Supernatural 10x20 "Angel Heart"

I must say, for an episode that doesn't entirely have anything to do with the whole Mark storyline, I enjoyed this one quite a bit. It may, in fact, be one of my favorite ones of the season, maybe? Who would've thought, particularly since the actress playing Claire is sometimes a bit... questionable with emotional heaviness. Not that I would be any better because I'm not actor. Anyway.

That's right, it's time to revisit the family Novak. As you may recall, Claire went off to points unknown last we saw her. She turns back up in search of her mother, only to get knocked out by a shifty guy, which gets her in the hospital. The hospital calls up Castiel since he's listed as her emergency contact, and he recruits the boys to help him out. Because, you know, teenage angst was their forte.

So, they track her down, she's snarky, per usual (I would've written the abbreviation here, per the ushe or whatever, but I have no idea how to actually spell that!), yet she has a point. Her mom disappeared two years ago after having stayed in contact via postcards up until then. She knows of a guy in town that her mom mentioned in her journal, and has a postcard from the last place she stayed, so it's a legitimate lead. Cas and Dean go to check out the guy and see what information he has while Sam stays back with Claire to do some research.

Cas and Dean find out that the guy used to basically take people to a supposed faith healer, but Amelia was the last one he took, as he saw the guy was doing some weird stuff to them rather than healing them. He gives up the guy's name, but then tips off the dude, who of course comes and kills him for that.

Sam decides he and Cas should head out to the last place the supposed faith healer was at, while Dean should stay back with Claire because, apparently, his questioning technique earlier was a bit too violent and Mark-y. Not one to sit around go crazy at home, Dean takes Claire to a local putt-putt, and they actually get to know one another a bit better. Claire says something that makes Dean have a revelation about this wound on the guy he saw earlier, and figures out that the faith healer isn't a faith healer, but rather a Grigori angel. Time to go after Cas and Sam, but not before giving Claire a little gun of her own to try.

Cas and Sam split up - Cas finds Amelia looking not so hot, and is not able to heal her, to boot, while Sam finds himself face to face with the angel Tamiel, who apparently sucks bits of human soul to get off or something. He gets tied up, but not for long, and unties himself just in time for Dean and Claire to show up. Claire gets a nice little reunion with her mom, who she was super mad at earlier on, but now seeing her all disheveled, is a but more ready for forgiveness.

But their reunion is to be short-lived, as Tamiel would much rather just, you know, kill her. But Amelia steps in to save her daughter's life at the point of a blade, just as the boys come running back in to fight him off. They fight some, Dean gets all anger-faced, but in the end it's a girl with a sword that takes out the Grigori angel. But, her mom's still dead. So, there's that. But at least her mom gets to have a piece of real heaven with her Jimmy.

Claire seems a little better tempered at the end of the episode, despite being hauled off to stay with Jody Mills and that other teenage girl she's got rambling about. Dean lets her keep the angel sword for the future, and there likely will be a future where we'll see her again, it would seem. Hopefully to not just be killed off, as sometimes happens on this show.


Random Thoughts:

- The Winchesters sure get knocked out a lot. Would this not eventually cause brain damage? Oh wait, Cas can just heal them up now, I guess.

- I guess I liked this episode because it felt way more emotional than most episodes have this season. I didn't really like Claire in her other episode this season, but I warmed up a lot more to her in this episode. Probably because of her banter with both boys. I wrote down quite a few quotes this episode, which I haven't done in a while.

- Only three episodes left of the season. I'm still miffed that they are taking a whole dang season to deal with this Mark stuff. I know I've mentioned it before, but some notes could be taken from both The Flash and Arrow here. They certainly would not dilly dally this long.

Quotes:

Castiel: I need help from both of you. You were both troubled teens; you speak her language.
Sam: All right, how is she?
Castiel: I haven't gone in yet, I was waiting for backup.
Dean: Backup? Three men and a lady. Let's do this.

Dean: Come on, give me something to punch already.

Claire: You guys are credit card scammers, too?
Sam: Yeah. Hunting monsters doesn't exactly pay the bills.
Claire: Then why do you do it?
Sam: To help people. Make a difference.
Claire: That's it?
Sam: That's not enough?

Dean: If we stay cooped up all night in this hotel room, I'm gonna lose my mind.
Claire: Spoiler alert: you already have.

