– Rock Candy –

Flavored sugar crystals attached to a convenient stick.

Hard, sharp candy

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Rock candy is probably the prettiest candy in the world, with a correspondingly horrible eating experience. The crystals kind of hurt your mouth and they dissolve really slowly. But who are we to dictate preferences to Abigail? (And the Dwarf, but they like weird stuff already and don’t really count.)

In fact, as far as I can tell the greatest appeal of rock candy is in making it. So go ahead, make it and then throw it straight out if you like.

But I’m being generous with canon this time. Any kind of hard, sharp candy will count… and if you do it right, any hard candy can become sharp. The champion hard, sharp candy is, of course, candy canes, which in some people’s hands violate the Geneva Conventions. It’ll also work with Jolly Ranchers, peppermints, and Werther’s.

And if you have the time and desire, go ahead and make some purple rock candy. It’s your mouth and you can destroy it with sugar blades if you want to.

– Chocolate Popcorn –

It’s normal popcorn… but with a chocolate coating.

Puffed/popped grains with chocolate

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This might be easiest to just buy. There are plenty of versions… and when we get right down to it, isn’t buying a snack ready-made more Movie Theater than making it from scratch?

But let’s assume you DO want to make it from scratch. It doesn’t have to be completely covered in chocolate to count. Something like the recipe at left, where it’s just drizzled, is perfectly acceptable and probably a lot easier.

But here’s the thing. It doesn’t have to be popcorn! Sure, you can do chocolate drizzle popcorn or moose tracks and call it a day, but other exploded foods work too, like Rice Krispies or even Chex. And you can add only chocolate or you can get fancy with other candies, sauces, or even dried fruit.

Any combination of chocolate with puffed grains will work. Even popcorn fondue—have a bowl of melted chocolate and dip plain popcorn into it. It doesn’t get much more low-maintenance than that. Unless you just buy it.

The Zuzu City Express

A beloved movie classic, carefully restored for modern theaters.

Choose a classic movie and award additional points as follows:

In black and white	+3
Set on a train	+3
Starring a Golden Age actress	+2
An “unsuitable” romance	+2

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You can’t tell from the Movie Theater what’s unsuitable about the apparent romance between the characters, but the woman is conflicted about moving forward with it. You can tell that the movie is black and white, takes place on a train, and stars a woman famous enough to take up the entire poster.

My first pick might be Roman Holiday—it checks all the boxes except the train. I don’t remember it very well but I remember thinking it was cute. And who doesn’t love Audrey Hepburn with proto-George Clooney?

My second pick is Murder on the Orient Express, which I saw more recently and remember in black and white, even though apparently it’s actually in color. This one is set on a train and has several famous actresses… but no “unsuitable” romance as far as I can recall.

There are surely many qualifying movies out there. Pick your favorite(s)!

Snacks to serve at your watch party:

• Apple Slices
• Black Licorice
• Cappuccino Mousse Cake
• Chocolate Popcoorn
• Cotton Candy
• Jasmine Tea
• Rock Candy
• Star Cookie
• Stardrop Sorbet

– Black Licorice –

A chewy candy with an intense, pungent flavor.

Licorice flavor

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Not much to this one. Black licorice exists, you either like it or you don’t. There are traditional whips, wheels, and jelly beans. There’s also ice cream, at some specialty brands or shops.

I will also make a plug for licorice root tea, which is not quite licorice flavor but is plenty close enough, to my mind. It’s very sweet but in the throat rather than on the tongue, which is really, really weird. I adore it. Once in Europe I found straight licorice tea (no other flavors) and it was delicious but it was a powerful diuretic, and I quickly learned not to drink it before bed. TMI, maybe.

Anyway. The canon version of this is a simple black licorice stick or whip, as shown below. I suspect a lot of us will skip this one…

– Fries –

Thin slices of potato, deep fried and then lightly salted.

Fried potatoes

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I mean… fries. Classic. Should be simple. But there are so many bad ones out there, yes?

The good news is, you don’t have to make them from scratch, or even at home. Simplest version: Get a bag of pre-cut frozen fries and bake ’em. It’s not 100% canon but plenty close.

From there you can incrementally increase the difficulty/effort: Deep-fry instead of bake. Cut your own potatoes and bake. Cut your own potatoes, parcook, and deep-fry. Cut your own potatoes, parcook, freeze, and deep-fry. Cut your own potatoes, parcook, freeze, and deep-fry twice. Supposedly the very very best fries are twice-fried. I haven’t worked up the courage to try it yet, but it doesn’t seem hard, just a lot of work. And they probably are great.

