(The giveaway is over, and random.org pulled number five, Kristy! Thanks for playing everyone!)

“I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.” ― Mark Twain

Back To School is 96 minutes of Rodney Dangerfield’s famous one-liners with some filler about parties and school and diving meets, aka totally hilarious. Thornton Melon is a totally self-made millionaire, but lacking a formal education. After his wife cheats on him, Thornton decides to visit his son at college where he finds out that his son is miserable. To help his son out (and because he is clearly having a mid-life crisis of some sort), he decides to enroll too! Money is thrown everywhere, ridiculous stunts are pulled to get him, his son, and their roommate what they want. Having Oingo Boingo play your dorm party? Sure. Hiring Kurt Vonnegut to write a paper about himself? Why not! Of course, you can’t buy everything.

Despite having all of this money, Thornton is nothing less than an awesome guy. He loves his son, he is free with his money and favors. The big issue is that he’s so used to buying things and doing what he wants when he wants, he doesn’t handle the responsibilities of college too well. But in the end, with a studying montage, he is able to pull through and squeak by with a solid D average! The American dream.

(Yes, I see the watermark. You see what comes up when you google image search ‘Back To School’ and find me some better screencaps!)

Starring Rodney Dangerfield (Caddyshack, Ladybugs), Sally Kellerman (MASH, her voice), Burt Young (all of the Rocky movies), Keith Gordon (Christine, director), Terry Farrell (DS9, Hellraiser III), Adrienne Barbeau (Escape From New York [she was married to John Carpenter], Carnivale), and William Zabka (the blonde bully from The Karate Kid and Just One of the Guys, Hot Tub Time Machine). Robert Downey Jr. is really good as the roommate, sadly his career never really took off. Who knows what he’s up to these days.

This is a great movie to play ‘spot the cameo’. Can you find Robert Picardo from Star Trek Voyager?

Celine contacted me and asked me if I wanted to give a copy of Vegan Sandwiches away, so I decided to work it into a MoFo post!

Entree: If you have Vegan Sandwiches, I recommend The Party Monster (page 124), or the recipe posted below! Rodney Dangerfield dumps a couple of appetizer trays into a hollowed out loaf, so I picked the sandwich that I thought was closest match, in spirit, to that strange concoction (no deviled eggs here).
Side: Dive into this three layer (Triple Lindy) dip!
Dessert: It’s just not college without copious amounts of beer (cupcakes). You should really use Miller to make it a proper tribute.

Jimwich, from Vegan Sandwiches Save the Day, posted with permission from Celine Steen (special thanks to Tami’s husband for inventing this!)

For Seitan

1 pound Moo-Free Seitan (page 180, or use your favorite), thinly sliced
1/2 c dry red wine
1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp smoked salt

For barbequed onions and dressing

1 tsp olive oil
1 1/4 c thinly sliced onion
3 tbsp barbeque sauce
1/3 c vegan mayonnaise (okay, there is one recipe that calls for vegan mayo!)
1 tbsp mustard
2 tsp hot sauce
2 tsp white wine vinegar

For fried pickles
1 1/4 c dill pickles, cut into 1/2 inch rounds and patted dry
6 tbsp flour, divided
canola oil, for cooking
1/2 c non-dairy milk
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika

For seitan and sandwiches

1 baguette, 20 inches long, halved lengthwise and some of inside removed
2 c shredded lettuce
1 large tomato, sliced

To make the seitan: Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Combine the seitan, wine, pepper, and salt in a 9 x 13 inch pan. Baked for ten minutes, or until the liquid has evaporated.

To make the onions: Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring, for ten minutes, or until softened. Stir in the sauce. Cook for two minutes longer. Set aside and keep until warm.

To make the dressing: Mix all the ingredients together in a small bowl until smooth.

To make the pickles: Line a plate with paper towels. In a medium-size bowl, toss the pickles with one tablespoon of the floor. Pour 1/4 an inch of oil into a large skillet and heat over medium-high heat. in a pie plate, stir together the milk, remaining five tablespoons of flour, baking powder, and paprika. Working in batches, dip the floured pickles into the batter, then place in the skillet. Cook for three minutes, or until golden. Turn and cook the other side for two minutes. transfer to the plate to drain.

To assemble the sandwiches: Spread the dressing evenly on both sides of the bread. Layer with the seitan, onions, pickles, lettuce, and tomato; replace the top of the bread. Cut int four pieces and serve.

Now onto the giveaway, that i’m sure you just scrolled past ALL of that to get to. Since Rodney Dangerfield was one of the most well liked and respected comedians on the past few decades, to enter, simply tell me who your favorite comedian is (unless it’s Dane Cook, then please don’t tell me). I will pick a winner on Tuesday evening, October 16th. This giveaway is US only, sorry!

Jesus loves winners!

Drop Dead Gorgeous is a mockumentary about a beauty pageant in a small town in Minnesota. Because of the subject matter, the cast is almost exclusively female, and I think it’s one of the best female-led comedies of the 90′s.

