Strawberry pastry cream tarts

I usually don't dedicate my posts to anyone. Okay, in fact I've never dedicated a post at all. However, this one time, this teeny exception I'm going to dedicate this one to my ever-relentless-hounding friend who is probably my only reader and biggest critic. Cinnamon, this one is for you.

Processing pictures of pastries

I'm sure at least a few of you have been wondering what I've been up to. Your daring displaced person, valiant vagabond, or even tenacious transient has not been quite the busy baker as of late. With a new little person (not mine) in my life, a new camera, and looming deadlines at work, I've been a bit preoccupied. I didn't realize what I had gotten myself into when I ordered Plate to Pixel, nor when I bought my new camera. It wasn't until I installed Photoshop Lightroom did I think, "whoa this is going to be a lot of work!" Taking pictures is easy. Taking well thought out, balanced and appetizing pictures of food is tough. Really tough. In her book, Helene Dujardin stresses that the more effort you take into taking good pictures, the less post processing you'll have to do. Since I don't understand most of Lightroom at the moment, I'll stick to what I've gleaned from the book. Let me know what you think? Here is a relatively decent pictures I took of profiteroles.

Holy Guacamole!

I often forget how lucky I am to live in California. When I lived in Paris and came across people in the workplace, they'd always say how it was their dream to visit California. I always wonder what the stereotype of a typical Californian was; bleach blond surfer a la Baywatch? People do love the Hasselhoff. It isn't always an ethereal land of sunshine, though I can't complain too much about the weather.

Churros

Every time I eat a churro, I'm transported back to when I was a kid at an amusement park convincing my parents to buy me a churro from the guy with the rolling cart. There was something so appealing about the long pastry batons, crispy with their cinnamon-sugar coating and yet they always seemed too big for my pint-sized self. Alas, I could always count on my brother to polish any remainders off.

Banana chocolate chip cookies?

Yes. This is how scatterbrained I've been lately, that I can't even remember what I baked. I'm surprised I even know what day it is, to be honest. Surviving a birthday that ended in a 0, in the midst maybe buying a house, moving, family woes, and pending family additions... well folks it's as if I've bitten off more than I can chew! Well, if you think about it.. not really bit off.. but there's a lot being shoved down my throat at the moment in any case! I've eased off on the baking a lot lately too...

Plate to Pixel

So here's some new food for thought. I just picked up Helene Dujardin's Plate to Pixel over the weekend and think, wow, why haven't I looked into taking better pictures of my food before!? Sure, I do alright with a point-and-shoot clickity camera, but it would be nice to be able to take really really good pictures.

She writes just about as well as she takes food photographs and though I could pick up any old photography book, I'm glad this one talks about EVERYTHING including food styling and props! I'll give you all an update as I dig deeper into it. So excited!!

Hand-dipped chocolates

I know I've been neglecting my blog lately. With temperatures rising, introduction of new social mediums (Google, please integrate blogger to G+), new toys at home (Google, please create a blogger iPad app), and feeling that my proverbial plate is overflowing and thus stressing me out, sometimes culinary therapy just doesn't cut it. I'd like you all to believe that I'm some sort of domestic diva, but sadly I have a life that extends far past the kitchen. Most of the time I'll gladly answer to anyone's "back to the kitchen, woman!" but lately I've preferred crawling back into bed.

Black bottom cupcake fail

Every now and then I'll dig through my baking books and look for something new to try. One book I brought back from France was David Lebovitz's The Great Book of Chocolate. Funny story about this book, actually. I went to one of David's book signing events out of a 'boite bouquiniste" along the Seine. For those of you who aren't familiar with Paris, these are the little book kiosks along the river where sometimes you can find some out-of-print special edition, and other times just random trinkets and souvenirs. I didn't have enough Euros on me at the moment to pay for the book, so he kindly let me pay the difference in metro tickets.