Lemon-y Autumn.

Lemon tarts are mid-summer sunshine, hardly at home with the pumpkins, kale, and slow-cooked stews of October.  I can't put off sharing these citrus beauties anymore, however, and I'm ashamed it's taken me so long already.  Absolutely ashamed.

So now, to the tarts: this spring, while living in Calgary and working for Sidewalk Citizen Bakery, I had the pleasure of meeting Shallon Cunningham, owner of Salt Food Photography and all-around lovely person.

Introduced by my friend/her cousin Marnie, we hit it off and planned a date: I, with some kitchen experience, would bake and food-style.  Shallon, with her photography experience, would capture the whole process.  It'd be a learning opportunity for both of us, and we'd have something luscious and sweet to snack on at the end.  We decided on lemon tarts.

Photography + pastry + lemon curd + cream = a very nice way to spend a Saturday afternoon. 

Included in this post are a selection of photos from that day, as well as a few that Shallon took of my friend Sue's macarons.  Lush.  They're a nice punch of colour in these dusky Autumn days.

You can visit Shallon's website to see more of her impressive work, as well as her account of our afternoon on her blog, which has a recipe for the tarts.

Some Days are Diamonds, Some Days are Stones.

Today, for the first time, I took on crème pâtissière. It’s not difficult to make, but I was worried I would err in one way or another and make our day at the bakery even worse. Aviv, dressing himself at 3:45am, accidentally wore an entirely green outfit to work - shirt, pants, and shoes – and while hilarious, this somehow turned him into the Tall Israeli Leprechaun of Bad Luck. Nothing life-altering happened, but a multitude of medium-sized troubles made the day last forever.

I didn’t want to add to his cursed luck by butchering a recipe, so while Aviv was out delivering bread I set myself up with the makings of crème pâtissière: a dozen egg yolks, sugar, milk, flour, and two very splendid vanilla beans. I triple-checked the recipe and measured everything carefully, then split open the curled black pods to scrape out their seeds. Whisked into milk and spinning on the surface, they reminded me of the Milky Way; black galaxies set against a bright white sky. Had Aviv walked in at that moment he would have found me bent over the stove, watching my pot with an odd kind of intensity. Turns out I really love watching vanilla-studded milk boil, and really really love making crème pâtissière. You start with just a few things, follow a recipe, and are rewarded with smooth, pale-yellow joy.

If you’d like to stargaze over your own pot, Martha’s got a recipe here.

Flour on My Face and Flour on The Brain.

And thus it begins - three months covered in a perpetual layer of fine organic flour.

I'm working for my friend Aviv at his bakery, Sidewalk Citizen. It's a small operation (I'm his first employee) but a very busy one. So busy, in fact, that the phrase "remind Aviv to sleep" should be written into my job description.

When I'm not at the bakery I'm learning about a wheat variety called Red Fife, my topic for our final UNISG paper (which, as much as I'm reluctant to remind myself, is due very soon). The more research I do, the more interesting it becomes, and the more I feel like I'm drowning in a field of grain. The politics of seed are complicated, people.

I've heard from many wonderful farmers and bread bakers, and had the chance to visit a farm where Mark Gibeau grows Red Fife. He's now in the process of setting up a small mill and generously took the time to show Aviv and I his whole setup. Here are a few photos from the farm and bakery.

This has been a lovely break. I must now return to my beautiful and confusing field of wheat.

Bread Watermelon Summer.

My friends Aviv and Michal are the coolest. Aviv's passion in life is artisanal bread baking, so several years ago as a way to practise he began selling bread, delivering them on his bike each week and donating the money to a charity in Malawi. His girlfriend Michal is a self-taught filmmaker who has now funded and filmed 3 independent movies. In February they quit their day-jobs and went all the way to Nepal to pursue bread and film together. At the highest bakery in the world he baked and she filmed, then they moved onto Paris where Aviv apprenticed with Jean-Luc Poujauran and Michal ate croissants. Just kidding, she ate croissants AND filmed. Please read more about their adventures here, because I just think they are incredible.

Also, I'd like to share one of my favourite pictures from two summers ago. It popped into my head a few weeks ago in class when we were discussing food photography techniques, such as the close-up food-porn money shot that dominates all the magazines. Every once in awhile, however, food manages to sneak it's way quietly into a shot and hold it's own even without a close-up. Find the super-pink watermelon with a knife stuck in it and you'll see what I mean - I didn't even notice it for ages, but once I did it actually screamed SUMMMMMER to me!!



Speaking of summer, ours just officially started. My parents arrive on Sunday for a two week visit, then I'm off to Norway to hike some fjords, eat some whale meat, and hopefully for once be an anomaly as a brunette. EXCITED.