KEW GARDEN’S SALAD BOOK
Carluccio’s and Italians really celebrate Easter with Colomba Cake, Easter Eggs and local towns make special pastries. It’s a time of year when families get together, eating fish on Maunday Thursday and lamb is becoming increasingly popular on Easter Sunday.
Chocolate eggs and Easter pastries being arranged at the breakfast table.
Colomba cakes hand made in Piedmont by Giuseppe and his team.
Chocolate Easter Eggs
We have shot some bright coloured images to lift clients spirits during these winter months.
KFC on drugs
Who let the daugs out?
Pappa al pomodoro on red.
Raw steak on yellow.
Enamel pans.
Delighted that the Kew Gardens cookbook is being re-printed for the 3rd time, this time in German.
It’s not long now until Christmas and any excuses to visit the Glenmorangie Distillery and photograph their whiskies. With seals alongside over looking the Moray Firth, wonderful mountains and pine forests which surround the distillery, it really is Scotland at its very picturesque best.
One of the shots was shooting a trickle flowing from a rock. This water (along with grain) is the basis of their whisky. The water is so soft because it fell from the skies thousands of years ago onto the rock above the distillery and has seeped through the rock creating this wonderful soft mineral water.
We all snap away taking lovely shots but however ‘nice’ they are, we have to listen to what other people think.
When I flew to Vejle, Denmark, all expenses paid for 5 days as one one of the two British exhibitors I felt I knew my market pretty well and generally liked what I saw on my website. Let’s face it, it’s not everyday I’m collected in a top of the range Porche by a 26 year Danish girl!!
However, during the exhibition & demonstrations, chatting away to photographers & art buyers from around the world, not only did i see and enjoy different styles of food photography but one Dutch art buyer’s comment really stayed with me. She liked one food photographers folio but was also highly critical of his work. She said it was ‘beautiful but isn’t food all about sharing and he didn’t have any human element in any photo?’ I can still remember her bewildered face as we waited for our planes to take us all home.
During my flight home, inspired by brash photos from NY and other wonderful images from around the globe, I thought, ‘I have a beautiful folio with high res post production BUT I need to add the interaction with people’.
Food is about sharing, it can be beautiful but shared with friends and family. My wife isn’t a foodie, although she appreciates a good meal out, she prefers talking to friends.
I have now introduced people in the folio and really enjoyed shooting them, both in sharing the food and also in the preparation.
On the banks of the Serchio river, in the Garfagnana mountains is a small artisan bakery, that has been feeding the local Tuscans since the end of WW11.
Brothers Emmanuelle & Giovanni, great grand children of the original bakers only use chestnut , spelt or potato flour to bake their loaves.
The oven, like many in Tuscan bakeries and trattorias is fired using local chestnut or olive wood. The bread, pastries and Friday night pizzas wouldn’t taste the same without it.
Using crystal clear water from the river, which is full of trout, the bread is totally organic and bought daily by the locals
Simple margherita pizzas with capers are cooked every Friday evening
The proof is in the pudding.
From Hugh’s current Trattoria book project - any publishers who would like to be involved I would love to discuss this with you.
I have done several shoots in the wonderful city of Bologna, the ‘Belly of Italy’, but none better than at the Mirasole, a short train journey from the city centre.
Bologna is famous for Mortadella, Lasagne, Bolognaise and also for snails, plus many other dishes. Parma,is the home of Parmesan & Procuitto is also very close
I love all the plates dishes and wacky ice bucket.
The Osteria del Mirasole, San Giovanni in Persiceto, Bologna
Tortellini with Mirasole cream
Classic lasagne with nettle lasagne sheets, chicken liver Bolognaise cooked for 8 hours
The grill
Veal chop with Parma ham with Parmesan cream
Florentine bistecca
The Bar, Mirasole
Rose, Lambrusco
Why do our Christmas shoots happen when the temperatures are in the 35C - 37C?
Today we are shooting a selection of Christmas still lives as we swelter under the burning sun, decorating a 20ft tree.
I remember when I was an assistant we shot a Christmas campaign for a Bank and hired a manor house for the shoot during a hot July. We had a huge log fire for the wintery effect. Presumably the chimney hadn’t been swept because as we were packing up the car after the shoot we could see smoke billowing from the outside of the chimney. We mentioned it to our boss who said ‘ Jump in the car and leave’. He left in his Aston, the other assistant and me drove off in the hired van. Ten minutes away, we met the fire brigade coming the other way!! We felt guilty but our boss didn’t!!
Diana Henry’s Buratta & Pumpkin salad, one of the delicious vegetarian recipes
PINK LADY Cream of the Crop winners & Wine - people
(also a winner in the US Colour Awards & AOP )
Leafy shadows and sun ripened vegetables
Chefs, pre diner drinks at Chateau Bagnol, Lyon
I still can’t tell you which of the 3 pictures are in the Finals of the Pink Lady Awards. Over 80,000 images were entered with 3 of my images in the final 50-60 images. There were some superb photos submitted from all over the world.
