Photography Archives - Page 4 of 24

Skagit Valley Tulip Fest

April 16, 2014 By Paola 1 Comment

It’s the that time of year again where I bore you with photos from Skagit Valley Tulip Fest, about ninety minutes drive from Seattle. For those of you still in the depths of winter, I apologise.

You’ve gotta love a road trip where you get to see this out of the car window.

But unfortunately several thousand other people had the same idea.

I even got to try out the pano feature on the iPhone for the very first time (no one can accuse me of being a gearhead) which was super duper impressive.

After a glorious day we chased the sunset back to Everett, where we stopped off for fish and chips.

Not a bad day on the whole.

If you’re in Seattle the fields are at their absolute peak right now. I’ve never seen them so pretty. Previous dispatches from the tulips here, here and here.

Seems I’ve been a lazy Instagrammer this week – I’ve been feeling in a bit of a photography rut – so instead of my Instagram feed, here’s an absolutely gorgeous MadMen graphic. Wouldn’t mind this on my wall.

The return of MadMen is of course going to be the highlight of my weekend (though we might also make it out for a family photography/cycling trip to the tulip fields). Here’s a gently spoilerish review of the first eppy and an overview of the college course I’d love to do.

To try and get out of my photography rut I will be perusing #Photography – a fab-looking online photography magazine by two photography graduates in the UK and following these peeps for inspiration (one day I want to be on this list).

I know I still have to share with you the story of the Minx’s latest birthday cake, but we might need to try these amazing cupcake shoes next year.

And I would imagine that this article on how to beat procrastination might be useful for us all (I can’t tell you how many times I opened Facebook in the course of putting together this post). Fingers crossed I’m not the only one for whom it resonates.

On the blog this week, we’ve discussed flower arranging in NYC, a fabulous food photography workshop I attended, photographing donuts for Edible Seattle and I shared a recipe for chocolate truffles (which are currently sitting in my fridge singing softly to me).

All you creative people out there, what advice do you have for getting me out of my photographic rut? I just don’t feel that my photography is improving much anymore. All advice gratefully received.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Chocolate Truffles Inspired by Miele USA

April 11, 2014 By Paola 10 Comments

Miele USA, manufacturers of some of the world’s best home appliances, and lovely sponsors of #BlogTourNYC, were very anxious that we should guess the new colourway that they would be unveiling at the Architectural Digest Home Design Show.

So anxious in fact that they had given us each a clue in the form of a little box containing two luscious Vosges chocolate truffles. One of my truffles was a subtly intriguing and very delicious smoked paprika flavour, so I somewhat embarrassingly guessed Smoked Paprika for the new colour. However, after discussions over breakfast we realised that we’d all been given different truffles and that the name of the new colourway must in fact be Chocolate Truffle.

And what a truly delicious colourway it is – subtle, sexy and smoothly contemporary and just as rich and glossy as the finest chocolate ganache.

The above is the only picture I managed to grab at the Home Show that looks halfway decent – the Miele stand was crowded that day. But funny to see me, my comfy boots and some of my fellow Blogtourists reflected in its glossy finish.

What you are looking at is the state-of-the-art Miele Combi Steam Oven in the new Truffle finish. As someone who bakes bread with a cast iron pan of water steaming on the oven floor, there is a lot I would do to get hold of one of these babies. The water reservoir for the steam is cleverly hidden behind top panel so no oven capacity is sacrificed and the control panel has step by step cooking settings for around 100 different meat, vegetables, fish and grains, meaning I would never have to buy a cookbook again! Possibly.

Anyway, as a little hommage to Miele’s new colourway I decided to make some chocolate truffles.

Chocolate Truffles

2014-04-11 00:31:06

Yields 30

Quick and easy chocolate truffles with paprika, coconut, pistachio, sea salt and meringue coatings

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Prep Time

30 min

Prep Time

30 min

Ingredients

275g/10 oz dark chocolate (minimum 60% cocoa solids)
250ml/1 cup heavy (double) cream
50g/3 tablespoons unsalted butter (at room temperature)

Assorted Toppings

Cocoa powder
Coconut flakes/dessicated coconut
Crushed meringue
Finely chopped pistachios
Hawaiian pink sea salt
Smoked paprika

