I’m getting so close…I can smell it! So far, I’ve written 90 recipes and shot over 65 photographs…but I’m a little behind - and still have 30 more photographs and another 15 recipes to go.

I must give great thanks to a hardcore team of testers who have been relentlessly testing, suggesting and tweaking my recipes for the past couple of months. I’m sure by now, they are all Asian’d out at dinnertime! But big hugs and eternal thanks to Katherine, Susan, Phil, Susan, Daphne, Arlyn, Diana, Michael, Patsy, Shasta, Renee, Helen, Kim, Claudia, Regina, Silvia, Joon, Jaime, Susan, Joel, Richard, Bonni, Marion, Audrey, Carmen, Christine, Brian, Rory, Tina, FriedApplePie, Gail, Robin, Lexi, De Hendrix, Tauie, Danielle, Jennifer, Sarah, Ashley, Cindy, Lisa, Jeff, Owlhaven, Barry, Juliana, Madam Chow, Kathleen, Lynn, Sara, Sowjanya, DmOrtega, Melanie, Suganya, Patsy, Andrea, Wiffy, Margy, Patti, Ed, Valerie, Eneri, Marvin, Jude, Joel, Emily, Lynne, Sandy, Courtney, Will, Anne, Melissa, Shana, Micha, David, Nicola, Margy, Jim, Laura, Ric, Tiffanie, Claire, Betty, Thuy, Kindra, Xavier, Shasta, Patti, Foodiebear, Lauriel, Dickie, Cinzia, Li-Chia, Su-Eng, Jacqueline and Christina.

While the testers have done a fantastic job, I’m a little behind. I still have about 15 more recipes and another 25 photos to take. I will say that I totally underestimated how long it would take to write this book. I mean, I write on this blog twice a week and write for the newspaper weekly and it’s like no big deal. And you have to understand that I CRAVE spontaneity and loathe anything that has to do with deadlines, long term planning or being a responsible human being.

Let me tell ya, the ONLY hesitation I ever had with agreeing to write a cookbook was having this massive, dark cloud hanging over me called a deadline. Not just a regular “due by next Monday” thing, but a MASSIVE BEAST of a deadline called 18 month project.

Holly, my editor, has pretty much let me do my thing, checking in once in a while and staying quiet in the background. I’ve had nightmares that on that day of delivery, she takes one look and says, “A cookbook? Wait. You’re supposed to be writing a needlepoint and quilting book!”

Which, actually, might have been easier to write - “just stick yer needle in the cloth.” Oh but wait, what size needle? What length? How big of hole? In which direction? How much does the cloth weigh? What kind of threadcount? If I can’t find silk thread, what to substitute with?

Never mind, I’ll just stick with figuring out how to perfectly decribe in words how to cut a plum in wedges without saying, “slice 1/4″ to each side of the plum’s ass-crack.”

Seriously. If I say “plum ass-crack” don’t you immediately know what I mean? Shhhh…I might try to sneak that sentence in the book just for giggles.

Would you like to help test recipes?

So obviously, I’m behind schedule and there are a bunch of recipes that still haven’t been tested fully. If you’re interested in testing, I’d be forever grateful. What I’m looking is real recipe testing, meaning don’t look at my recipe and then just make your own thing. I need you to follow exact measurements and directions as it is written and give me feedback on the dish. That’s the only way I know if my scribbly scrabbly gobbly gook actually makes sense to people.

You’ll have to use your real name (sorry, no nicknames) when you register and try testing some of the newer recipes that I have posted.

Steamy Kitchen Cookbook Testing Site
(just click on the register link)

Please only register if you’re serious about testing at least 1 recipe, okay?

***

I survived first week of kindergarten

and so did Andrew…

I was eating cold slices of leftover grilled steak and just had to take a photo.

I love happy meat!

The arranged slices are out of order - I had already eaten half of the steak by the time I noticed. But wouldn’t it have been fun to arrange them in order, fan through them like one of those kids flip sketch books and see the range of facial expressions!!

Or damn. If I wasn’t so hungry, I could have sold these meat slices on EBay.

I could be a rich! famous! or just stupid and the subject of endless mockery.

but I do like happy meat. and there are SO many jokes that are running through my head right now but I’ll just keep to myself because my mother reads my blog now.

This isn’t the first time I’ve had my food smile at me:

***

Thank you Washington Post!

Food columnist, Kim O’Donnel from the Washington Post interviewed several female food writers and bloggers to share their favorite ways to cool off in the kitchen — suppers that are raw, uncooked or using as little stovetop power as possible.

Come read our answers! Bea of La Tartine Gourmande and Rachel of Coconut and Lime also contributed!

***

Cookbook update!

