Food On Film: Today’s Special

Friday nights are my weekly cooking quizzes for myself where I test out a dinner party menu and see if I can successfully make at least three items from memory.  This is what I call the “dinner party drill”. I’ve found it much more relaxing to cook up a menu for guests after I’ve had a few opportunities to practice it.  However, at times it’s just Hubby as the only guest and I have a feeling he doesn’t mind a five course meal.

If it’s just Hubby for dinner, most of these practice runs are accompanied by a Friday night movie.  Hubby and I don’t own a television so we pick up DVDs from the library next door and watch it on the computer, or search for something online.

For a while now, I’ve been looking forward to watching Today’s Special.  A film about Indian cooking where a professional chef in a French style kitchen ends up running his family’s Indian restaurant.

I love food films.  So it was a real treat to find one about Indian cooking.  It was also a plus that this movie stars one of my favorite Indian cookbook authors, Madhur Jaffrey, who plays the mother to the main character. Hubby watched the movie with me and actually enjoyed it as well.  He’s a sci-fi thriller fan and light, feel-good food movies are not his style. So it was a bit surprising he actually sat through the whole movie and thoroughly enjoyed it. The movie stars one of his favorite comedians Aasif Mandvi from the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, as well as Naseeruddin Shah, who is one of India’s most respected Bollywood actors.

I could never find this film anywhere until I found it last week on iTunes.  If you choose to rent it on iTunes, keep in mind that it needs to download first, which takes about 70 minutes.  You can rent it for up to 30 days but once you press play, you have only 24-hours to watch it.  In twenty-four hours I got two viewings of it.  I think it will have to be a film I get for my library of food movies as it’s certainly one to watch over and over again.

If you are looking for a fun movie about Indian cooking with lots of great kitchen scenes, this is the film for you.   Make sure there is some good food around because this film will make you hungry.

Why was it inspiring?  It reminded me to cook from the heart with a sense of adventure.  Many of the scenes were about cooking for those you love as well as cooking for your own enjoyment.

This movie reminds us that it is the act of cooking itself that brings joy; cutting a tomato, releasing the aroma of spices in hot oil and filling the air with scent of fresh garlic and mint. This is the joy, not just the end product.  Why go for the short cut?  Sure, I can buy a box of samosas from the store and they will be great, but it would never give me the same satisfaction and pride I get from seeing others enjoying the food I’ve learned to make on my own.

Alright, I am off to plan my own “Today’s Special” in my kitchen. Enjoy watching “Today’s Special”- the movie.