But all this is skipping over the very easiest version of all: McDonald’s. Or any restaurant. Sophie and I used to go to a pretentious bistro that made amazing fries with truffle oil and aioli—really really good with a Belgian tripel. After all, the canon version doesn’t say MAKE them. In fact, since you get them at the Movie Theater I think you can argue that true canon is NOT making them.

You could also stretch the point and use deep-fried potato chips instead of fries. Also delicious. You really can’t go wrong here.

It Howls in the Rain

A group of youngsters set out to discover the source of a mysterious sound. (Parental Supervision Required)

Choose a horror or suspense movie feature a group of teenagers, and award additional points as follows:

Features rain	+3
Features howling	+3

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Dark seems like a home run. It’s about youngsters, involves a mysterious sound (it wildly overuses the horror movie bass-to-deeper-bass slide)—I’m pretty sure there’s even rain. And the first season is super horror-y, at least by my wimpy standards.

Serve these snacks at your watch party:

• Cotton Candy
• Hummus Snack Pack
• Jasmine Tea
• Joja Cola
• JojaCorn
• Nachos
• Personal Pizza
• Rock Candy
• Salmon Burger
• Stardrop Sorbet

– Salmon Burger –

A thick slab of salmon on a lightly toasted sesame seed bun.

Sandwich containing salmon

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Easy: Put some salmon on bread! It can be fresh cooked salmon, hot-smoked salmon, canned salmon, lox, or any other variation you can find, not to mention any bread at all.

Canonically, it should be a whole salmon fillet (per the description) or a salmon patty (per the picture) on a sesame seed bun. But even if you do exactly that, there’s a ton of room for improvising the fixin’s. Anything you’d put on a burger is fair game, but I think it definitely needs some kind of creamy sauce. Mayo, remoulade, or tartar sauce, if you’re built that way. Cream cheese on a bagel with lox. And a little texture would be nice, especially if you’re using a patty rather than a whole slab. Pick bread that matches the shape and size of your salmon—it can even be open-faced! Try:

• Cream cheese on a bagel with lox, capers, red onions, and tomato
• Salmon salad (like tuna salad) on a baguette, open-faced
• Hot-smoked salmon on toast with eggs, for breakfast
• Poached salmon po’ boy with mayo and lettuce and tomato

– Personal Pizza –

A pizza small enough to enjoy as a snack.

Small-format pizza

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When I was a kid, getting a personal pizza was the most amazing thing—you didn’t have to share! With anyone! They’re still fun, although as an adult I usually prefer the leftovers from a large.

Any small pizza will work here. You can get an actual Small pizza from your favorite local spot. You can have a pizza party where everyone gets a piece of dough and a buffet of toppings. You can also have pizza toast or pizza bagels. I suppose it boils down to: find some bready stuff and make a pizza with it. You know you can just buy pizza dough, right?

I used to be obsessed with Pizza Hut’s dessert pizzas—a thin cooked fruit filling covered with streusel and drizzled with icing—you could get them at the buffet. I don’t think any of that is a thing anymore.

Assuming you don’t go the dessert pizza route, put some kind of sauce on your bread and top with whatever your heart desires. Cheese, meats, vegetables, herbs…

– Nachos –

Gooey, spicy cheese on top of freshly fried tortilla chips.

Chips with melted cheese

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NACHOOOOOS hurray, nachos are my favorite! I especially like the terrible ones with the goopy fake cheese sauce—the deal is that I’ll attend sporting events with Sophie if she buys me nachos. Yum yum yum.

So here’s an interesting tidbit I’ve learned: pre-shredded cheese doesn’t melt very well because it’s coated with anti-caking dust. Block cheddar that you grate yourself will melt great!

If you’re really going for canon, you need to make your own tortilla chips—although I’ll allow you to bake them instead of fry them, if you prefer. Then sprinkle generously with freshly grated cheese and microwave or bake until melted. That’s the purist version. But even canon doesn’t say anything about beans, guacamole, meat, jalapenos, sour cream, or salsa… so you can add all your favorite fixin’s.

– JojaCorn –

Joja’s patented corn food, slathered in plenty of “b’utter sauce”.

Packaged butter popcorn

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We’re fortunate not to live in a universe where Joja Corp actually exists. (We have plenty of our own soulless megacorporations, thank you very much.) So you can’t actually get JojaCorn.

But you CAN get corn food with fake butter. Any packaged popcorn will work if it’s marked “butter,” but you get extra points if it’s something like “Movie Theater Butter.”

Pick a day to be extravagant and greasy, put on your guiltiest-pleasure movie, and luxuriate. This is NOT homemade, artisanal, boutique, low-calorie, or organic, this is synthetic salty grease. Embrace the grease.