One of the things I did with the kids during the second half of the month long school holiday was cooping up at home watching movies.  The haze condition chased most of us indoors, we could only do that many craft projects before the paper/glue/paint mess got too big to be handled.  So I slotted in a few celluloid classics while I do the cleaning or cooking.

A few titles that always get requested are the anime works of Hayao Miyazaki’s (宫崎骏), my kids love them, from the earlier ones like Castle in the Sky, Whisper of the Heart (My Favorite!), Kiki’s Delivery Service, to the recent ones like Spirited Away, The Secret World of Arrietty, etc.

** A Must : When you are done with the movies, and can’t get enough of their beautiful soundtrack, be sure to catch this Studio Ghibli 25 years concert, and relive those favorite moments again.

Made old school popcorns at home for snacking while watching the movies.  I always thought that you’ll need those huge looking corn popping machines seen at the theater snack bar to do the trick.  Turned out that my heavy bottom pan, some butter, and corn kernels would do.  Even your microwave could do it, some made it look even simpler with a brown bag and eating straight out of it after the corns are popped.  Just stay away from those microwave-ready popcorns.

Butter and ghee are my preferred fat for making these popcorns.  I still rely on the stove-top method instead of the microwave version because somehow my microwave seems to burn the popped corns easily.  It was so frustrating picking out the charred ones.  A lower setting did not work either.  Think I am destined to stand by the stove…

HOMEMADE POPCORNS
// Adapted from Creative Simple Life

INGREDIENTS
1 heap tablespoon of ghee
1/3 cup corn kernel

1. Place 3 corn kernels in a covered (preferably glass cover for see-through) pot and heat over medium fire.
2. Once the 3 kernels are popped, remove them from the pot, and add the ghee and rest of corn kernels into the pot, covered with lid.
3. Corns should start popping in a while, shake the pot back and forth intermittently, so that the popped kernels does not get charred below.  Lift the lid slightly to let steam escaped.
4. Once the popping slow down to just 1 per second, turn off fire, and pour the popcorns into a serving bowl.
5. Season according to preference.  I love the convenience of Old Bay or melted dark chocolate.