I don't know if it was the Campbell's soup talking, but immediately after our first dinner and a movie night the Army Dude suggested we do it again - this time choosing a country instead of a time period. We bandied around a few ideas, finally settling on Indian food and a Bollywood movie. I was concerned because it wasn't so long ago that the Army Dude officially did not like Indian cuisine. I figured that a couple of good Indian dinners could be completely cancelled out by my inexperience, so I looked around for user-friendly recipes. Eating Well magazine had a Chicken Tikka Masala recipe that looked easy and tasty. It was, both. We loved it.
For dessert, I used an apple spice coffee cake recipe I found online and I subtituted garam masala for the spices listed. Voila! Yummy Indian Spice Cake! If you want to try this at home, add 3 teaspoons garam masala - I followed the recipe and wished I'd used more than the 2 teaspoons it calls for - and knock the heat back to 350 degrees to prevent the bottom from getting overcooked before the center is done.
While I was planning the dinner, I kept asking the Army Dude if he was sure about the movie. I said "You know Bollywood movies have songs, right? And they're REALLY campy?" But he was brave. (This, my friends, is why our army is the envy of the world.) We watched Bollywood/Hollywood, which technically was not made in Bollywood but it plays on the conventions and storylines of romantic comedies in general and Bollywood films specifically. It was hilarious and the Army Dude actually liked the songs. It may have helped that the lyrics were in Hindi.
