I had such wild plans to shoot lots of great food, but then I did not know that I would be so busy this time of year! You know how it goes right, you think you have lots of spare time, to do some fun shooting of your own, but then person one calls and books a shoot, person two calls and books a shoot and before you know it… time has left the building!
In the meantime we are getting soooo close to christmas and we are planning to make a lovely buffet with great snacks and food, that we had also planned to test before the actual party. But guess what… time is running out there too!
So I apologize for not being able to live up to my own challenge, but I DO promise to make up for it in the very near future…!
So a golden oldie, to keep you entertained…:)
Chocolate trifle
Well…. here it is; my first attempt to replicate the original photo from the Delicious…. As you can very clearly see I did not have the same props, as I could not find them on short notice. So the glasses where a little taller which had a result on the layers and the plates where also not the same (bigger and different color). So that all had an effect on the end-result obviously.
If you compare the original photo with mine I am not too unhappy with the endresult…:) The original does not have that slightly blue cast which the scan has for some reason. Not sure why that happened..
The taste of this (rather heavy) dessert is fantastic! Not something you want to eat after a heavy meal though… The chocolate that I used is quite bitter as I used a cacao content of more then 70%. I can’t remember wether it was 80 or 85%… I might try a little less cacao content for next time, although it does go quite well. I was a bit worried that it would get too sweet, but it didn’t due to the chocolate and the fact that you really don’t use much sugar anyway in the recipe…
I am sure you are now all dying to try this recipe as well so here are the details!
Chocolate trifle
Ingredients:
- 350 gr chocolate brownies of good quality (I am not sure why you would need 350 gr as I only used about 150 gr for the 6 smaller ones. Could be different for the larger version)
- 60 ml kahlua or different kind of coffee liquer
- 275 gr dark chocolate of good quality, in pieces
- 3 eggyolks
- 1,5 tbsp sugar
- 1 tsp maizena
- 600 ml whipping cream
- 150 gr white chocolate, in pieces
- 30 gr walnuts, roasted and coarsely chopped
Directions:
- Make chunks of the brownies and spread them over the bottom of the bowl of over the 6 smaller bowls. The large bowl needs to be 1,5 ltr content, the smaller ones 250 ml.
- Sprinkle with kahlua and leave to set.
- Put the pieces of dark chocolate in a heatresistant bowl above a pan with softly boiling water. Make sure the water does not touch the bowl!
- Leave to melt and stir the chocolate untill smooth.
- Take the bowl of the pan and spoon by spoon add 225 ml hot boiling water so you will get a thick chocolate sauce (don't add more then one tablespoon at a time, as otherwise the chocolate will start to split and become grainy)
- Pour the sauce over the brownies and put the bowl(s) for 2 hours in the fridge.
- Whisk the eggyolks, sugar and maizena to a thick and light creamy mixture.
- Heat 300 ml of the cream in a pan at middlehigh fire untill it is almost cooking. While stirring add this to the egg-mixture. Put the custard back into the pan and heat for about 2-3 minutes untill it starts to bind. Don't let it boil.
- Put 100 gr of the white chocolate in a heat-resistant pan. Pour the custard over it and stir untill the chocolate is melted. Leave to cool completely and pour over the bowls with the brownies and chocolate. Put back in the fridge for another 2 hours.
- Put the remaining 50 gr of white chocolate together with the walnuts in a kitchenmachine and chop them finely with the pulse button.
- Whisk the remaining cream to soft peaks and spoon in the walnut-mixture.
- Put it on top of the trifle and let it rest in the fridge for at least another 2 hours. Garnish with chocolate curls if you want.
I did struggle with making the chocolate curls and ended up with shavings. I think it was too cold after I had melted it; I am not sure… Anyone has any good tips for making proper curls?
A while ago I was asked to go to a basic-workshop to learn about decorating cakes. I have done that on a couple of occassions and I do like it once in a while although I also have to confess that I am not the kind of girl who spends hours and hours to perfect the little thing that needs to go on top of the cake. I am more a “the quicker the better” person when it comes to decorating cakes!