Dean: Billy Murray. Caddyshack. It's a classic.
Claire: Never seen it. Not a fan.
Dean: How dare you.
Claire: You done?
Dean: Yeah I'm done. Done with your whole generation.

Dean: You go down this path, it's not a long life.
Claire: I don't know, you seem pretty old.
Dean: Thanks.

Previous Episode -- Next Episode

Peanut Butter Bacon Cookies

Last week, I was in Las Vegas for a work convention, and let me just tell you, five days in Vegas is way too many. One thing I got to indulge on while there, though, was bacon. I don't consider myself the biggest bacon person, but then I have some and I'm like oh wait, right, bacon is actually quite delicious. Why do I forget? Who knows.

So I decided to take my bacon-spiration and put it into cookie form! And now just any cookies - peanut butter cookies. Peanut butter + bacon + cookies? Definite winner.

The base peanut butter cookie here is an old, gluten-free, standard that I only learned of about 10 or so years ago while living abroad in Ireland. No, it's not an Irish recipe, but one of my fellow study abroad-ers knew it and we made it quite often since it was so easy and required very little ingredients. It's the 1-1-1 recipe - 1 cup peanut butter, 1 cup sugar, 1 egg. Technically this also adds in some baking soda and changes up the sugar a tad, but you get the idea. Super easy.

And super versatile! You can add in the bacon like I have here, or you can just make them plain, or you can add in some chocolate chips like you can see below. OR, you can add in bacon AND chocolate chips for double whammy action. I didn't do that here because my boyfriend isn't a big chocolate person, but he IS a big bacon person, so I didn't want to make him sad.

So if you're in the mood for some salty and some sweet, give these a try! I'm pretty sure you won't be disappointed. Especially if you like bacon.

Peanut Butter Bacon Cookies

Ingredients

• 1 cup peanut butter (chunky or smooth)
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 6 slices bacon, cooked, cooled, and diced

Cooking Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicon baking mat. In a mixer, combine the peanut butter and sugars until well combined, about 2 minutes. Add in the egg and baking soda and beat for another 2 minutes. Fold in the bacon.
3. Roll into walnut-sized balls, place on the baking sheet, and press with a fork to create a criss-cross pattern. If you like, you can pre-roll them in some sugar.
4. Bake for 10 minutes, until lightly browned. Cool on a baking sheet for five minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Recipe via Joy the Baker

 

Supernatural 10x19 "The Werther Project"

As you may remember from last week, Sam is making a deal with Rowena to decode the book of the damned to find the spell to remove the Mark from Dean. Just what are her terms? She wants Sam to kill Crowley. Sam is quick to agree, because obviously he's never been a very big fan of Crowley in the first place. The only thing is, Rowena can't actually decode the book just yet. She needs another book to do it, the special spell book that had a certain name that I've now forgotten from a long dead witch named Nadia.

But just how is Sam supposed to find some old grand coven witch's special book? Well, luckily the Men of Letters are now involved in basically everything even though the Winchesters had never heard of them until a few seasons ago, because it turns out they took the book many moons ago. Sam does some research and discovers that a rogue Man of Letters that we saw last season created a box to keep the book in, only when people get too close to the box, it activates and makes those near it kill themselves. Well, that's no good now, is it?

Sam heads off to where he believes the book to be, a former St. Louis Men of Letters chapter house. He tries to do it without Dean, but Dean ends up following him and taking it as a sign that he needs to apologize for going after a nest of vamps by himself earlier on. This development, of course, forces Sam to lie about what he's really doing there, in a matter of speaking, because it's only technically not telling him the whole truth than full on lying. Anyhow, while Dean chats up the woman of the house, Sam heads down to the basement to try to deactivate the box's enchantment. But, it doesn't work, the thing gets released and infects all three of them.

While the owner lady kills herself rather quickly, Dean goes into a kind of catatonic hallucinatory state, where he believes he's back in Purgatory with Benny. Sam, meanwhile, faces the accusatory ghost of the owner lady, who is starting to get to him until Rowena appears and dispels her. She and Sam head back down to the basement to try to figure out this box, tying Dean up to a chair so he doesn't try to kill himself in the meantime.

