Motivated.

So Kristin gave me my Christmas present today and it was seriously the most motivational gift for this blog ever. She got me new props for my photography shoots! I've been racking my brain about what to make next because I want my first real post back to be special, especially since I have absolutely nothing planned for tomorrow (except an oil change). I'll have great light and all the props I need. I've also posted a picture of my working station right now. This is what I do to try to find recipes, inspiration, and ideas. =) THANK YOU KRISTIN!

AND I'M BACK!

I'm glad to be back. I've done all of the things that I last posted so I feel that I am ready to go back to the blog! I got into business school, I took my photography class and am ready to start cooking again! I wish I could say that I've cooked a lot during the hiatus, but I really haven't, not even for the holidays. But in the new year, I plan to improve my food photography and by doing that I am bound to cook more. Wait for it! ;)

Short Hiatus

Hello readers! I am taking a short hiatus from the blog...I have a few other obligations I need to take care of like b-school apps, going to vegas, and taking my photography class I purchased! Here are a few pics I've taken. Please remind me to never try to bake again...i am horrible at it. ;)

Egg salad

I was majorly craving egg salad for some reason. I hadn't had it in years and am still not really sure what made me crave it, but boy am I glad I did. I experimented with a few different combinations, but felt this had the most flavor. I actually liked adding white wine vinegar, but couldn't get the perfect combination, but I'll keep trying. So to get perfectly cooked eggs, all you have to do is put the 6 eggs in water and heat it on medium high. Once the water starts boiling, put the timer on for 9 minutes and you will have a perfectly cooked egg.

I also learned something about toasted bread that I'm pretty sure everyone already knows. Fresh bread toasted is way better than stale bread toasted. I love fresh bread so much that I thought toasting it would just ruin it, so I never did. I only toasted bread if it was stale until recently. FRESH BREAD TOASTED IS SO GOOD! The outside edges are crispy while the inside is fluffy and it's just amazing. Ok, there is my epiphany of the day.

Did you know that eggs are my favorite food? I love them boiled, scrambled, sunny side up, poached, over easy...the list goes on. If it wasn't so high in cholesterol, I'd have it a lot more. Anywhere, here's the recipe; it's actually not that fattening because I used minimal mayo. Enjoy! Oh, and I know I said I was going to make a dessert and I am! I just had to find the perfect recipe and I have! It is a raspberry mocha dobos tortelette from dessertsforbreakfast.com...it's probably the most complex dessert I've ever made with the exception of the raspberry souffle I attempted to make; unfortunately it never rose.

Mushrooms and potatoes in a red wine sauce

I debated calling this post "Mushrooms and potatoes in a red wine reduction" but thought that it sounded too pretentious for how easy it is. This side dish was delicious. I adapted it from herbivoracious.com, one of my favorite sites; however he used chanterelles and I can't afford chanterelles, but I did pair this with filet mignon because I had a deal from Living Social at whole foods. Gosh, I forgot how amazing whole foods is. Everything there just looked and smelled amazing, especially the produce.

Regarding this dish, the only thing I might do different is cut up the potatoes next time, mostly because it would photograph better. I didn't like how disproportionate the potatoes were to the mushrooms or to the steak. Anyway, I highly recommend this whole meal because steak, potatoes, and mushrooms just go well together. I made the steak a little differently this time because a friend suggested baking the steak first, then searing it, which made it super juicy...but the key to a good steak is to heavily salt and pepper the sucker; it makes a world of a difference. I'm not going to include the recipe for the steak mostly because I just kept an eye on everything and didn't time it; plus it varies for every size steak, but below is the recipe for the side dish.

I've decided I want to make a dessert next. I'm not really sure what yet, but something that looks really pretty...I am NOT a baker though so wish me luck!

Taco Seasoning!

This is my first attempt at taco seasoning and it turned out pretty good! I altered a recipe from thewaytohisheart.wordpress.com and saw that she had a good point in homemade taco seasoning...NO MSG and you get to control the amount of salt that goes into your meal. I actually bought Kroger taco seasoning the other night fully expecting to use it, but I'm glad I didn't because this one was just as good and tasty.

