Praline Vanilla Ice cream ala Jo

12:45 AM

I had a sudden craving for something sweet. I wanted to have coffee, but my stock needs replenishing... which is a good thing at this point. My insomnia has gotten so bad. Even if I'm sleepy and tired by 11PM, i just can't get myself to sleep. And having coffee at 12 midnight would make it worst.

So I went downstairs to raid my kitchen for something sweet. I'm not a fan of vanilla ice cream. I don't like drinking milk. And having vanilla ice cream is akin to drinking milk (nice philosophical view noh?). The only something sweet I found was a tub of vanilla ice cream in the freezer. I remembered I made some peanut sesame seed pralines (or peanut brittle) a day before for my food photography series. And there's chocolate syrup... hehehe... now you know the rest of the story...




so here's how to assemble my sweet concoction...

One scoop of vanilla ice cream. Crush some peanut-sesame seed brittle. Sprinkle over the vanilla ice cream. Drizzle with chocolate syrup. Repeat process, making two layers. add one big chunk of peanut-sesame seed brittle on top.




hay... hay... hay... sweet!

Salmon en Papillote

I finally rediscovered the joys of cooking. Thanks to those food blogs and cooking shows on cable (aside from having food photo ops), I am now inspired to cook. M brought home two salmon steaks. I'm not a fan of salmon for I find them kind of malansa for my taste. But it's such a waste of money to just ask my yaya to fry it. For dinner tonight, I made baked salmon (Italian style)... with a twist... instead of baking them inside the oven, I wrapped the fish pieces in baking paper... en papillote! I popped them inside the microwave... baking the lazy way... hehehe... I'm so lazy to pre-heat the oven kasi...

I'm sharing the recipe here...





Salmon en Papillote

salmon fillets
Olive oil
tomatoes, cut into small cubes
red onion, sliced thinly
garlic, sliced thinly
fresh lemon juice
dried thyme
dried oregano (i substituted basil)
salt & pepper

In baking paper, place a bed of tomatoes, onions, & garlic. Place a piece of salmon fillet on top. Season with salt & pepper, dried basil & thyme and drizzle olive oil on top. add some lemon juice (i added a slice of lemon on top). Add more tomatoes, onion & garlic on top. Seal by folding the edges. Pop inside a microwave oven for around 7-10 minutes.

I made sauteed spinach with garlic to go with the dish.




Note: careful when opening the paper. Steam from the dish can burn...

french toasts

I'm starting to go back to my cooking... the past two days, I've been glued to the AFC (asian food channel) on cable. I plan to slowly build up stocks on my pantry again. Last night, Pipay & I made fruit jello's which I'm going to shoot later tonight. And for my kids' snacks this afternoon, I made french toasts.



One can never go hungry if you have the basics - milk, butter, eggs, bread, potatoes. I could make a meal out of these basic ingredients. Bakit nasama yung potatoes dito? Well... I love potatoes that's why... whenever I go hungry and looking for food at night, I'll just slice some potatoes, pop them in the microwave or grill them on my cheapipay panini grill... dipped in soy sauce, calamansi, sesame oil dipping... and voila! Satisfied na ko... This dipping sauce is a must try pala... got this from my vegetarian Australian boss in Filcartoons. Goes well with everything...specially steamed veggies. You might also want to put some kick by adding chili.

So going back to my french toasts... here's the recipe. as usual, no measurements...

Sliced bread (you can use all kinds of bread - I like mine multigrain)
2 eggs
milk
sugar
butter
maple syrup, chocolate syrup, marmalades, etc... the possibilities are endless.

combine eggs, sugar and milk. add nutmeg and cinnamon (optional; but they really make a lot of difference). Melt a pat of butter in a non-stick pan. Dip bread slices in milk-egg mixture... drain excess; fry in butter. 2 minutes on each side. Serve warm with maple syrup, marmalade/jelly...

How hard can that be?

Food Photography Class

February 4-5, 2009

I was an hour early. Excited to meet the famous Mark Floro, a well known food photographer...excited to learn from him.

Sir Mark looks very jolly and at first glance, you could tell that his class will be one hell of a wacky shoot. I wasn't wrong. It was really FUN...FUN..FUN..FUN!

I learned a lot from this 2 day workshop... food styling... tricks of the trade...lighting (we had three kinds of light set-up). On day 2, we shot for our portfolio.

after a few days, I got myself those DIY lights that were taught to us. Did some practice shooting at home, in our living room...