Dean and Benny walk around Purgatory, talking about how Dean was better off there, because there's always an easy fight around the corner, and blah blah. I mean, we know this isn't really Benny, and Dean knows it isn't really Benny either, so when he starts going on about how Dean should really just end things himself rather than relying on Sam or Castiel to do it, I was thinking to myself - um, Dean can't kill himself, precisely because of the Mark. Which, thankfully, Dean pointed out anyway, and pulls himself out of his catatonic state.

Meanwhile, Sam and Rowena have deciphered the box's encryption - it needs Men of Letters blood in order to open. Except it wants a lot of blood. So much that Sam is starting to look a bit pale and weak from losing so much blood. Luckily, Dean comes running in just in time to stop him and give it some of his own blood to finish the ritual or whatever you want to call it. But wait, you say, if he sees Rowena, then he'll know what Sam is doing! Ah, yes. This Rowena is but a figment of Sam's imagination, trying to get him to kill himself with the whole blood spillage deal.

Lucky for him, the box really did want Men of Letters blood to open, so Dean is able to add some of his to the mix and they do actually get the box open, retrieving the book inside. Sam feigns innocence as to its contents, but we know better. He takes it to Rowena with the book of the damned later. But, as he doesn't trust her, he chains her up until she does what they agreed to, and nothing more. Bum bum bum!

Random Thoughts:

- There was supposed to be kind of this suspense around whether Sam would be able to deactivate the box in time to stop Dean from trying to kill himself, but to me that kind of lacked suspense because duh, the Mark won't actually let Dean kill himself. Were they trying to say if he tried he would go demon again or something? Or was it just assuming we wouldn't think of that?

- Would that really be the situation Dean's unconscious would go to when hit with that stuff? I feel like there are other, more effective, ways the stuff could've tried to get to him, but maybe that's just me.

- I feel like I enjoy Rowena a lot more when she's interacting with Sam than I did when she was hanging out with Crowley all the time. Not sure why, per se, but that's why this is called a random thought.

- One has to wonder what is in store next after they get this whole Mark of Cain business figured out. Is it going to be more of Rowena as the villain, or something completely new?

Quotes:

Susie: Tall white fella. Pretty hair.

Rowena: We had an agreement, giant.

Previous Episode -- Next Episode

Supernatural 10x18 "Book of the Damned"

Can I just say - finally?! After so many episodes where it just felt like blah blah let's waste some time until we get to the interesting stuff, tonight was actually some interesting stuff. Finally!

As you may or may not remember, Charlie went off to points unknown to see what she could figure out about the whole Mark business. Turns out, she was able to turn up the Book of the Damned after searching pretty much around the globe. Only now she has some creepy dudes on her tail with strange markings on their arms. Luckily, she manages to get away from them, but they're able to track the book with this magical compass, so she calls up Sam and Dean for help.

They meet her in one of Bobby's cabins, as apparently he has quite a few in random spots, and she gives them the dish on the book. Basically, it's in such an ancient language that no one can read it. Some nun had dark visions many years ago and wrote the book on pieces of her own skin in her own blood. Yeah.... that's definitely a book you want to be messing with. And on top of all that, the book seems to be sort of calling out to Dean, wanting him to take it and run away with it.

Eventually, Sam is able to figure out that it's in some ancient dialect, but the words don't seem to make any sense when translated. Charlie deduces that it must be in code, only they aren't having any luck in deciphering it. Meanwhile, Dean has looked up the dudes who were after Charlie, and they are part of an old family called the Stynes that have basically caused mayhem over the years thanks to the help of the book, which they lost about 800 years ago or thereabouts, and now they want it back. Dean runs into one of them, Jacob, at the local gas station when picking up some snacks, and though he is able to fend them off, they follow him back to the cabin. He urges Sam to burn the damn book of the damned, because nothing good can come of using it, despite the dude saying that there really is a cure for the Mark inside it. They have some fisticuffs, and Sam throws the book into the fire - or does he?

I admit I saw this twist coming, because duh, when Sam was talking about how he couldn't keep hunting if his brother wasn't around, you just knew he wasn't really going to get rid of the seeming one shot at getting it done. Instead, he pretend to burn the book, and then took it to Rowena in secret to have her decipher it and remove the Mark. What will be the price? That remains to be seen. Dun dun dun.