The main character is Amber, who wants to win the pageant to help her get out of a dead end life in this small town. She lives with her chain smoking mom in a trailer, she’s super nice, and she’s a talented tap dancer. She is totes going to nail this shit, right? WRONG. The head of the pageant committee’s daughter has also entered, and…strange things happen. Exploding threshers, exploding trailers, stray bullets to the head. Anyone who crosses Becky is eliminated, the judges are clearly paid off, and her family is the richest family in town. But is that enough to get her to the state pageant? We’ll see!

Besides being incredibly quotable (“Mom still cries whenever she sees a tilt-a-whirl or a fat lady in a tube top.”), and having some really bizarre moments like a dramatic monlogue from Soylent Green or Becky (badly) singing and dancing with a blow up Jesus on a cross, I think the best part of Drop Dead Gorgeous is that there are so. Many. Funny. Women.

Kirsten Dunst (Spiderman, Bring It On) and Denise Richards (Starship Troopers, Wild Things) are fine as the leads, but they are outshined by the three duos of adult women in the movie. Ellen Barkin (The New Normal, This Boy’s Life) and Allison Janney (The West Wing, Juno) are Amber’s mom and her best friend, and they are hilarious. The best part of the pageant is every shot of them in the audience. Kirstie Alley (Cheers, Look Who’s Talking) plays Becky’s mom and Mindy Sterling (Austin Powers) is her lackey/verbal punching bag. And finally, Nora Dunn (SNL) and Mo Gaffney (That 70′s Show, The Kathy & Mo Show) have a few minutes as the ladies in charge of the state pageant. And of course, Brittany Murphy (Clueless, King of the Hill) is awesome. I’m sure i’m not alone when I say GOD DAMMIT WHY ARE YOU DEAD YOU WERE SO FUNNY AND SO AWESOME. Oh and some girl named Amy Adams who is now super famous got her movie career kicked off here.

And now onto the menu! The first thing I did was google ‘vegan lutefisk‘. You have fun with that.

Appetizer: One great thing about being vegan is that you never have to worry about food poisoning from undercooked shellfish. We could win every beauty pageant with a seafood bar! I know not a lot of people have access to vegan versions of seafood, but I bet this shrimp cocktail would still be good with this fish flavored seitan.
Entree: With all of the funerals and church potlucks going on, you need a casserole. Or as they call it in Minnesota, a ‘Hot Dish‘. A looser recipe with more of an explanation can be found here.
Dessert: Gladys may have had her faults, but apparently she could solve world hunger with a rhubarb pie.

Hit it!

The Blues Brothers is one of the greatest movies EVER. Funny? Check. Awesome cameos? Check. Bitchin’ soundtrack? Take that check to the bank and cash it! It was the first movie ever made out of a Saturday Night Live skit, and the most successful (maybe tied with Wayne’s World, most of the others were complete turds). A lot of people don’t know that The Blues brothers was more than a skit though, before the movie they released an album, and still continued to tour after Belushi’s death (although now the only original members left are The Colonel and Blue Lou).

The basic plot of the movie is that after being released from jail and finding out that the orphanage he had been raised in with his brother is in danger of being closed for unpaid taxes, Jake has a religious vision that tells him to get the band back together to save the orphanage. It’s comedy with a conscience! Of course, there are many wacky hijinks. Run ins with nazis, Carrie Fisher trying to kill them a few times, more cars wrecked than any other movie in history (103, which wasn’t topped until they wrecked 104 for the sequel).

I don’t think anyone bills The Blues Brothers as a musical, but it is full of awesome music and cameos out the wazoo! The musical guests include Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Cab Calloway, Chaka Kahn, John Lee Hooker, and Ray Charles. And obviously, the band themselves.

Starring John Belushi (SNL, Animal House, rock n’ roll heaven) and Dan Akroyd (SNL, Ghostbusters, all of my other favorite 80′s movies). Other non-musical people include Carrie Fisher (Star Wars), John Candy (Spaceballs, Uncle Buck), Twiggy (60′s supermodel), Frank Oz (Yoda, Miss Piggy and various other Muppets, Paul Reubens (Pee-Wee, Blow, Buffy the Vampire Slayer [the movie]), and some guy named Steven Spielberg is near the end. The bummer about this movie is that a lot of the cast is now dead, mostly from old age, but it’s still a little sad to watch and realize that.

I saw the sequel in the theaters, and while it’s nowhere near as good as the original, I think the musical performances are still great.

The movie takes place in Chicago, was filmed on location, and Dan Akroyd even does an amazing Chicago accent (“We’re on a mission from gad.”), so let’s chow down on some windy city grub!

Entree: I don’t know if I would want to eat the vegan equivalent of four fried chickens along with some dry toast, so instead let’s make a Radical Reuben from The Chicago Diner.
Side: Let’s kill two references with one stone! Sweet Home Chicago AND the cigarettes are both covered with Sweet and Smoky Sweet Potato Fries.
Dessert: There’s only one place we can go with this: Blueberry Pie.
Cocktail: “Who wants an orange whip? Orange whip? Orange whip? Three orange whips!” Easily veganized with non-dairy creamer (thanks to Katie for suggesting this). Non-drinkers should, of course, drink a coke.