Charcutepalooza Challenge #6

Once again, this month's challenge was down to the wire, but James and I refused to be defeated by our busy schedules. We scrambled to make our Hot Dogs the day before the posting date and here's a quick roundup on how we felt about the challenge this month:

James: H-dogs 2.0. After our epic fail last time (when we weren't suppose to make hotdogs anyway) I was more than a bit nervous that this would all turn pear-shaped for a second time. It didn't! We made delicious, hotdog-tasting hotdogs. The thing about hotdogs is, well, they're just hotdogs. The best hotdog I've ever had? Nearly. Was it worth it? Absolutely not. While I do appreciate the process of making an emulsified sausage, the attention required to make it work and the premium ingredients - I don't think it's worth all the time and cost required to create a gourmet dog. Sure ours were juicier, more tender, had better flavour and weren't the least bit rubbery. Sure they rank right up there with the best. But c'mon, they're just f*cking hotdogs! The lesson is this: While it's nice to use costly beef ribs to make hotdogs, it's not worth it. The reason: With simple slow, low smoke you can turn a rack of beef ribs into something divine instead of a glorified kid's birthday party treat. I'd give ours an 8 out of 10. But what's a 10 out of 10 hotdog really worth? A 6 out of 10 rack of ribs? C'est la vie.

R: Oh, while we were rushing to get everything done, we did somehow manage to squeek in dessert. Giant soft pretzels, that turned out to be the perfect accompaniment to our hotdogs. The recipe we used called for pretzel salt, but we thought this treat would be far superior if we doused the pretzels in salted butter and cinnamon-sugar, and boy were we right!  I highly recommend giving these a try! For the recipe, click here.

The Little Promo That Could

As I mentioned in my last post, I'm rather blown away by the level of response I've been getting from my promo. Just as I was beginning to feel like the chatter was tapering off, both the Applied Arts Blog and PDN Online wrote a little something about my bacon-y package this week. I'm pretty stoked, so I thought I'd share.

For the Applied Arts Article go here.
Click here to read what Heather Morton has to say in her PDN interview for the "Promos I Kept" column.
P.S. Thanks Heather for choosing my promo to talk about... again!

Since I couldn't dream of posting without sharing some images with you, here are three snappys to get you through the day:

Behind the scenes from Charcutepalooza

In and Out Burger in LA - ohhh yum!

 Seriously THE BEST dessert on the planet! I'm salivating just remembering it. No joke.

Butterscotch Pot de Crème with Salted Caramel & Crème Fraiche from Gjelina in LA. Go There.

Charcutepalooza Challenge #3

This month's Charcutepalooza challenge was hot smoking. We were to either smoke pork loin that would become Canadian Bacon or smoke pork shoulder which would become Tasso Ham.  Since James has been smoking meat successfully for years and Michael Ruhlman's spice blends have proven to be perfectly balanced, it seemed that our biggest challenge this month would be coming up with our recipe. Seeing as James and I have promised a little bit of a Canadian flare with each of our challenges, you would think the choice would be clear with Canadian Bacon on the list.  Not so. 

James: Canadian bacon is only Canadian in the United States. In Canada it's called Peameal Bacon and most often cured and rolled in cornmeal, but not always smoked. The concept for our blog post was proving to be a bit of a conundrum. Tasso is an important ingredient in Jambalaya, a distinctly Louisianan creation but there was little evidence that it has ever made it's way out of the Bayou and into the Canadian culinary canon. In fact, I don't know anyone else who'd ever heard of it. So Tasso Tourtiere, Pâté chinois (Shepard's pie) or Flipper pie were all kind of out.

And were we really going to make another sandwich?  Uh, nope.

Almost stumped, I thought we could justify our Can-con while still taking the low road, or swamp track as it were. When I pulled out the Lonely Planet: New Orleans City Guide in light of my upcoming trip I came across a 'legend' about the humble crawfish...

