that looked more genuine to boot.  For $36, I was able to get 6 sizzling plates with the wooden base and free shipping... sure they looked used with the knife marks in them and everything but that is EXACTLY what I was looking for. As time goes on and I expand this little tradition, I will have to find more plates, but at least now, I know what I am looking for!  This creates another nagging dilema though.... where to store this stuff.... grr...


VALAR MORGHULIS!


Thursday, April 14, 2016

S6PP: Our series through new eyes... GoT DEATH POOL!

Season 6 Premier Party

Game Of Thrones Through New Eyes


It does not escape our tribe of bandits that this season will be the first time that we have no flippin clue what is going to happen.  We've all read the books and watched the podcasts - we are nerds, after all, and have to maintain our delicate reputation on these things...

That being said, we are going to have to up our game a little.  Before the start of every episode last season, (and the season before) we took a "Nipple Bet." There are, of course, rules to the nipple bet.  Man nipples did not count unless accompanied by woman nipples. Nipples are also counted independently.  Groups of 10 or more independent nipples did not count (angry mobs of slaves, for example).  The person who guesses the correct amount of nipples without going over wins.  Bets are placed before the show starts and a winner is announced when the credits are over.

I won't lie, the nipple bet is fun.  It may be a tradition we carry into the completion of the series - it's a lot of fun during a tense moment of the show when everyone is silent on edge for some random member of your posse to suddenly shout out "NIPPLE!"   It's good times....

This year, however, we are in the dark!  Just as all other masses who have not taken on George's task and picked up the books.  We know it's going to be awesome, just as we did before but we also knew when key characters were going to lose their heads... we don't know anything now.  That being said, I'm playing around with a dangerous idea...

The Game Of Thrones Death Pool

Here is how this works:


During dinner we will all have an opportunity to place our bets on who is going to die this season.  You get 10 points for guessing the correct person and 5 points additional if you correctly guess the episode.  You do not lose points if you incorrectly guess the episode.  You get minus 10 points if you incorrectly guess a person (so you can't bet on EVERYONE, k?) but you can never go below 0 points.

The person who has the most points at the end of the season will win something effing amazing at the finale party.   More details on that as soon as my brain births it...

Presentation:

I bounced this around in my head for a long time before settling on simple.  I could get a big piece of plywood and modge-podge everyone's pictures on it with a map of Westeros in the background and a hand-painted title and little metal cocktail swords but... WE ONLY HAVE 6 DAYS LEFT.  So lets settle on something a little more manageable here...

I printed pictures of all of my living characters on some parchment paper and will cut them out.  I'm going to pin these to a cork-board.  Yup!  That's it, nothing fancy, just a cork board.  I was able to find some super cute weapon thumb tacks that I'll use for my guests - get to that in a minute.

The pictures will be pinned to the cork board with regular boring pins, title and decorations at the top, of course.  Each guest will have a pile of  little flags at their plate - each one is a different color labeled with their name.  They will also have a pen - on the back of their flag they will write the name of the person they are choosing to die and an episode number (if they wish) then will use a weapon to pin their flag to the character.  Betting is CLOSED once the show starts and will remain that way for the entire season.  As people die, they will be marked with a red skull and crossbones and each guest will be updated of the stats via text.

I have room on my board for 7 more people and suddenly names start flying from my husbands lips like he's an auctioneer... Eventually we found ourselves having the John Snow discussion.  He is NOT ON THE BOARD.

SPOILERS!?!?  Ok, seriously, you haven't read the books and you haven't watched the series yet, what are you doing here??  Don't get all huffy over spoilers when we are going into season 6 and you haven't done your homework!  At this point, if you aren't caught up yet that's on you.

I digress.  John Snow is not on our board because he is "dead."  A LOT of people are going to be disappointed when they set his body on fire, that's all I'm sayin.  (Not saying that's a certainty but all this talk about him being alive means he's dead and he's not coming back..... my guess - I mean, who doesn't live and breathe for the moment that Game of Thrones dashes our hopes and ruins our dreams?)

The seven we must consider are, according to the Lord of the house, are as follows:








 What do you think?  Is there anyone who is more worthy?  

Here are all of the images I chose for the board - if you want to make your own, feel free to copy+paste away!  OR you can just save this post and I will update as the season progresses.  Don't be too shy to put your own best bets in the comments- If the hype is any indication, this season will be BRUTAL.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

 


Death comes for us all... can't wait to see what this thing looks like when the season is over!!!
VALAR MORGHULIS!