MEANWHILE! Castiel is on the hunt for his grace with human-Metatron in tow. Metatron is enjoying the human existence thanks to some waffles, but is clearly delaying their search for the grace. Finally, he leads Cas to a library that he says he had another angel give him clues to where Cas' grace is hidden. That is - he had another angel hide it so he couldn't be tortured for the information. Of course, Metatron is always sneaky and secretly writes some angel-hurting sigils around the library, putting Castiel down for the count. Turns out, he had hidden the demon tablet there, which he takes and runs off with. BUT, he also really did hide Cas' grace there, which Cas manages to find and restores himself. So, no more worrying about Cas' missing grace.

And in a fun little scene, Cas and Charlie meet. I guess I never realized they hadn't met before, but it was a cute scene, and he healed Charlie's bullet wound (oh yeah, she was shot in that opening scene too) and her carpal tunnel. Aw.

Random Thoughts:

- Is it just me, or did Cas' angel wings not look quite so healthy when he got his grace back? They looked kind of falling apart.

- Did anyone really believe that Sam actually burned that book? I mean, you knew Rowena was going to have to come into play in all of this somehow, and seeing as it's some kind of spellbook, it only makes sense she would have to get involved with it. What that means for them in the long run, who knows. Because who knows what the heck she's going to want in exchange for her help. Seems a bad idea to let her stay in possession of such a thing.

- What does the demon tablet do? I honestly can't remember if they ever found the demon tablet before, or if it was only the angel tablet? Man, canon. I just know it's probably not good if Metatron is running around with it.

- Did I count not one but two classic rock songs in this episode? Nice!

Quotes:

Metatron: Goosebumps! Don't even get me started on those. Creepy. And yet, arousing.

Dean: When was the last time either one of us was on a beach?
Sam: Never.

Metatron: You were human. Don't you miss this?
Castiel: No. I don't miss digestion. Indigestion.

Metatron: Sorry about the mess. I guess I'm lactose intolerant.
Castiel: Let's never speak of it again.

Charlie: I thought you'd be shorter.

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Avocado Pound Cake

Have you ever gone to the grocery store, all ready to buy certain things with specific meal ideas in mind, only to find they are literally out of every single thing you wanted? Welcome to my weekend! I mean, sheesh. Was it because of the whole Easter holiday business or what? Nonetheless, I was foiled. I wanted to make some homemade ice cream to share with you this week, but no.

Instead, I searched for what I had already sitting around in my kitchen, waiting to be used, and discovered I had some very ripe avocado on my hands, and I've always wanted to try baking with avocados. Of course, I could have also made avocado ice cream, but... but... sigh. Ice cream was not meant to be. Nor was a broiler chicken with potatoes, but I digress.

Let me tell you about this Avocado Pound Cake. The original recipe calls for cornmeal, which of course I don't just keep lying around, so instead I put in a bit more flour to make up the difference. In the end, the middle of the cake drooped a little, but it still cooked all the way through. I'm not sure what caused the middle to drop here - was it because of my baking soda? Too much mixing? The lack of cornmeal? Whatever the case, oh well. The cake still tastes delicious, and that's the most important part, right?

One thing I especially enjoy about this pound cake? The crust is super yummy. Normally I am not a crust person, but this crust kind of turns into this sugary crunch that may be my favorite part of the whole thing! Otherwise, the avocado adds a nice extra moistness to the cake, but not an overly avocado flavor. In fact, you may not even know it has avocado in it if someone didn't tell you first.

Avocado Pound Cake

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 6 Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 ounces buttermilk
• flesh of 1 ripe avocado (about 1/2 cup mashed)

Cooking Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Spray your loaf pan (or grease and flour it, if you prefer).
2. In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda. Set aside for now. Set out your eggs to come to room temperature at this time as well.
3. In your stand mixer, beat the butter on medium speed until it's nice and soft. Add in the sugar and beat until that's light and fluffy, about four minutes. Add in the avocado and beat for another minute to get it incorporated, making sure to scrape down the sides and get all that goodness in there.
4. Add in the eggs one at a time, beating for a minute after each addition. Then mix in your vanilla extract.
5. Reduce the mixer speed to low, add in half of your flour mixture, then all of the buttermilk, then the rest of the flour mixture. Only beat that until just combined.
6. Pour that into your loaf pan and place in the oven, turning it down to 325F. Bake for 40-45 minutes, or until a tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Mine took longer than this, but I used an 8 inch loaf pan rather than a 9 inch, so that is why. Let the cake cool in the pan for 10 minutes before you invert onto a cooling rack to let it cool all the way.
7. Slice and enjoy! 