Instructions

Break the chocolate into pieces (I used Guittard Bittersweet Chocolate Wafers) in an ovenproof bowl.
Bring the cream to the boil (watch it like a hawk as it flares up quickly) and then pour it over the chocolate.
Stir the mixture gently until the cream is fully amalgamated into the chocolate and you have a smooth chocolate 'sauce'. It will look curdled and scary to start but keep going.
Leave to cool for 2 minutes and then add the butter in two stages, stirring gently until fully incorporated.
When you have a smooth glossy ganache place it in the fridge for a minimum of 3 hours or overnight until the ganache has set firm.
Remove the ganache from the fridge about 15 minutes before you want to finish the truffles. Using a 1 tablespoon scoop form small balls and finish rolling them between the palms of your hands so the surface melts slightly.
Dust with cocoa powder or use your favourite toppings. I used cocoa powder, cocoa powder topped with a touch of pink sea salt, cocoa powder with a dab of smoked paprika, coconut flakes, finely chopped pistachios and crushed meringue shells.

Adapted from Unwrapped - Green & Black's Chocolate Recipes

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I was curious to experiment with smoked paprika for these truffles. I coated some with cocoa powder and added the merest dab of smoked paprika on top and they turned out to be rather smokily beguiling.

And don’t you think Smoked Paprika would be an AWESOME colour for kitchen appliances? MieleUSA please make this happen!

Cover Girl–Edible Seattle

April 9, 2014 By Paola 16 Comments

Talking, as you probably weren’t, of my burgeoning food photography career, there was much excitement in da house a few weeks back when I was asked to step in and shoot the cover for the late Spring edition of Edible Seattle.

I worked with editor Tara Austen Weaver to realise her vision for the cover and the inside pages, and in the process we learned a lot about styling and preparing jam doughnuts (or, if you really must, jelly donuts).

For example, it’s quite tricky to style a tower of three doughnuts so it doesn’t look like a little nodding donutman.

We ended up remaking the doughnuts and cooking them for slightly less time, so that they were softer and more pillowy.

Here are few more images from the shoot that didn’t make the cut.

However if you’re looking for a recipe, it’s not mine to give. It’s from Beth Maxey and you’ll have to buy the more recent edition of Edible Seattle to get your mitts on it. It does make truly excellent doughnuts (it is possible I sampled one or two), and they’re not half as tricky to make as you might have imagined.

Believe me Tara and I know.

Food Photography Workshop–Saint Simons Island

April 8, 2014 By Paola 2 Comments

So while I was on blog hiatus I did yet another food photography workshop with the brilliant and captivating Helene Dujardin, Senior Photographer at Oxmoor House and of Tartelette blog fame.

This time the focus was not so much on still-life food photography and composition as in the previous workshop I attended but instead gave us a chance to photograph food in action.

Helene had teamed up with the incomparable chef John Ondo of Lana Restaurant in Charleston, and while Helene talked about food styling and plating, lighting for food photography and gave us invaluable insights into her day-to-day working relationships with her styling team and editors; he whipped up fabulous gourmet meals, all the while discussing his cooking techniques, answering questions and letting us take as many photos as we liked.

Helene and John had rented a house by the beach on Saint Simons’ Island about an hour out of Savannah, Georgia, and the workshop included a day in Savannah, a field trip to the cute and exceptionally photogenic Back in the Day Bakery and dinner on the outside terrace of a Savannah restaurant. I absolutely adored Savannah, of which more in a future post, while the Bakery also was a dream to photograph and also warrants a separate blog post. Chaps, I have so much pent-up bloggery to share with you!

John showed us how to make gnocchi with a couple of different sauces.

While Helene got us styling salads, pasta and bruschetta (please ignore the shitty prop styling and iPhoneography – the bruschetta below is just placed on a garden chair – and look at the FOOD! All of these sessions ran over as Helene had so much good stuff to impart).

Then John prepared one of the most incredible hunks of herb-encrusted lamb it has ever been my pleasure to experience.

Even the lamb though paled into insignificance against the fact that Libby was there again. Libby acted as the workshop’s sous-chef, photographer, general factotum and mother hen and is one of the kindest and most thoughtful people you’ll ever meet. Nothing is too much trouble for her.

She is also one of the funniest people I know and yet again had me weeping drunken tears of laughter well into the wee small hours.

In fact, despite the beauties of Savannah, the fabulous education, the gourmet meals, the lovely beach, excellent wine and exquisite lamb, it is the laughter and friendship which stick with me from this workshop.

Chaps, these people are utterly bananas. In a very, VERY good way.