(rubbing hands excitedly) I’ve got 44 out of the 100 recipes ready for testing!!! I’m drafting email to send out to you all right now. I’m also including a little “Cookbook Update” tab in the box to the right, up on top….to keep you posted.

But I’ve created a new website with the recipes, notes, photos - and it’s in a blog format so that you can submit comments, questions, etc. I’m really excited to have you guys start!

The site URL will be emailed to the list of testers who have signed up. If you are interested, please comment below and I’ll add you to the list.

As you know, I’m doing all the cooking, writing and photographing for the Steamy Kitchen cookbook.

Today, I’m taking a photo of Grilled Pineapple with Chocolate Coconut Rum Sauce for the book, and I thought I’d let you take a peek into one of the most idiotic things I have to do in order to get the most perfect shot for the book.

A couple of things make shooting this dish difficult:

• I’m the only one at home today (otherwise I would have had one of the kids push the shutter button)
• It involves me holding sharp skewers with one hand and the remote shutter release in the other.
• DId I mention it includes hot, gooey chocolate sauce?
• And am I crazy enough to videotape myself taking a photo of myself holding the skewers so that you can make fun of me?

Absolutely.

So, I concluded that things would be so much easier if I had a food fluffer. (And yeah, I know what a fluffer is) But a FOOD fluffer would be there to drizzle the chocolate sauce on the pineapple, sprinkle the coconut flakes, nudge each skewer in place.

After just a couple minutes in the muggy Florida weather, the coconut was looking a little limp.

Simply put, I really wished that I had someone to fluff my coconuts today.

Then, I could have concentrated on cooking and photographing!

Ok, here’s the video…Just don’t laugh too hard!

A note to my testers

Sorry for the delay…I’m not quite ready yet, as I want to make sure that I had at least 1/3 of the recipes ready before we even begin testing. I’ll let you know asap when I’m ready!

Instead of showing you some the of photos that are going into the book, I thought I’d show you one that isn’t.

This is a photo of Indonesian Beef Satay with Peanut Sauce. I do looooove the photo, however, I’ll have to re-shoot.

Let’s play! Can you guess why?

I purchased my my meat pre-sliced at the market - it was thin-sliced sirloin, and all I had to do was cut the slices into strips, marinate and skewer. However, the meat was sliced about 1/8″, which tasted just fine, but for the photo, it just looked too skimpy…kind of like beef jerky. The meat also gets lost in the photo - brown on brown on brown on brown. The satay looked lifeless in the end.

What do you think of the tray? I bought it at Crate and Barrel. I think its cute, but is it too cheesy?

As I’m shooting photos for the book, I’m learning so much about food styling and lighting and using my camera’s multitude of settings. But there’s one thing that my friend, RasaMalaysia reminded me, and its that I’ve gotten away from showcasing the beauty of the food. I’m concentrating so much on composition, the props, plates, mats and other styling stuff that it’s become a little too Food and Wine Magazine-ish? Too fake?

I think I need to go back and look at some of my early photography on the blog, where food was king. Some of my favorites are the clean, simple and pure photos, like these:

While those aren’t necessarily cookbook-worthy shots, these were all taken last year when all I focused on was the food. Do you kinda understand what I’m getting at? I love the lightness and textures of all these photos. So, my next batch of shots for the book will take what I’ve taught myself technically about photography and food styling and go “back to the basics.”

Would love to hear your thoughts.

***

More food photography posts:

My food photography lighting setup: Lowel EGO

Green Beans with Garam Masala Butter and Toasted Hazelnuts (light setup)

Kona Kampachi on Citrus Soy Soba (see my step by step photo analysis)

Sparkling Ginger Lime & Mint Cooler (see my step by step photo analysis)

Escargot with Garlic Butter and Splash of Cognac (see my step by step photo analysis)

More in Photography Category

Today is Saturday, May whatever. This morning I woke up and FINALLY gave myself permission to be sick. After uttering those words to my bedside lamp, the already straining cork that had been clinging on for dear life where head meets nose the past 4 days, holding back the gush of mucus (gross), finally popped.

I am sick.

Which, in all honesty, just being sick actually feels better than my mind knowing that my body is sick but demanding, “Man up, soldier! YOU ARE NOT SICK.” Yesterday was a big day, when Holly, my editor, flew all the way down from Vermont (brrr) to Florida (aaaahhh) and spent the day with me in the kitchen. It just would have sucked to be snottin’ and sneezing all over the food. It was an absolute must that I was healthy - er- at least functioning fairly well for that day.

Our plan was to spend the day cooking, testing/writing recipes, photographing, eating and editing. Ok, really, my agenda was to distract her as much as possible in the kitchen, get her drunk so that we could forget about editing. Cuz me no likey editing. You could threaten to take a hammer to my cherished kiwi Le Creuset baby dutch oven and I still would choose THAT over picking apart words and trying to come up with a suitable phrases to replace my babbling, wandering musings and cussing. <– that sentence was a run-on and probably didn’t make much sense.