"When the Acadians were forced to leave Nova Scotia, the local lobsters (very loyal shellfish, indeed) decided to follow their adopted humans to Louisiana. During the arduous marathon swim, the crustaceans lost a lot of weight and most of their size. By the time the lobsters reached the bayous and swamps of southern Louisiana to reunite with their beloved proto-Cajuns, they had transformed into the Acadian's smaller, and now-totemic, crawfish." If the lobster is the forefather of the crawfish, and an undoubtedly Downeast ingredient - well we're bringing it all back home, as Bob Dylan once mumbled.

Bingo! Tasso is in Jambalaya and Lobster could be our Canadian crawfish! One down, one to go. Andouille is a spicy cajun sausage and also an important ingredient in Jambalaya. It is not readily available up here, but all of it's ingredients are. The pork shoulder needed to make Tasso is the very same cut needed to make Andouille. A bit more work but it was certainly worth it. Homemade sausage is easy, delicious and maybe just a bit totally awesome.

R:  Seeing as this was my first experience with Cajun cooking, and that James is able to Cajun-ify almost anything with his eyes shut. I quickly fell into the roll of Help-y McHelperson, where I found myself elbow deep in freshly ground meat, feeding the sausage stuffer at a leisurely pace.  I'll say this much, while making homemade sausage is not a difficult task, it may potentially have the power to convert any meat eater to a vegetarian. But not us! Finding myself without tonnes to contribute to the preparation of this meal, other than immersing my hands in meat and fighting back tears when it was time to cook our well behaved and photogenic Lobster, who we had affectionately named Jaques, I would tackle dessert.

We decided that I should prepare a Canadian classic. Buttertarts. Growing up, I spent a lot of time in the Muskokas where we basically spent entire summers waterskiing, barbecuing and begging my parents to take us for Buttertarts from Marty's in Bracebridge. Marty's has literally ruined me for all other Buttertarts in the universe.  They are the best.  Hands down.  Flaky, tender, chewy pastry with runny, sticky and sweet insides. A couple of years ago my mom surprised me with a copy of Marty's cookbook and I'm pretty sure that the angels sang when I discovered the recipes for his pastry and filling. But how were we going to give these tarts the Southern flare that they would need to follow our Jambalaya you ask? Pecans. Maple roasted pecans. Oooooh-we! 

So, how was the meal? Spicy and smokey with a hint of sweetness each time you discovered a coveted piece of lobster.  The Jambalaya was even hot enough to have those of us that hadn't braved James' homemade hot sauce reaching for the Kleenex and wiping away tears. Often, with spice of that magnitude, the flavour can begin to take a back seat.  In this case, not so. Each bite was filled with a wonderful and slightly different combination of tastes. The Tasso and the sausage, while at the core were quite similar, brought very distinct yet perfectly married flavours to the table. The buttertarts, that we served with cinnamon ice-cream from Ed's Real Scoop and a snifter of Bourbon were the perfect way to cool our over-heated pallets. All in all, this meal was well worth the effort and Tasso-rific in our books.  

After a really fun day in the kitchen and a great meal with friends, it was off to bed with the anticipation of waking up to the lingering smell of that deliciously smokey aroma, that is always left behind in my hair, that would have me re-living our meal the next morning.

Deep Fried Butter

Yesterday, my husband and I took a trip to The Ex and I'm sure it won't come as a surprise to anyone that we went for the food.  This year, with all the hype surrounding the deep fried butter, how could we possibly resist?  The entire time we stood in line I kept contemplating bailing.  Deep fried butter??!  I'll eat just about anything, but the thought of biting into a ball of butter was borderline too much to handle.  Curiosity definitely won out this time, especially when my husband heard the guy ahead of us say that they "taste like heaven."  How could I possibly say no to a treat that would make angels sing?
How did they taste?  Like Yum.  Essentially they're frozen blobs of butter dipped in funnel cake batter and deep fried.  These confections are pillow-y masses of fried dough with a melt-y, delightfully-buttery and salty centre.  For those of you who would like to replicate this taste in your own kitchen: take a plain doughnut, warm and butter liberally.  That's it.  In the same way that bread with butter is better than bread without, so are doughnuts.  They're not life-changing, but they are very tasty.
As decadent a treat as these were,  I can't say that I would wait the 40 mins in line next year.  I would however, stand near the front of the line to watch and listen to people's reactions while I snacked on a bag of Tiny Tom's donuts, which are always worth the price of admission.