Now, there's no secret to making tacos...tortillas, ground beef, cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, cilanto, and avocado. BAM! I typically add black beans cooked with some garlic too, but I forgot to this time which was ok because the taco tasted very fresh. The recipe is down below. Just add 1 tbsp for every 1 lb of ground beef. I want to make sauteed mushrooms with a red wine sauce, but I need to think of a proper entree to go with it. Stay tuned! ;)

Albondigas Meatballs with Salsa Espanola

So I am continuing my way through The Cuisines of Spain cookbook and I love these meatballs. It has the simplest ingredients, but creates something so amazing. It's a little time consuming but well worth the time. Now, if you haven't noticed, I got new plates and the pictures above are my attempt at food styling. However, don't be fooled because when I actually ate the meatballs, I ladled about 2 more cups of sauce onto that plate. I attempted to make french fries but I don't think they turned out exactly the way I wanted them too so I will keep trying.

I've decided that I love cooking with wine. I don't actually like the taste of wine to drink, but cooking with it adds such depth of flavor that you can't get from herbs or spices. I'm really going to try to find more recipes that involve wine. Below is the albondigas meatball recipe shown with my newfound Photoshop skills! ;)

GAZPACHO

Gazpacho! So, my boyfriend's sister in law made this amazing gazpacho a few weeks ago and I had to make it myself. I actually bought the cookbook because they have made a few things from there that I just love. I'm sure other recipes (like albondigas meatballs) will make it to this blog. ;) Anyway, this gazpacho recipe is tough! It sounds easy, but I decided to take the difficult route which I probably won't do next time. I actually peeled each tomato even though the recipe didn't call for it. The soup is normally a reddish orangish pretty hue instead of this pink ugly color but it still tastes good! It's refreshing, flavorful, and very addicting.

On another note, I got photoshop! I have Jason to thank for installing it and Faye to thank for teaching me few basics. So watch out for a few improvements in the blog!

Garam Masala Chicken

So, I've definitely blogged about this dish in my last blog, but I wanted to post it again because I really wanted to be able to reference it here since I deleted my other blogs. So, my friend, Jason actually gave us his mom's recipe for this amazing chicken. I had never tried anything with garam masala in it, but now I really want to find more recipes with it. It not only has great flavor, but actually thickens sauces really quickly. I accompanied this chicken with store bought garlic naan from Trader Joe's, which I highly recommend. This dish has so much flavor and the perfect amount of spice.

I know it seems like I haven't cooked in a while, but I have! I made this brown sugar salmon last week, but just didn't feel like it was up to par for my blog. I'm realizing that I am bad at choosing recipes. I try to choose recipes that are really easy, but maybe I have to start going for recipes with more depth of flavor.

Anyway, below is the recipe for the garam masala chicken. And I know I said I was going to choose a recipe from the Bon Appetit magazine, but I might go with a recipe from my new cookbook! Stand by.

Guacamole

I have made guacamole at least 50 times in my life and believe I have perfected my recipe. It's super simple with all of my favorite things: avocados, onions, and cilantro. I've actually had complaints on the excess amount of cilantro and onions I put in things so to hear that people actually like my guacamole came as a big surprise. The key to good guacamole is ripe avocados. Make sure to wait if needed! A nice trick I learned in middle school is to put any fruits in paper bags to speed up the ripening proces. I can't remember why, but it works! Here's the recipe.

*P.S. I just got my Bon Appetit magazine subscription! So expect some recipes from there!

I have new kitchenware!

So sorry I haven't posted in a little while. I got a new job this week and have been adjusting with not much time to cook. However, I do have an important update...I have new pots and pans! Nate's mom graciously gave them to me since she was not going to be using them. Thank you Sheila! I've taken a few pictures that don't do them justice...they're SOOOO pretty and I can't wait to use them. =) I'm not sure what my next post is going to be. I've had requests for my guacamole, but I should probably cook an actual meal soon so we shall see.