But, I’m totally stoned on Nyquil right now. So back the hell off.

I wanted to show Holly what a “day in the life of a deranged, disorganized food blogger, cookbook-author wannabe” would be like. And boy, did I work her ass off. We created 4 new recipes, photographed them for the book and fed the dinner party for that evening. I had scribbled down recipes for 4 dishes that I had created in my SICK BUT NOT SICK head and when she arrived, I thrusted my notes to Holly and said, “here are my recipe notes!”

They really shouldn’t be classified as “recipes,” because they looked like this:

hoisin, honey, ginger but maybe garlic or maybe just omit both, how about orange marmalade? could use palm sugar too, 5sp, S+P, ribs, slow+low and glaze.

Holly looked at me with the “this is a recipe? are you fucking serious, lady?” look and then muffled into her sleeve, “bluejay calling mother hen…red alert..I REPEAT…red alert…operation steamykitchen is a no go….requesting permission to abort mission.”

But it worked out well - I would add this ingredient, add that ingredient, taste, adjust and Holly would be right there next to me documenting my every glug, pinch, pour and stir on a piece of paper. She wrote legibly, weighed ingredients and even timed my cooking! I think I am in love and need to just stuff her in my pantry and keep her here in my kitchen until this cookbook is done.

The most time consuming part was photographing. It took about an hour for each shot - partly because I still fumble with my camera settings. Ok, I admit I just use 1 setting and turn the wheely dialy thing a little to the left or a little to the right until I get what I want. BUT - I hope you’ll be proud of me - I graduated from the “P” setting on my Canon Rebel XT and am now on the “Av” setting, because 2 weeks ago when I went to my local camera shop, this nice camera salesman told me I should be using “Av” as it’s what professionals use. So I switched to “Av” but I still don’t know why or what the hell it stands for. All I know is that AUTO is for noobs. “P” is for semi-noobs. And “Av” is a setting that if I wave my camera in front of a real photographer pro, he’ll be like, “OMG. she’s so hot, I want to dry hump her Rebel XT” Plus, if I was still using “AUTO” or “P” then I would be a total dork for writing “Food Photographer” on my new business cards.

Yeah. I’m sooooo “Av.”

Oh and the “M” setting???? “M” is PURE EVIL. If you ever think it’s funny to play a joke on me and switch my camera to “M”, I will KICK YOUR ASK.

Here’s one of the dishes that was translated from:

herb, fish, no fish sauce, wrap in wrapper for diff tex? crispy! deep or pan? salmon or white? mince. need filler like potato, egg to bind, pretty to tie with chive.

Which translates to this:

Coriander Fish Cakes with Thai Dipping Sauce

Pretty nice, eh? Actually, if I think about it, the transformation is kinda like me when I first wake up in the morning before any coffee…incomplete thoughts, totally nonsensical and um…not pleasant to look at. Then I have coffee, shower, slather on concealer, pluck brows and get dressed and cha-ching! A nice, pretty package emerges.

***

Alright, now back to the original reason why I am posting - to give you this insanely kick-ass recipe for Ginger, Soy and Whiskey Grilled Chicken that I tweaked from this dude, who I think has the same warped sense of humor that I have.This was a dish I cooked last weekend and was declared a family fav.

Props to J-Vo for the original inspiration and recipe. [Me love you long time, J-Vo!!!!]

Ginger, Soy and Whiskey Grilled Chicken

chkn, mar in gr ginger, soy, glug whiskey or bourbon? garlic, sugar. grill

serves 4-6 as part of multicourse meal

3-lb whole chicken, carved (or if you prefer, your choice of already cut-up chicken parts)
1 tsp grated fresh ginger
2 garlic cloves, minced
3 tbl soy sauce
3 tbl brown sugar
1/2 lime, juiced (or 1 1/2 tsp white wine vinegar)
1 ounce whiskey/bourbon/scotch
freshly ground black pepper

Combine all ingredients in a zip-lock freezer back. Squeeze all the air out of bag and let the chicken marinate, preferably overnight, but even 1 hour is fine. If marinating overnight, 15 min prior to grilling, drain the marinade into a small pot and reserve. Let chicken sit on the counter so that it can come to room temperature. Boil the reserved marinade and keep at a steady simmer for 5 minutes to cook and thicken.

Heat BBQ grill on high. Grill chicken skin side down for 3 minutes until skin is nice and golden brown. Flip chicken, reduce heat to medium, brush with cooked marinade and close cover. Cook for another 5-7 minutes, until cooked through.