But I had said yes to the workshop which was last saturday and above you can view the result of the marzipan roses we had to make. To be quite honest; the workshop was fun but not really very difficult when you have made a few cakes yourself already. We first had to do lines with icing, which is really not that difficult once you get the hang of it and the same goes for the marzipan roses.
Ofcourse I am quite proud of my own roses; I think that I did get the hang of it quite quickly…
The photos are taken with my compact so not the best of quality but it’s the thought that counts!
The photos with person are from Nicky…
Here she is working with the icing.
For next week we have to make a cake which we are then going to decorate. I think it’s great timing since it’s Tom’s birthday next week as well, so that means we have a lovely cake to eat already! I am not entirely sure if he is going to like the pink roses that are going to be featured on top, but hey; it’s the thought (and taste) that counts right?
For my ‘challenge’ I have already picked the first dish. It’s going to be a chocolate trifle… The original photograph is from Ben Dearnley and was featured in the Delicious of november. I thought it would be a nice start although I first have to see if I will be able to manage…! More to follow soon; I haven’t planned the date yet when I will be making it but I think possibly wednesday and then on to photograph it on thursday (it has to be cooled for quite a while first)
I am not sure I have the right glasses either, so it might include some shopping first! Stay tuned for more news soon!
Photography: Ben Dearnley, Styling: David Morgan. From Delicious november 2008
Cookies
Whoohoo!!! It’s official; I had the first photoshoot in my new studio. Oke, it doesn’t account for much but still it is more shooting then I have done lately anyway, so I am glad it all went reasonably ok. I always have to get my bearings when I am in a new studio. The light is different and I wanted to use the studioflashes for this particular shot. Just because I have to get better in lighting particular scenes.
I bought a couple of cookies at the supermarket, so no, I did not make those myself unfortunately. It’s a simple cookie with some marzipan decoration on top. Quite tasty but not really home made. I do have the option to cook in the studio. Which is much much better then it was in the previous studio.
I have set myself also a new challenge which should keep me occupied for most of the winter anyway. One of my favorite cooking magazines is Delicious. Now one of the reasons I love it so much is – ofcourse – the food photography, so what I want to do in the coming months is try and recreate one dish each week which I then try to photograph in exactly the same style as is done in the magazine. Reason is that I want to be able to recreate certain lighting effects. I struggle with that quite a bit; up till now I have done mostly daylight and that all works fine. But sometimes you see – especially this time of year – beautifully darkly lit atmospheric photos. I want to be able to recreate those.
So what I will do in the coming weeks is that I will pick a recipe with fabulous photo and I will make the dish and then do two things; one is to scan the original so you can see how it was supposed to be. Then style the shot in the magazine way first and then do a second shot in a different styling.
Not sure how big of a challenge it is going to be… It might be virtually impossible for me to do, but I will definitely give it a good go!
So come back here in a week or so to view the results! I can’t wait to start on it!!
In case you were wondering why it has been so quiet lately; I am working my ass of in the new studio. It's getting to the finishing point so just a few more days and I can finally get back to work again and maybe some decent cooking and shooting as well!
Have a look at my other
blog if you want to know all about the new studio!
I think there are all things about food that we like better then some; for me that is goatcheese. I am not sure why I just love the taste but I do…
So when I was asked to make a reportage for school for a magazine of choice it wasn’t very hard to pick! My magazine of choice was – what else – Delicious. and I thought making a reportage about an authentic goatcheese farm would make a great trip and a great reportage as well. It’s for my assesment so fingers crossed that I pass.
I did have to get up at a ridiculously early hour (4.15 am) to go there as it was far in the east of Holland but the trip was worth the time and effort.
The people where really lovely and very very friendly.
Imagine how you would feel having a stranger come over at 7 am in the morning..
I followed them around for the day and consequently saw the entire process of cheesemaking from the milking of the goats to the final product in the store…
You know how you always have this image in your head of how cheese is made? Well, that is only partially true. I am not going to describe the entire process as I am not sure I would get it entirely right, but it was very interesting!
Now let’s hope my teacher agrees on tuesday!
Appetizer
Asian
Bread
Breakfast
Desserts & other sweets
Healthy