From Near Disaster to Chocolate Bliss

I seem to have recently been unofficially dubbed the "maker of desserts for family functions."  As you all have figured out by now, I LOVE to bake and any excuse to find a new recipe to add to my repertoire is fun times in Reena land.  Usually, I'm asked (or offering) to bake for our weekly Friday night dinner at Bubbie's house, which is relatively stress free.  If I were to try something new and have it flop, people would be understanding (although probably sad that there was no yummy dessert).  One of my sisters is getting married in June and 'the aunts' were throwing her a tea.  I was asked to make a cake as a center piece for the table.  Repeat after me: EEP!  I was no longer just baking for my immediate family, I was baking for a gaggle of women who appreciate all things lovely and tasty.  Here's the kicker - I had never baked a cake before.  Ok, that's not completely true.  I had made three cakes prior to this one but, I made two of them in my baking arts class where failure was almost an impossibility, and I made the third one with sponge that was leftover from my baking class.  P.S. that third cake (that I assembled at home) was lopsided and u.g.l.y.
I immediately recruited my friend and partner in crime, Tammy, to help me with some serious recipe testing.  I had decided on a chocolate layer cake with chocolate mousse filling, chocolate glaze on top and chocolate meringue fingers that would surround the cake.  Sounds simple, right?  heh.  The first major obstacle and the one thing that worried me the most, was getting my oven to bake the sponge evenly and thoroughly.  If you aren't up to date on the stress my oven was giving me, you can catch up here.  I had a new plan for baking a successful cake, and it was about to be put into motion.  Tammy and I whipped together the batter for our tester cake, which, by the way, was not going too well from the start, and into the oven it went.  Fingers were crossed.  This was the first baked good, larger than a cookie, that I had made since I started having oven problems.  Fast forward to the timer beeping: insert tester stick and success!  An evenly and thoroughly baked cake!  (Quick update:  I have solved my oven issue by baking everything at 10 degrees higher than the recipe calls for).  Now was the time to cut our sponges into layers.  First layer cut, and disaster!  Giant pockets of unincorporated flour.  EEP!  Here's Tammy and I and our sad sad cake.

We didn't bother filling or glazing the cake since it was about to meet the inside of a garbage bag.  Oh, by the way, our mousse turned out more like pudding and our meringues were uneven heights.  All in all, we gave this one a pretty big fail.  All this failure had me mildly bummed, but mostly annoyed that I had to find a new sponge recipe, and fast.  I was three days away from the tea.  Through sheer luck, and the help of a great recipe, my next cake test was a smashing success.  Moist, rich, chocolatey devils food cake.
 

Assembling and glazing the three layer nine inch cake went quite well.

I decided against the meringue fingers since they would all have to be exactly the same height and width, which I am not quite capable of yet.  Instead, I opted for some pretty pink flowers for the top.

Well, all in all the cake was a success.  Something I could be truly proud of.  In the end, for me, this cake was a bit of a reminder to stick to my guns,  push for what I want, not to get too discouraged when things don't go as planned the first time, and that a labor of love will always be worth it in the end.  In this case I got to have my cake and eat it too.

Dessert at Last!

The first thing I do when a menu is dropped in front of me is decide what I will be having for dessert.  This is a trait that I have happily inherited from my father.  I was working on my portfolio a couple days ago and it hit me that I had completely skipped over New Years Eve dessert!  How I could have possibly forgotten about my favorite part of any meal is truly beyond me!  I think that this may actually qualify as an unforgivable sin, so I quickly rectified the situation and am happily serving you the final course.  Baked berries with cake-y biscuits and vanilla ice-cream.
If you missed the meal the first time around, might I suggest having your dessert then going back to join me for the first three courses.
Happy Friday!  Enjoy your weekend.