Tomato Tart

I made my very first homemade puff pastry! Admittedly, it was only because I was at Trader Joe's and they didn't have any and I was too lazy to go to Ralph's to get it, but regardless, I'm glad I didn't. Pastry dough is so easy. Anyway, on to the main course, the tomato tart. I LOVE this recipe. I will be making it again and again. It is so simple and has so much flavor. The recipe is from none other than Ina Garten, the Barefood Contessa. She is the one chef on the food network that I can watch straight for hours because her food just always look and sounds amazing.

I love the addition of white wine to the onions as well as the thyme. I went to the Santa Monica Farmer's market to get all the herbs and produce while practicing my photography in the natural sunlight. I really want to make a habit of this because Farmer's Market vegetables have a noticeable freshnss in taste to me. I've also decided that thyme and basil are my favorite herbs. Driving home, I had the pleasure of having this aroma as a car freshener.

Now, I have cooked other dishes in the pas week with the intention of blogging about them, but there were some difficulties. I tried making thai green curry, but it came out way too spicy, then I also made chicken adobo, but I was very disappointed with the pictures. I need to perfect my thai green curry recipe and hopefully get better pictures next time I make chicken adobo. In the meantime, below is the tomato tart recipe!

Honey Vinaigrette

So, this salad dressing was inspired by Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc at Home, which I HIGHLY recommend. He has many recipes of vinaigrettes and I gravitated towards this Honey one. I made some adjustments to make it not so oily and was really pleased with the outcome. This recipe is slightly sweet and very light.

On another note, I tried my camera on the manual setting today and did NOT realize how hard it was to focus on an item. All my pictures were blurry and I have no idea why, so I'll be using autofocus until I figure it out. Additionally, I tried about 10 photos using different ISO settings and didn't notice anything different in all ten photos. Gosh, this is going to take a lot of time. Practice makes perfect! ;)

It begins.

Sobrasada con Tronchon

Since I finally settled on a blog name Crostini, I thought it would be fitting to have my first post be a type of crostini. I tried this dish called Sobrasada con Tronchon at Bar Pintxo in Santa Monica and just fell in love. Realizing how simple it was, I went to try to recreate it. You really can't go wrong with bread, cheese, meat, and honey, but I think this particular combination works. The meat is peppery while the cheese is a little salty, then the honey brings it all home.

My photographs need some work, but I am loving my new camera so far. I've only messed around with the autofocus so far, but will venture into manual pictures soon. I've included a picture with the recipe below. You can just click on it to make it enlarged. I couldn't make it any bigger, which is another thing I'll have to work on but this is what the blog is for. ;) Enjoy

I have found my passion...

I've never had a passion for anything. I went through high school reading the Harry Potter series, shopping, watching lots of tv and playing sports. Then, I went to college for a Business major, the major that everyone chooses when they don't know what they want to do, spent a lot of time watching the food network and attempting to cook. So naturally, when my boyfriend would ask me what my passion was, I'd say cooking, but then I'd go on saying that I didn't want to cook that night. There was an aspect of cooking that I liked, but not the actual cooking part. I'd tell him that I really liked the outcome of the cooking more than cooking itself. He would then tell me that cooking was not my passion. So, I became pretty set on just accepting that I did not have a passion in life...but then out of nowhere, it hit me. Foodography.

I actually realized my passion while reading the following blog.

whatkatieate.blogspot.com

There was an article in there where Katie had a quote saying "I'd been telling my friends for years, 'I think there's something else that I'd excel at''. She is a food photographer (a really good one) and I realized that is something I'd like to try. I spend so much of my time watching the food network and looking at food blogs, but it never occurred to me that maybe this is what I could be doing, taking pictures of food. This probably didn't occur to me because I love eating food more than anything, but that's besides the point. I want to be a food photographer.

I just know that it will make me happy. I gravitate towards great pictures of food and whenever I have a camera in hand, I usually only take pictures of food. I must say that I'm not very good at it right now; I'm not sure if I have the eye for these types of things, but it is definitely worth a shot. That's where this blog comes in. I want to document my growth as a foodographer and chef.

Right now, I have a point and shoot camera, but I've always been disappointed with the quality of the pictures so I am going to be brave and spend the money for a nicer camera. I have a lot to learn, but I am ready and willing. I hope this blog helps me see where I need improvement and maybe even entertain a few of you. Wish me luck!