Dinner and a Movie

[Bike geeks (like me) can talk about bikes and biking and bike races and other cyclists and gear and equipment and . . . you get the picture. It can be endless and BORING for anyone who doesn’t share the passion.

I get that.

My plan is to broaden my focus a bit in the coming months. I will post a recipe and a movie review every weekend. Let me know what you think!]

Dinner
This isn’t typically “dinner,” but it could be. I love to eat breakfast for dinner. My mom used to let us have pancakes and scrambled eggs when my Dad wasn’t home for dinner – it seemed like we were getting away with something. Anyway, this is my sister Barb’s recipe. She usually makes it for holiday brunches and I love it!! Serve it with some fresh fruit and low fat yogurt.

HASH BROWN QUICHE

INGREDIENTS
3 cups shredded hash brown potatoes
2 tablespoons butter, melted
seasoning salt to taste
1 cup diced cooked ham
1/4 cup chopped onion
1 small can green chiles, drained
1 cup shredded pepper jack cheese
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
salt and pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

Press hash browns onto the bottom and sides of a 9-inch pie dish. Brush with melted butter, and sprinkle with seasoning salt. Bake in preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until beginning to brown.

In a small bowl, combine ham, onion and shredded cheese. In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, salt, pepper, and a little seasoning salt. When crust is ready, spread ham mixture on the bottom, and then cover with egg mixture.

Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C.) Bake in preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until filling is puffed and golden brown.

Movie
A Crude Awakening (2006) (85 min. run-time)

Basil Gelpke and Ray McCormack's nonfiction treatise Crude Awakening joins Maxed Out, An Inconvenient Truth, and other recent documentaries devoted to unearthing and exploring forces that are untying the connective threads of contemporary society.

The subject at hand is crude oil - specifically, the depletion of petroleum from the Earth, in an era when consumption threatens to exceed supply. The overtone of the film is speculative but admonitory; Gelpke and McCormack suggest that if western society fails to reinvent itself altogether (via such innovations as hydrogen-powered autos, and a decreased reliance on politically unsound Middle Eastern nations), economic cataclysm is not just likely it is inevitable. To underscore this point, the filmmakers contrast obscenely naïve shorts from the 1950s that promise depthless oil supplies, with contemporary warnings from geologists who suggest that the bottom of the well is close at hand.

McCormack and Gelpke interview subjects such as former OPEC secretary general Fadhil Chalabi and Bush advisor Roger E. Ebel.

Phil and I watched it June 26 while doing interval workouts. First let me say that because Phil is a petroleum engineer, we are pretty educated on this issue. The movie takes a somewhat simplistic approach to the problem, but it still presents a great deal of thought-provoking information.

The bottom line is that hydrocarbons are a non-renewable resource. Production is not keeping up with demand. The entire Western lifestyle is predicated on cheap hydrocarbons to drive industry and agriculture. What are we going to do when cheap hydrocarbons are no longer available?

In an effort to provide a “fair and balanced” picture of what is known as the Peak Oil issue, I’m providing a link to an opinion piece that ran in the New York Times recently.

I disagree with the analysis, but I’ll throw it out here so you can form your own independent opinions.

I give the movie 3 stars out of 5. A superficial treatment of a critical issue – but at least it introduces the core concepts. The audience can do additional research if so inclined.