Filed under: Cellphones, Portable Video

Are you ready for some football? How about full-length, live coverage of 24 NCAA bowl games. Sounds good, right? Just forget about big screen HDTV though, this is MediaFLO on your itty bitty cellphone display. Fanatics (in every sense of the word) will have access to games provided by ESPN Mobile TV, CBS Mobile and FOX Mobile through Verizon’s V CAST Mobile TV. Unfortunately, none of the BCS Championship games will be available on the service. You will however have access to Roady’s Humanitarian Bowl, Gaylord Hotels Music City Bowl, the Meinke Car Care Bowl, and Papa John’s.com bowl to name just a few. “Must see” games Verizon — really?

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Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

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Filed under: Dinner, Vegetables, Recipes, Christmas

My parents had Thanksgiving dinner with some old friends this year and after the meal was over, my mom called me to rave about the Brussels Sprouts that Lucy, the friends’ daughter, had made. Lucy has two young sons and had made these sprouts in the hopes that her boys would eat them. She put a lot of effort into them, removing each leaf from every small sprout head in order to get a kid-friendly consistency. When she gave my mom the recipe, she stressed that one does not have to go to such labor-intensive lengths in order to make this dish.

The way we did it last night was to chop 2 pounds of sprouts into eighths (quarter them and then halve the quarters), which took some time but was worth it in terms of cooking speed. In a large skillet, I sauteed four thinly sliced leeks (they were fairly small leeks, total yield was about 1 1/2 cups) and two chopped shallots in a couple teaspoons of olive oil. Then the chopped sprouts went in, along with a sprig’s worth of minced rosemary. When the started to get a little dry, I added about half a cup of chicken stock (there happened to be some around, otherwise I would have used water). Cover until soft. At the very end, add 1/4 teaspoon of freshly grated nutmeg and 1/2 a cup of cream or half and half. Lastly add salt and pepper to taste.

They were so good and while they felt a little decadent, they weren’t overwhelmingly rich. I think these are going to end up on the table come Christmas dinner.

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Filed under: On the Blogs, Food Gadgets

I use my serrated edge peeler all the time, it’s a kitchen utensil that I’ve never, not for a minute, regretted buying. However, not every utensil I’ve brought into my kitchen has inspired the same feelings of affection and appreciation in my heart. The corn zipper was a pain in the butt and totally not worth the money I spent on it. I love my mandolin, but am happy that I picked it up at a thrift store for $3, as I only use it two or three times a year. However, lest you think my kitchen is filled with things I don’t use, I am totally devoted to my microplane as well as my flat whisk (so wonderful for making roux).

They are talking about this subject over on the Recipe Swap Forum at the Epi-Log, but I’d love to hear you all chime in about the gadgets you love as well as the ones you wish you had walked past, here in the comments as well.

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Filed under: Vegetables, On the Blogs, How To, Real Kitchens, Holidays, Christmas

I saw an ad in a food magazine recently in which a mother was putting down a platter holding a tofurky in front of her son and girlfriend. It implied that it was the first tofurky that this woman had prepared and that she was doing it for this new arrival who was presumably a vegetarian.

I imagine that there are actually quite a few of you out there who may find yourself with a vegetarian or vegan around your holiday table next week. I actually don’t recommend preparing tofurky as my experiences with it have been decidedly unpleasant (it’s great in concept but sadly just doesn’t taste that good). Instead, you might want to check out this post over at the Well Fed Network which lays out a bunch of tips and recipes for how you might want to make your non-meat eating guests feel welcome around your table.

During the years that my sister was a vegetarian, we typically made lots of veggies and always had several non-meat dishes into which we added chopped and toasted nuts for additional protein. For those of you who aren’t meat eaters, how to do you handle these big, celebratory meals?

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Filed under: Recipes, Candy, Sugar, Holidays, Christmas

For the next two weeks I’m in Portland, Oregon, hanging out with my parents for the holidays. One of the first things I did when I got here was pull down my mom’s old recipe notebook and start flipping through. She’s had this collection of recipes since before I was born, although she replaced the half-size binder about ten years ago when the original one started shredding. Twenty-seven years of use will do that.

In the miscellaneous section, I spotted this recipe for Christmas Divinity and thought it would make a great recipe to share. I haven’t tried this out myself, so I’d love to hear if you guys give it a try. I have no idea where the recipe comes from as it is cut out of ancient newsprint and pasted to a sheet of notebook paper. For another divinity recipe, check out this one on Noshtalgia (which is where I found the picture above).

Continue reading Christmas divinity for the holidays

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Filed under: PlayStation Store

‘Tis indeed the season to be jolly. You’ll be forgiven for wondering what was taking SCEA so long to update the store and they, in turn, will be forgiven when you cast your eyes over the mighty treasure trove of goodies that have been placed at our feet. You want PS Eye games? You got it. Add-on packs? Yep, even free ones. There’s definitely something here for everyone. Here’s the full release list:

• Games:
• Toy Home full game ($9.99)
• Trials of Topoq PS Eye game ($4.99)
• Mesmerize Distort PS Eye “game” ($1.99)
• Warhawk PS1 game ($5.99)
• Snakeball full game ($9.99) - To download, you must get the free demo and purchase the full game from within the demo.

• Demos:
• Snakeball demo (free)
• Blacksite: Area 51 demo (free)

• Themes:
• Warhawk (free)
• PAIN (free) - Warning: These are the worst things ever.