Recipe adapted from Joy the Baker

Supernatural 10x17 "Inside Man"

Rowena said something in tonight's episode that I feel pretty much sums up my feelings: you're stalling! Or something close to that anyway. Watching this show compared to others like Arrow and The Flash, which go through storylines really quickly, it makes this whole Mark of Cain storyline feel neverending, and not going much of anywhere. I mean, we're at episode 17 now, so we must be getting close to a resolution here, but an entire season? Sheesh. Whereas other things that would be interesting to last more than one episode, don't. Maybe I'm the only one feeling this way? Hmm.

Despite all of the above, this episode was actually one of the better ones of late. There was some movement in the whole Mark storyline, and the whole Rowena/Crowley neverending storyline that was beginning to feel extremely repetitive and, dare I say, kind of pointless. So let's start with that one and get it out of the way here. Basically, Rowena is tired of Crowley not acting against the Winchesters, which we've heard her complain about ad nauseam. She decides to take things into her own hands and, in the guise of going on a date, takes the fight to Dean himself. She tries to use some big spell written in blood on her skin against him, but it doesn't do a thing thanks to the Mark. So, she heads back to the den of Hell and beats herself up, then pretends it was Dean who did all that, trying to get a rise out of Crowley to send him after Dean.

Well, Crowley does go to see Dean, but only to have a wee chat. Dean tells him Rowena lied and has this whole speech about family not necessarily having anything to do with blood, so Crowley heads back and kicks Rowena out. And, oh yes, forgot this bit which may come in to play later, she also claims that the Mark is just a curse, and as a curse, it can be removed, though she doesn't know how. So, Rowena heads off to points unknown with goals rather unknown, leaving Crowley to pursue his own... unknown goals. Hmm. Did I miss the goals somewhere? Hmm.

Why was Dean hanging out by himself where Rowena could just pay him a visit? Because Sam and Castiel are teaming up to try to get to Metatron, since he claimed he knew how to get rid of the Mark. To do that, they need to get into Heaven, but the angels are barring Cas from entering and releasing Metatron. So they come up with this brilliant plan to use a psychic to contact Bobby in Heaven and get him to help open up the portal.

Do I really need to recount how that goes down? No. Bobby escapes his slice of Heaven and opens up the portal. Cas jumps in and manages to escape with Metatron. Metatron is all like I have all the leverage here, you can't do anything without me, so you better let me go, so they finally get some smarts and take out his grace, turning him mortal, and shoot him in the leg for good measure. Which then forces him to reveal that he, in fact, does NOT know how to get rid of the Mark. But he does know where some of Cas' grace is hiding. While Cas gets to decide what to do with that information, Sam heads back to the bunker, where he reads a heartfelt letter from Bobby basically saying, you know, he shouldn't hide this stuff from Dean, yada yada.

Random Thoughts:

- I enjoyed the whole pool hustling scene, though I didn't recount it above as it's not really necessary to the overall story. But those guys were kind of idiots to not realize he was hustling them. I mean, come on, dudes. It was pretty obvious when he said let's make it $300. Duh.

- What did you all think of the return of Bobby? At least it was in Heaven and not another way of resurrecting him, I guess. I mean, don't get me wrong, I like Bobby, but I really didn't like the Ghost Bobby storyline.

- Why wouldn't they ever try contacting anyone else in Heaven like that? Like, oh, say, their parents? I mean, Papa Winchester surely would have been a help in that situation too, no? Or are we saying he isn't actually up in Heaven?

- What exactly were those angels planning to do with Bobby at the end there? 

Quotes:

Sam: I was thinking about seeing a movie.
Dean: That could be cool.
Sam: It's a French movie.
Dean: You mean like nudie French?
Sam: Even better. It's about a mime, that's secretly a cockroach.

Crowley: You're my mother, I don't want to see anything. I've been to Hell, thanks.

Oliver: What are you?
Castiel: I'm an angel.
Oliver: You can't be. I'm an athiest.

Crowley: Squirrel.
Dean: Boris. Where's Natasha?

Bobby: This is the scribe of God? Looks like a Fraggle.

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