I was moved to write the post as I notice from my Facebook page that there are still a couple of spaces left on Helene and John’s next workshop in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. If you’re into food photography, want to learn a ton of good stuff AND have the most incredible fun time imaginable I can’t recommend this highly enough.

Weekend Link Love

April 5, 2014 By Paola 1 Comment

It’s been a week full of Spring here in Seattle, though looking back I have not been a very prolific Instagrammer. Been too busy trying to get my life back together after all my travels and birthday parties and cake baking. The good news is that I’ve pretty much finished unpacking, so I’m no longer tripping over suitcases in the middle of the night as I go to the bathroom. Go me!

Here for your weekend delectation and delight are some links that caught my fancy this week.

Ever fancied ghosting for a cookbook writer? This article shows you how famous celebrity chefs are able to carry on churning out cookbooks while they’re busy making their TV shows/ running their restaurants/sunning themselves in the South of France etc.

These thought-provoking photos by Dina Goldstein show the Disney Princesses as you’ve never quite seen them before.

If you still want to believe in fairytales, these incredible portraits by Alexia Sinclair might help.

Simi Jois from Turmeric ‘n Spice gives us a tutorial on how to paint background prop boards for food photography.

This post on focusing on the essentials of life really resonated with me.

And here on the blog I’ve actually been blogging! Truly it’s been an incredible week.

We’ve been discussing WTFery from Kim Kardashian and Anna Wintour, looking at images from the Food Markets of the Cote D’Azur, shopping ‘til we dropped on #BlogTourNYC at Michele Varian’s NYC Shop, taking a look round the Architectural Digest Home Design show, welcoming April and peeking into my first StitchFix box.

This weekend I’m going to be relaxing after my hard week of blogging and last weekend’s cake/party extravaganza. Next week on the blog I’ve got a gorgeous recipe to share with you, I’ll be revealing said cake extravaganza and there’ll be much more from #BlogTourNYC.

Have a good weekend! What are you chaps up to?

The Markets of the Cote D’Azur

April 4, 2014 By Paola 2 Comments

‘But where is the FOOD, Paola?’ I hear all two of you crying.

Well actually I don’t, though I have to admit we’ve strayed rather from the food porn in the last few posts. Unfortunately I’ve been travelling so much recently that food photography has had to take a back seat. I’ve hardly had time to cook, let alone take pictures of food. Things will change soon I promise.

But in the meantime, I’ve realised that I still have TONS of photos from my trip last year that I haven’t yet inflicted upon you shared with you, so come with me as we visit some of the local shops and markets of the Cote d’Azur. Summer is on its way!

Menton has a wonderful indoor and outdoor market full of tantalising shops and equally tantalising characters.

It was such a pleasure to shop here every day, chat with the vendors and exclaim over the quality of the produce. When I bought a melon I was asked what I was planning to do with it, so that that the melon selected would be at optimum ripeness when I came to eat it. Another vendor slipped a small bunch of parsley into my bag full of courgettes, so I could saute’ them with the right herbs.

It goes without saying that the food was absolutely mouthwatering.

The Marche’ aux Fleurs in Nice is an outdoor market that sells all manner of produce as well as flowers.

And the food here is equally mouthwatering.

We’re planning this year’s holiday as we speak. We were thinking that maybe we wouldn’t go back to France, but when I go through my images I can’t imagine going anywhere else.

More pictures of Menton here.

New York, New York

March 28, 2014 By Paola 13 Comments

So I’m back from two back to back trips to New York, New York – firstly to attend a food photography workshop given by Penny de los Santos (with the Minx and the Husband tagging along) and secondly for Blog Tour NYC and the Architectural Design Home Show. I am still processing all I learned, saw, thought and felt, though I will be blogging the bejeezus out of everything in the coming weeks. Stay tuned for sumptuous shops, stunning restaurants and sexy hotels.

In the meantime, by way of an introduction, here are some of the sights and characters of New York City, which are still buzzing round my head.

One day I AM going to start a Tumblr called ‘Hipsters in their Habitats’.

Loved this hardworking little guy down in the subway.

New York, New York photography by www.paolathomas.com

Love truly was in the air.

Pilgrimage to PurlSoho. Check.

Remember when we did a ‘Go Fug Your Room’ on Diane Von Furstenburg’s NYC penthouse? Well here it is, seen from the magnificent new High Line Park. I couldn’t quite see in to see if she’d taken our decorating advice.

