Movie Night: The Graduate

Well here's to you, Mrs. Robinson . . . Here's the first Movie Night "Classic Film and Recipes Pairing" for my Premium Subscribers. We have MY pick for best "Mrs. Robinson cocktail" recipe on the worldwide webs, AND a 1967 contemporary dish I found that I think might have appealed to Mrs. Braddock (Elizabeth Wilson) to cook up for her family in Pasadena. (Insider note: Mrs. Robinson lived in Beverly Hills. She and Benjamin met at a hotel in between.)

If you do an internet search for "Mrs. Robinson cocktail" you get quite a few results! The one that seemed to me most like a recipe Ms R. would mix up at her own home bar in Bev Hills, comes from David Shoemaker at the Teardrop Lounge in Portland, Oregon, courtesy of The Drunkard's Almanac website.

The Graduate Cocktail

Equipment

• Collins or Highball Glass

Ingredients

• 1 oz Sweet Vermouth

• ¾ oz Scotch Whisky—Just use a blended Scotch here, nothing fancy.

• ½ oz Curacao

• Tonic water

• Garnish: lemon twist

Method

1. Combine sweet vermouth, Scotch whisky and Curacao in an ice filled glass.

2. Top with tonic water.

3. Stir briefly and garnish with lemon twist.

4. Queue up The Graduate movie.

5. Drink.

And NOW, for the dinner recipe. "Oriental" is still allowed for referring to rugs. But you'll graciously forgive me for the name of this recipe. I think Mrs. Braddock, Benjamin's mother, whose first name we never learn in the film, would have found this recipe appealing, and exotically international, and "healthy," for the time. And she would probably have had the MSG (which, by the way, is not bad for you) on hand. So here we go. From a vintage 1967 cookbook I acquired, "What's Cooking in Beverly Hills."

ORIENTAL STEW

1 lb lean pork or beef

3 T oil

MSG

2 crushed garlic cloves

1 T sugar

1/4 t ground ginger

1/2 c soy sauce

3 T dry mustard

2-3 carrots

1/3 lb fresh green beans

1 lb fresh broccoli

5 lg sliced mushrooms

5 chopped green onions

1 pkg oriental type noodles

Slice meat into strips. Heat oil in large enamel casserole or deep skillet.

Sprinkle MSG generously over meat before browning. Add garlic sugar, ginger and 1/4 c soy sauce. Fill pan half way with water. Cover and simmer about 20 min.

Then add diagonal sliced carrots and green beans and broccoli, split in large slices. Let cook

'til just tender not soft. At last minute add sliced onions and mushrooms.

Prepare noodles (Saimen or Udon) according to package. To serve place noodles in individual

soup bowls. Pour stew over them. Pass around bowl containing dry mustard and 1/4 c soy sauce mixture. Dab mixture lightly on top of stew.

Serves 6-8.

Connie Kamahele

Hawthorne

The cookbook cover. A number of schools outside the city limits, one assumes, were part of the Beverly Hills solar system, and tapped for recipes.

First Edition, 1967.

As mentioned: here's to you, Mrs. Robinson.