Later in April I can publish which 3 have got through?
I am not allowed to tell you about success in the Pink Lady Awards apart from 3 images have been Shortlisted but I have 3 winners in the Color Awards USA 2022.
The three winners are Ripe Bananas, Buratta winning for the 3rd time and Chefs for the 3rd time.
Ripe Bananas.
Buratta
Chefs, Chateau de Bagnols, Lyon, France.
Still life may be considered a weird subject but one that is fascinating. It allows you to make an everyday object extraordinary.
Surfaces, outlines and shapes, reflections are often crucial to making the photo interesting. Often there’s a fine line between an image being wonderful or boring.
An example can be clearly seen with my award winning Whippet photo. We all know what they look like but can you show it in a slightly different way with a slight twist or from a different angle? Do you need to see the head?
I shoot more and more ingredients and the skills learned from being a still life photographer enable me to make a simple ingredient more interesting. The most everyday object can be beautiful.
In my eyes, photography is not just about taking the picture, it’s just as important to arrange all the components, the correct food & props stylist so everyone is working and pulling in the same direction with the right props, backgrounds & foods.
I love briefing out the props and backgrounds so the stylist can go out and do her magic. Without good props our work is very tough.
On a lovely OFM brief with River Cafe Chef, Joe Trivelli I could put my skills into practice. The recipes were wonderful and I thoroughly recommended them for Easter.
Smoked haddock, samphire, sun-dried tomatoes, green olives, lemon peel, garlic drenched in olive oil.
I love this simple execution, i tried it looser, with cutlery, more bread but the oval plate was so good, with amazing food, it just didn’t need it.
Shaved asparagus, a hint of anchovy with eggy pasta.
The simplest pastas are often the best; I love this surface
Mussel & tomato soup served on a friselle to absorb all the juices; friselle are similar to a bagel and originate from Puglia.
The pork is browned off before putting in the oven for a slow roast with stuffed artichoke hearts.
Sliced stuffed pork plated with the delicious artichoke hearts. I really like this shot, there’s beauty in the messiness. These shots can look very contrived but I think this works. (there are some awful supermarket alternatives out at the moment, which is a shame as they never looked so bad).
The lamb & potato casserole soaked in red wine with capers & bay. I worried about this shot, it not only tasted wonderful but looked amazing too. Relieved and happy.
I try not to add cutlery unnecessarily, but I think the spoon works?
All the dishes tasted so good, so cook the recipes in the Easter Observer Food Monthly..
Thanks to my wonderfully organised assistant, Tom Teesdale, food stylist Rosie Mackean (& assistant Holly) & Tamsin Weston who always brings great props & surfaces. Everyone did such a great job, thank you.
Ready meals used to be a ‘Dirty” word and predicted to disappear in 2010 but now with more and more food delivered to our doors post covid, they really are returning stronger than ever.
My Local Kitchen recipes are written by chef Garry Hollihead who has won 3 Michelin *** around the globe and head chef at the Embassy Club during the Brit Pop days
Japanese fiery broth
Sri Lankan coconut fish curry
Pistachio flat breads
Banana, rum and raisin bread with salted caramel
I have been shooting a lovely project for the Kew Garden Cookbook with two lovely ladies from Kew, Gina & Lydia and Jenny Linford a food book author on over 20 cook books, many of which we have in our kitchens.
I have been shooting mainly in London but several ingredients were shot at home use my flagstones around the house and stables.
I always like looking at the humble background of how a shot was taken, the old bits of wood holding backgrounds up etc. In this case the pumpkins stood up perfectly balanced by themselves and were still there the following day despite the gales, before being wheel-barrowed off to our lane annual charity for Cancer Research.
Our little winding country lane in Sussex grows about 350-500 pumpkins and about 200 chillies every year with all proceeds going to Cancer Research. We all have friends and family who have lost lives to cancer so it’s nice being able to give back.
Italian produce is so good, wonderful sun-ripened fruit and vegetables that just need a drizzle of oil or stacciatella served with the sweet tomatoes.
Basket of mixed Italian tomatoes and aubergines
Served slice with stracciatella & olive oil
Marcelo’s fine crop of aubergine
Ivana’s farm fresh eggs
One of my favourite ever foods to eat is the humble onion bhaji and no one cooks it better than head chef Sham at the https://newicktandoori.com
So many Indian restaurants cook a horribly floury version but at the Newick Tandoori, they’re wonderfully crisp and packed full of flavour with a sweetened dipping sauce. Amazing, you’ll have to try them…
Best ever mouthful of food, a real contender
I love the golden softness of the sunlight light during ‘golden hour’. It’s magical…
Tuscan cactus
We all love going out to restaurants but often they’re using the wonderful produce we grow at home. A sun ripened, home grown tomato is hard to beat.
Just add a sprinkle of rock salt and a drizzle of oil or roast at 200C for 5minutes and then reduce the heat to 120C for 5 hours, grind some black pepper & throw in some garlic.
