"Julie and Julia"

When I visited Washington in March I saw Julia Child's kitchen at the Museum of American History. I was so taken with it that I even blogged about it and posted one of the photos above. Tonight I went with my friend, Mary to see "Julie and Julia" which is both about how Julia Child came to write "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" and how Julie Powell of Queens, NY (the neighborhood near my office) wrote a blog about cooking all the recipes in "Mastering the Art..." in a year.

I loved it! It's about food (and extraordinary food), Paris, blogging, New York and stars one of my favorite actresses, Meryl Streep, who is extraordinary as Julia Child. It's also about finding the thing in life you love to do and doing it with joy and passion. And dear readers, it was filmed at Silvercup Studio, which I wrote about earlier this week.

In the one degree of separation...Meryl Streep and I overlapped for one semester in college. I spent my junior year at one of the men's colleges that was thinking of going coeducational -- and did the next year -- and Meryl was there the year before I got there and my first semester. We didn't know each other, but there were only 70 there, so I pretty much knew who the women were and even then she was an outstanding actress and very beautiful. It came as no surprise when she was starring in movies a decade later.

And my only experience cooking from "Mastering the Art..." came one Thanksgiving. In a total break from tradition a friend suggested we cook goose stuffed with prunes and foie gras. It took hours and involved such actions as stuffing the prunes with foie gras, intricate and labor intensive. The result was delicious, but very rich. I have happily returned to turkey in the years since.

Wishing you all, dear gentle readers, joy in all that you do.