May All Your Days Be Filled With Pie

There is something about warm mid morning light that affects me like nothing else.  The second I sense it's presence my chin tilts upwards, my eyes start to close and the biggest most satisfied grin you could imagine begins to cross my face.  I can't help but feel a calm come over me in these moments.  I often have to fight the urge to curl up in a puddle of light and stay there until it fades (except for on weekends when I'm allowed to be a slacker).  I find that great food can have the same effect on me.  The moment a dish makes its appearance at the table the anticipation of flavor and texture can have the same effect on me as when the light slowly begins to sweep across my face.  When I take my first bite, it's like the sun hitting me full in the face with it's gentle, warming rays.  Calming, soothing, comforting, pure bliss.
One of the foods that can, without fail, turn any day into a sunny day for me is lemon meringue pie. It's one of my ultimate comfort foods.  My Bubbie (which is what I call my grandmother) is the queen of lemon meringue.  As a kid, she used to make it for my dad. Once my love of her pie, I think, exceeded his, she began making it for me.  Recently, a friend of mine commissioned me to make dessert for her boyfriend's birthday.  Now this, in itself, was an exciting moment.  My first commission!  Completely unprompted and unsolicited. AMAZING!  After some chatting and serious convincing on my behalf, that she had not asked for too much and that I would be thrilled to make something for her, we settled on lemon meringue pie.  That afternoon, at lunch with my mother, I proudly proclaimed that I had been commissioned to make my first pie.  I also may have kinda, sorta made it sound like it was no biggie and I could whip it together in ten minutes.  To which my mom replied: "great! then while you're at it you can make a second one for dinner at Bubbie's on friday."  Whoops... I had instantly doubled my work load.  For those of you who have not delved into the world of scratch pies, FYI, they do not take ten minutes.  I had a busy week ahead and two pies to bake.  One was for pay and the other would be judged by the high priestess of lemon meringue, my Bubbie.  The pressure was on.  Pie day finally arrived.  I had a few tense moments while working on the cooked sugar stabilizer for my meringue and assembling everything while still piping hot, and to my utter relief all went smoothly.  My friends were thrilled and said they loved the pie (thanks again guys!).  Then came my proudest moment.  After very thoughtfully tasting my pie, and questioning the authenticity of my filling, my Bubbie didn't have a single bit of "constructive criticism" for me.  Nothing.  Trust me she tried.  I had passed the test.  SUCCESS!

Here are the photos of my lemon meringue pie doused in some of the most beautiful light I have had the pleasure of playing in recently.  I wish I had some shots of the pie's golden insides to share with you, but I'm pretty sure people frown upon receiving a birthday pie that's missing a slice, and the second pie didn't stand a chance once it hit the table.

White-On-White

Here it is.  Drum roll please.......the results of my icing project:

Monday night, after I posted to the blog, I sat myself down to have a little chat.  'Enough is enough!' I said.  'No more procrastinating and no more projects until this one is in the bag'.  This is one project that I was feeling a little nervous about because it was going to take me outside of my comfort zone.  I never really work in such a sterile, stark lighting environment.  I'm usually drawn to more natural lighting conditions and a homier atmosphere.  I decided to listen to myself, and first thing Tuesday morning I pulled out my lights and whipped up some icing.  Once I got down to work, I kept wondering what had possessed me to shoot such a stark, white-on-white project, seeing as this is not usually the kind of look that attracts me.  After some thought, I realized that there was just something about the shape, sheen and starkness of white piped icing that made me feel the need to display it on a crisp white background.  My original plan for the second shot (the cake slice) was to keep it crisp and clean and as white as the piping.  Well, that obviously wasn't my final decision.  Two factors played into my reason for smushing the cake:

1. Apparently it's really hard to cleanly mask a single piece of cake that is built out of pieces of box-brownie stacked together to appear as one. (It's a bit of a long story - I'll get into it another time.  I do think I deserve some creativity and resourcefulness points for this one though).

2. Everything was looking a bit too 'hospitaly' for me and I just wanted to make a bit of a mess: a well thought out and organized mess, mind you, but a mess none the less.  There is just something about imperfection that really interests me.