• Add-ons:
• Warhawk: Operation Omega Dawn expansion ($7.99)
• Folklore “Holiday” add-on (free)
• Motorstorm “Holiday skin” add-on (free)
• Guitar Hero III “We Three Kings” song (free)
• High Stakes add-on pack 1 (free)
• High Stakes add-on pack 2 (free)
• Rock Band songs
• The Pretenders - Brass in Pocket ($1.99)
• Weezer - Buddy Holly ($1.99)
• Radiohead - My Iron Lung ($1.99)

• Game Videos
• GT 5 Prologue “Sizzle” trailer (free)
• Devil May Cry 4 final trailer (free)
• Warhawk “Omega Dawn” trailer (free)
• PS3 “Only On” TV Spot (free)
• PS3 “Universe” TV Spot (free)
• Tony Hawk’s Proving Grounds “Mike V’s Skater Story” video (free)
• Turok “Dino Mauling” video (free)
• PSP “Feature” video (free)
• Uncharted “Animation” behind the scenes video (free)

• Movie Trailers
• Strange Wilderness movie trailer (free)
• Oral Fixation Tour Blu-Ray trailer (free)

We honestly didn’t expect to see Toy Home releasing today, but we’re sure glad it did - on both sides of the pond. Releasing the PS1 version of Warhawk for download is certainly very cute of Sony. Now stop reading and start downloading - there’s a lot to get through!

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Filed under: e-Distribution Games

The European PSN Store updated with a trailer for a newly unveiled PSN game, appropriately called Sky Diving. (Looking at the font, it looks like it was originally going to be called Go! Sky Diving … ) The concept is pretty original, and we’re excited to see how it’s executed. However, we’re terribly afraid that the game will make poor use of unnecessary SIXAXIS controls, like so many PSN titles. Who knows? Maybe this one will work just right. Or, maybe it’ll make you look so stupendously awkward that it’ll be a blast. Either way, our interest is piqued.

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Filed under: Best of 2007

Stay tuned all this week as we reveal the our nominees for the very best games of 2007. Winners will be declared on December 27th.

2007 didn’t really see the release of many strategy games. The games are generally slow-paced, involve a lot of micromanagement, and have branching stories that lead to a multitude of endings. Whether turn-based, real-time, or some sort of middle ground, strategy games almost always make for an exciting gaming experience. Knowing this, we should mention the single strategy game that earns an automatic victory this year.

The winner of PS3 Fanboy - Best Strategy Game is:Stay tuned all this week as we reveal the our nominees for the very best games of 2007. Winners will be declared on December 27th.

2007 didn’t really see the release of many strategy games. The games are generally slow-paced, involve a lot of micromanagement, and have branching stories that lead to a multitude of endings. Whether turn-based, real-time, or some sort of middle ground, strategy games almost always make for an exciting gaming experience. Knowing this, we should mention the single strategy game that earns an automatic victory this year.

The winner of PS3 Fanboy - Best Strategy Game is:

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Filed under: Drama, Foreign Language, Independent, Casting, Deals, Mystery & Suspense, Cinematical Indie

As a lovelorn cop in Wong Kar Wai’s Chungking Express, he ate expired cans of pineapple; as a mute urban guerrilla in Wong’s Fallen Angels, he broke into other people’s businesses and forced passers-by to be his customers. Those were the first two films in which I saw Takeshi Kaneshiro; his brooding, romantic looks have served him well in a career that has ranged all over Asia — aided, no doubt, by his broad appeal and multi-lingual talents. Born in Taiwan, he speaks Japanese, Taiwanese, Mandarin, Cantonese and English.

His highest profile titles in the West have probably been the Japanese science fiction action picture The Returner and Zhang Yimou’s costumed martial arts epic House of Flying Daggers. He’s one of the stars of the just released action epic The Warlords (which has done boffo box office) and will also be featured in John Woo’s upcoming Red Cliff. Kaneshiro will also be starring in The Fiend With Twenty Faces (AKA K-20: Kaijin niju menso den), according to a recent story by Mark Schilling at Variety Asia Online.

Kaneshiro will play a master criminal plying his trade in a fictional Japanese city in 1949. The lovely Takako Matsu — who is coming off a lead performance in the big fall hit Hero — has been set to portray a victim of “The Fiend” and veteran Toro Nakamura will co-star as a detective. Shimako Sato will direct. Filming is scheduled to begin in January and Toho plans to release it in December 2008. I’m hard pressed at the moment to think of a role in which Kaneshiro has played someone that could be called a “fiend,” so I’ll be very interested to see what comes of a film that’s been described as a mystery crime drama.

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Filed under: Drama, Independent, Thrillers, Casting, Deals, Newsstand

I can think of a lot worse than being stalked by a girl who looked like Mischa Barton. (Like being stalked by a guy who looked like Barton Fink.) Yup, the girl we all remember as playing Marissa Cooper on The O.C. is preparing to show us that hot girls can be stalkers too by signing on to star in the indie thriller Homecoming. What, you’ve never had a hot girl stalk you? Seriously? You should try on my job for a day — hot girls are absolutely infatuated with overweight, balding internet film writers. It’s insane! But if we can get serious for a moment: Variety tells us the actress will star alongside Matt Long, Jessica Stroup and Michael Landes, while Morgan J. Freeman (Hurricane) will direct off a script from Frank Hannah (The Cooler).

Homecoming will tell the all-too-familiar tale of a former small-town golden boy and his new girlfriend who decide to visit his hometown when — holy bleeping crap — they discover his high school sweetheart (Barton) is, like, totally obsessed with the guy still. Variety calls it an “unhealthy obsession,” while I say the more the merrier. No word on a production schedule or a release date, but it should be fun to watch the girl from The O.C. go absolutely nutty over a guy. I want her doing bad things. Very bad things. Despite being pretty well known, Barton still has not managed to land a role bigger than “insert random indie title here.” Perhaps she’s going about her career in the right way, or perhaps she’s just not appealing enough for the bigger stuff. What say you?

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