Tuesday, May 22, 2012

the week the cat left the bag

With the last part of April (and week 17) came the arrival of strawberry season. Sure, we had gotten some strawberries to go on top of our Easter cheesecake a couple weeks before, but now they were in greater supply at the farmers markets. To celebrate, Steve made me some waffles with strawberries on top for breakfast on Sunday, as well as some small strawberry tarts for dessert. We were originally going to make a mascarpone filling for the tarts, but in our efforts to avoid using raw eggs, our improvisations on the recipe didn't quite work out. The mascarpone decided to curdle when Steve started to whip it—probably a temperature issue—and heavy cream wasn't saving it. Rather than dealing with that for the tart filling, Steve made some pastry cream instead, which he mixed with heavy cream to make chiboust or diplomat cream. That ended up working out great, and I got my tart picture after all. Meanwhile, the mascarpone mixture found a use as a topping for my leftover waffles. Less glamorous, but still tasty.

113/366 strawberry tart


On Monday, I was feeling somewhat lazy in the picture department. Rather than taking a lot of pictures, I was reading about taking pictures. I still have a tiny bit left to read from the food photography book I started in January, but I'm also branching out to read more about taking pictures of people. Gotta get ready to photograph my own kid eventually...

114/366 beyond snapshots


Still inspired from the previous day's reading to shoot more with my old 50mm lens, I took a walk to a parklet on Tuesday. I left the 50mm on my camera and tried to get the feel of it again while shooting various flowers. Unfortunately, I suspect that that lens is back focusing slightly; several shots were just a little off. (The one below is a bit soft at the front too.) I haven't done any tests to confirm my suspicions, so it could very well be user error that's the problem. However, I don't seem to have that issue with the 35mm lens. It may just be time to send the 50mm in for a tune-up.

115/366 blossoms in 50mm


A trip to Omnivore Books was on the schedule for Wednesday. We had decided on a cookbook as a birthday present for a couple friends, and I figured I'd also buy the Bi-Rite ice cream book for us. We still haven't made anything yet from the ice cream book that I got Steve for his birthday in February, but who was I kidding? We were going to get the Bi-Rite one eventually anyway. Might as well just get it now. For my picture of the day, I shot the Omnivore chicken in its chef's hat. The chicken's been on the counter with the cash register a lot in the past, but it was in the window this time for easier photograph-ment.

116/366 the omnivore chicken


Yet another Noe Valley walk occurred on Thursday afternoon. I can't remember if I actually needed anything in the area this time or not, but I saw a Where the Wild Things Are cake in the window of Noe Valley Bakery, so that made the trip worthwhile. (This was before the passing of Maurice Sendak... RIP.)

117/366 put a wild thing on it


Friday was the day that I made all my phone calls to my family, telling them to expect another grandchild/niece or nephew in October. Dan and Carmen had actually found out via text message on Wednesday evening. The short version of that: It's really not how I wanted to make the announcement, but it's what ended up happening. And since they had been sick for over a week, we hadn't seen them in person in quite a while. I was getting impatient to finally share the news, since I was entering my second trimester, so I guess it was good that we didn't have to wait until we finally saw them again.

Anyway, we had planned to tell Dan and Carmen at one of our usual pizza nights, but we had a string of Dan- and Carmen-less Fridays. This was the second of those, so we went out to Pi Bar to eat our pizza by ourselves again. On the plus side, we got to tell Steve's friend there our news when she asked about our weekend plans. When we got home from dinner, we were also able Skype with Steve's parents and tell them.

118/366 pizza night


Finally, a trip down Church St. on Saturday. We needed some meat for our dinner from the butcher shop, so I went with Steve to get it. There were some interesting metal roses—probably candleholders—outside an antique shop, and they provided me with my photo du jour.

119/366 tabletop trinkets

2 comments:

  1. This post was extra exciting to read! Regarding the "big announcement"! That Pi Bar pizza looks so-o-o-o good! Looking forward to the next time we are there and can have it...but that won't be for awhile I guess. As always, I enjoy each and every one of your posts! Thanks! BSD

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  2. I was wondering whether my Amazon package showed up at your apartment? Congrats again!

    Cheers,

    Ronald

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