Gorgeous chartreuse green tables and chairs on the High Line, and windows that look like makeup palettes.

Ladies in green.

Photogenic taxis? Check and check.

For some reason people kept mistaking me and my Canadian friend Danielle – fellow foodie and street photographer extraordinaire, for British tourists. Can’t think why.

But I forgave her wearing that scarf when she introduced me to Balthazar’s.

Fabulous street art everywhere.

Can anyone tell me how water towers work? Do they collect rainwater? They fascinate me.

Lots of neon.

New York truly is a melting pot.

And obviously many iconic tall buildings.

I’ve never been a big one for street photography, but I could get completely obsessed by it in New York. We didn’t have a huge amount of time for it on this trip, but I WILL be back. I love this city so much.

Menton Mon Amour

March 11, 2014 By Paola 1 Comment

Did you know that around 80% of American tourists in France only go to Paris? Which is a crying shame as the rest of France is so spectacularly beautiful, so deeply fascinating and so incredibly varied from region to region.

Gelateria at sunset on the Menton waterfront

I was fortunate enough to be invited to lunch in Seattle last week by the France Tourism Development Agency and several regional French tourist boards, as they keen to spread the word in the US that France has much more to offer for travellers than just Paris.

As long time readers of this blog or followers of my Instagram feed know only too well, I have a very soft spot in my heart for Menton, the gracious old city on the very eastern edge of the Cote d’Azur, a hop, skip and jump from the Italian border.

The beach where we swam every day

We rented an apartment there for three weeks last summer and it occurs to me that, what with one thing and another, I never shared any photos with you. So these are for those of you who might be planning your summer vacations and may need some encouragement to get out of Paris.

Menton Mon Amour photography by www.paolathomas.com

It’s the colours of Menton that get to me most. The warmth of the coral, ochre, mustard and terracotta, punctuated by bursts of brilliant blue from shutters, sky or sea. And everything bathed in the most astonishing clear dancing light.

We rented an apartment full of antique furniture in a cute residential neighbourhood just behind the casino, about fifteen minutes walk from our favourite beach.

The Minx learned to sail (it’s so useful that she’s at the French immersion school here as we can put her in cool French camps).

And we spent endless days just hanging out on the beach, and endless warm evenings watching night fall over the Mediterranean. That sea. It does something for my very soul.

Tomorrow we’ll be visiting Menton’s fabulous covered market. I have a lot of holiday snaps to inflict upon you get through. (What is a blog for after all?)

Heart Shaped Cake

February 20, 2014 By Paola 3 Comments

Dear hearts I am back! Had a bit of a recurrence of the health problems which plagued me last year – adrenal fatigue, I’ll write a blog post about it one day soon – but I’ve been resting up and feeling good again.

And I need to get back to full blogging capacity because I’ve had some fabulous news that I’ve been bursting to tell you for some time now.

I’ve been chosen to be one of the featured bloggers on Blog Tour 2014 to New York City where we’ll be visiting the Architectural Digest Home Design Show and partaking in all sorts of fabulous shenanigans. Here’s the official announcement from organisers Modenus. Not sure how I managed to slip in among all those eminent interior designers to be honest.

I don’t know much about the itinerary as yet, except that we will be staying in a sexy midtown Manhattan hotel and spending a day at the Design Show. The last day of our tour will be organised by Tina and Sarah of NYC interior design studio Franklin Eighth. You may remember Tina as a monthly guest blogger on this very blog, so I know it’s going to be good.

Anyway, all this means I have the best possible reason to boost up this blog and my social media presence again, so do stick around for the ride. I’ll let you know a lot more details on the itinerary as I get them. #BlogTourNYC is happening from March 18th to 22nd.

In the meantime, here are some random pretty pictures of the chocolate heart shaped cake I made for my dearest best beloveds on Valentines Day. I again used the deliciously tasty and extremely forgiving ‘Mom’s Chocolate Cake’ from the first Macrina Bakery cookbook and the heart-shaped pan I bought ages ago from Ikea.

I frosted it with my usual buttercream (2 sticks/8oz/225g of butter to 6 cups of sifted icing/confectioner’s sugar) and added a little pure raspberry puree for both colour and flavour. I used a Ateco 825 icing nozzle, as I don’t have the rose tip that everyone else uses. Need to rectify that.

If you make and eat this cake please think of me. Due to the aforementioned adrenal fatigue I’m not actually supposed to be eating sugar. Ugh.

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