Try not to stare.

Yes. Our job is hard. We know it.

The New Guy in Town

We had the opportunity to meet the new chef at Blue Fire Grill at La Costa Resort in Carlsbad. Chef Gregory creates some, not only tasty dishes, but art inspiring as well! With amazing colors and textures, these dishes are summer on a plate. If you have a day where you find yourself without something interesting to do, take a ride down the coast and treat yourself to a delectable meal and maybe a glass of local wine. It's Summer time, live it Up!

One Cool Dude.

Don't shoot us, but we are now big fans of NY Giants football. Ok, maybe not the entire team, but at least one cool member, Steve Smith. We were fortunate to have the opportunity to shoot him and one of our best clients, House Foods for a promotional campaign they are doing. He was willing to be silly and play around with different ideas for Football meets Tofu! We always appreciate a celebrity that is willing to laugh at themselves and have some fun along with us. Steve actually grew up around here, although now calls New Jersey home, and went to USC! One of our hometown boys makes good!

Nice to know you Steve, and thanks for the laughs!

Anyone got some limes?

Still, after this many years in the business, it's exciting to see our work in ads and in print. Most of the time, we shoot these images with a vague notion of how our client will use them in their final product, and never see the end result. Yet as we were perusing the morning newspaper this weekend, Ta-Da! There was a full color ad displaying proudly, our tempting images of tacos for our client Baja Fresh! And not only did they use the original shot as per concept, but also our "beauty" shots that we like to do to keep our creativity flowing. How fantastic!

Now someone pass the salsa, we're having Tacos!!

Fun and Fabulous!

It's that time of year again and the crew was back up in Seattle to shoot the massive Tulalip Resort & Casino. This year the powers that be decided to go in a new direction with their advertising look, which we were excited to be a part of. More movement, use of selective focus and less cheesy thumbs up in the camera. Thus, we ended up with over 5000 really amazing casino shots! The models were gorgeous as well as professional and personable. It's so nice to be able to work with that caliber of people. We did several outdoor shots where the models were in their "cocktail" attire in around 50 degree, wind-blowing, weather. It's not the first time we were happy to be the photographer, comfy in our jeans and jackets and not forced to look "sexy" in our slacks and mini-skirts!!

We had several delightful dinners, a few choice bottles of wine with friends, and only had one catastrophe with our equipment. And it's amazing the silly things we see, when staying in a place for a week straight. There was an entire contingent of Red Hat Ladies, two little old people riding double on a scooter, and the big boss pushing a production cart! It's the little amusements that keep the day moving along...

Cheers!

We've Done It!

As promised, our very own self-directed, self published cookbook has been born! The recipes are scrumptious and the pictures (if we do say so ourselves) are stunning. We couldn't be more pleased with the result of our excited efforts on this project. It took several days of shooting, creating all of these images from our own imaginations, changing a few recipes out and adding others, and one or two typos, and we are pleased to present "In Season; Winter Recipes".

Here are a few of the recipes that we thought you'd like, just to tease you into wanting a copy of your very own! Please let us know what you think!

p.s. In an earlier post we included several more images from this book. If you have a minute, check those out too!

We love stew but wanted a lighter alternative to traditional beef recipes. Our chicken stew is a crowd-pleaser that’s just as good the day after. Serve with our heavenly Sage Biscuits.

Chicken Stew

Makes 6 servings

Easy

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

8 ounces button mushrooms, cut in half

2 stalks celery, sliced

2 medium carrots, peeled and sliced

1 medium yellow onion, sliced

3 cups low sodium chicken broth

4 chicken breasts, boneless and skinless, cut into 2-inch pieces

1/2 cup heavy cream

2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley or 2 teaspoons parsley flakes

Salt and ground black pepper to taste

1 tablespoon chopped fresh sage (optional)

Heat 2 tablespoons of the butter in a large saucepan over high heat. Add mushrooms, carrots, celery and onions and cook, stirring constantly, for 5 minutes. Stir in chicken broth. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer for 20 minutes. Stir in chicken, reduce heat, and simmer until cooked through, about 15 minutes. Stir in cream and parsley and cook just until hot. Remove from heat and stir in remaining butter. Add salt and pepper to taste. Garnish with sage and serve hot.

Tip: This recipe can be doubled or tripled if made in a stockpot.

Tip: Make this recipe a day ahead of time. Refrigerate in an airtight container. Reheat over medium heat until heated through.

Tip: Replace the breasts with chicken shredded from a whole roasted chicken.

Tip: Spoon leftover stew into a casserole dish and cover with prepared puff pastry for a quick chicken pot pie. Place in a casserole dish on a baking sheet (to catch any spills) and bake in a 350 degree F oven until pastry is golden brown.

Paella originated in Valencia, Spain. The name comes from the wide, flat-bottomed pan traditionally used to cooked paella. They are inexpensive and well worth the investment but a very large skillet will do. Recipes vary from region to region, town to town, family to family but they all have three ingredients in common: rice, tomatoes and saffron.

Seafood Paella

Makes 6-8 servings

Healthy

5 cups low sodium broth

1/2 teaspoon saffron threads

1/4 cup olive oil

1 large yellow onion, chopped

1 red bell pepper, chopped

4 garlic cloves, minced

2 cups medium grain rice

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/2 pound large shrimp, peeled and deveined

1 pound small clams

1 pound mussels, beards removed

1/2 pound halibut or other thick white fish, cut into 1-inch pieces

4 medium tomatoes, diced

1/2 cup chopped fresh flat leaf parsley

Lemon wedges for garnish

In a large saucepan, bring chicken broth and saffron to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat and keep at a simmer.

In a large paella pan or very large skillet, heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil over medium high heat. Add onions and peppers and sauté for 5 minutes. Reduce heat to medium low, add garlic and continue cooking until garlic turns golden. Remove onion mixture from pan and set aside.

Add remaining olive oil to pan. Increase heat to medium high. Add rice, salt and pepper and cook, stirring frequently, until slightly golden, about 5 minutes. Pour broth over rice and stir in onion mixture. Reduce heat to low, cover and cook until liquid is nearly absorbed, about 15 minutes.

Uncover pan and place shrimp, mussels, clams, monkfish, tomatoes, and parsley on top of rice. Cover and continue to cook an additional 10 minutes or until shrimp is cooked through. Garnish with lemon wedges before serving.

Tip: You can double this recipe if you make it in two paella pans or very large skillets.

Tip: In place of the clams and mussels use 1/2 pound of sliced pre-cooked spicy sausage.

Tip: In place of the halibut and shrimp use 1 pound of chicken breast cut into 2-inch pieces.

All kinds of flying things

With a slightly confusing shot list, a huge pile of product, and one "freegan jumper" (ask, and we'll tell ya later) we powered through the most shots we have EVER done in two days of shooting. 50 images folks. Count 'em. 50. For those of you out there that don't get into our studio as often as you'd like, we usually range about 6-9 shots in one day. I mean, you don't want your food stylist to go crazy and start talking nonsense... Do ducks really only swim in one direction? Are they all in a row? Oh, wait... oh, no... it may have happened already. What does it mean then, that we can still understand them? But I digress...

Nature's Best came in and we had some fun deciding the best way to make panna cota look good, actually making frozen pizzas look delicious and watching how far peas fly when a bowl full is knocked off the table. It's never boring around here!!