All in all,  I'm happy I tried out this new approach.  I may even shoot a 'part 2.'

mmmm...icing

Inspiration has struck again!  Ok, ok, it struck on monday night, but sometimes these things need a little room to grow.  My baking class exercise this week was piping and masking (masking, I have learned, is fancy pastry-chef talk for putting icing on a cake).  I was really excited for this class and walked away with a great lesson on technique.  I don't usually find icing particularly inspiring, as it's way too sweet and often gives me a toothache.  I do, however, find the artistry of delicately piped cakes and pastry items to be an object of beauty and measure of skill.  Before this class, I've piped a few cupcakes and masked one cake (not exactly masterfully, I might add) but, until now, I've basically been piping by the seat of my pants.  No more! I say.  From this day on I will pipe with more skill than ever before (not sure how much skill that means I've acquired, but I can reassure you that's it's more than I had on Sunday).  My new found love of icing has led me to a fun little project that will allow me to test out a new lighting look that I have been thinking about lately.  I'm not too sure how this project is going to come together.  To be honest it could be a total flop (conceptually and visually) but, it could also turn out to be pretty cute.  I've been doddling a bit on getting started because, as I've mentioned before, I'm not really a big fan of working on a project where the prospect of failure is looming.  I like to have every minute detail planned out before I shoot, whenever possible.  The truth about this project is I just won't know until I pipe some frosting, turn on my pack and point my lens.  As difficult as it is, I'm coming to grips with the fact that not everything I touch will turn to gold, but If I give up without trying I'll never know and I'll never be able to improve upon it next time.  For me, testing is just as important as executing well planned-out projects.  It's all a part of the process.  Let's just call this one a test and 'giver!  

Here is an iphone shot of my beautifully (if I do say so my self) piped and masked cake dummy.  I can't wait until there is cake under all that icing (that I will most likely scrape off and put on my husband's plate).

An Ephiphany in Puff Pastry

I've fallen a bit behind in updating you about my baking arts class, so let's rewind a week and talk apple pie.  I was quite pleased with my first attempt at making a pie.  Actually, I was more than pleased.  It only took four days for my husband Zac and to I polish off the entire thing with only a single slice going to a friend.  Further proof of this pie's yumminess is that I made a fresh one to take to a little dinner party last weekend and Zac and I managed to help out with that one too. (P.S. the second one was even better!)  Usually I'm more of a pie filling kind of gal.  My crust often gets left behind sad, lonely, dry and uneaten.  Not this time and never again!  I've seen the light, heard the angels sing, had a flaky pastry epiphany!  Never again shall I pine for a firm yet tender, melt in your mouth pastry shell or choke down a dry flavorless one....well, at least not if I'm the one handling the dough.
I planned to save my first pie so I could shoot it whole but it just didn't happen.  By the time my lovely pie and I got home, there was no daylight to speak of and the temptation to cut into it was just too high.  Luckily, I snapped a quick shot with my iphone as I was packing up the pie for our short trip home.

 

Something Pink

Well, I talked your ear off a bit yesterday so today will be short, sweet and pink.
Enjoy.

Prop Styling by Cheryl Thompson

Day 1 x 2

OK, So today is a day of firsts for me.  First attempt at my own blog and first day back to school in a looong time.  I'm off to George Brown to bump up my baking skills in what I'm sure will be a quick and intense three months.  As much as I am consumed by what one could call a food obsession, my one true love is (and always will be) photography.  During the last couple of months I have discovered that I am able to marry my love of food and a good prime lens quite easily.  I have decided to put my portrait photography on hold for the moment to really allow myself to explore and become immersed in the world of food photography.
I suspect that this blog will be a bit of a mish mash.  Lost of food photos, maybe some recipes and I'm sure a few links to photography sites that make me oooh and aaaah.  To be honest I'm not quite sure exactly what direction this blog is going to take but I'll chalk that up to sense of adventure and leave it to chance.

I guess the only thing left to say is welcome aboard.  Hope you enjoy the ride!
And just to get you salivating, I'll leave you with a chocolate tart.

Prop Styling by Cheryl Thompson