the end of summer… aka Fun with Homemade Marshmallows

Cinema Brittahytta did not end with my Oz birthday…there was still a whole month of summer left, even though this year the weather was so cool it didn’t really feel like it!

I knew I wanted to show a Trek-related 3 week series, then we added Kick Ass the week before since it was a new release, and I had missed it in theatres when I was in Australia. I really liked it but boy was it violent! Most definitely rated R, and if you didn’t like Kill Bill, don’t even bother, since the violence is on that level. No special food that week, but I raided my closet to throw together a Teal Girl outfit ala all purple Hit Girl from the movie…heehee!

I also finally bought an aqua stand mixer as an early birthday present for myself, inspired by wanting to make my own homemade marshmallows. I tried vegan gelatin which didn’t work, then I tried maple bacon marshmallows just for fun which I liked but got mixed reviews. I also experimented with colored sugar techniques, and knew I would do some kind of special Trek marshmallow creation but not sure exactly what.

The next week was Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, still the best Trek film ever! I found out it was also National S’Mores Day, so that made my special Trek food obvious…Trek S’Mores!

Since my chocolate mold was only Next Generation commbadges, which did NOT go with classic movie Trek, I made a new silicone mold for milk chocolate chevrons since s’mores must be milk chocolate, and made a normal batch of marshmallows (boy that stuff is STICKY!), cut into large rounds that exactly fit on the half-graham cracker and fit the chevron just like the belt buckles in Wrath of Khan.

Even though I hoped they would be melted later like proper s’mores, for presentation I pre-toasted the edges of the marshmallow rounds over a candle. I think they turned out great, we had a blast roasting them over open flame in my firepit, and everyone enjoyed them!

I have been dying to show my fellow geeks the movie Free Enterprise for a couple years, since it makes me laugh so hard but needs the right audience to appreciate it. Since Wrath of Khan figures in the plot, I thought it was perfect to schedule after Khan, and it was well-received…yay! We mixed our own Romulan Ales with Absolut Citron & blue curacao, and I got out almost all of my Trek collection & posters to make the patio look like the apartment of one of the main characters.

We closed out the season this week with the newest Star Trek, the reboot from last year complete with matching Spock & Kirk posters, and since it was the season finale, I wanted to make one last special dessert…Trek marshmallows in command gold, sciences blue and services red! It was finally warm weather so we didn’t roast these marshmallows but everyone liked them…I think the red ones were demolished first…?

I found a metal cookie cutter I wasn’t using and bent it into the Trek chevron shape to cut a new batch of homemade marshmallows, then I dipped the sticky cut edges into colored sugar…services red came out of the jar, but command gold was yellow & orange mixed, and sciences blue was a mix of light blue and purple. This time I wore my Live Long & Prosper cutesy Spock shirt, and I was so hot getting everything ready in the triple-digit heat that I never did cool down! We saw “movie rat” a couple times, which has become a game to see who notices him first running so fast across the roof or power lines. Cinema the Cat came back during the movie to hang out with us, getting nice pets from everyone, then he went to the patio to hang out with Onyx who was inside my bedroom looking out at the patio. Ebony is still protective of her territory, but Onyx & Cinema seem to get along just fine. Cinema stayed out on the patio until well after everyone else left. Since he hasn’t come by too often, I’m glad he joined us for the season finale.

Now that the movie screen has been taken down, my summer is over…even more so because this time next week I’ll already be in Ireland, and by the time I return to California, it will officially be autumn!