This is Episode IV of my Book Update series, in which I share some behind-the-scenes aspects of my cookbook and the writing thereof, an activity that occupies roughly 99% of my waking and sleeping thoughts. And today kids, the topic will be: food photography.

(Read the first three installments of the series, dealing with the book deal, the recipes, and the recipe testing.)

I never really considered hiring someone else to take care of the photography, even in the early days of the project, when I was putting together the basic elements for the book proposal. Oh, I certainly don’t fancy myself a professional photographer, not by a very long shot (haha), but here’s the thing: I got into the whole food writing thing through this blog, and I feel that the pictures play an important part in conveying my excitement — just as much as the story or the recipe itself. And this is an approach I wanted to keep for the book.

The proposal said, “photography by the author”, and no one seemed to have any objection, or think me self-deluded. My personal wish was that we could include full-color photos throughout the book, but life and production costs decided otherwise, and the book will have some full-color, and some black-and-white pictures — the upside being that the price of the book will be lower, allowing more people with smaller budgets to purchase it and finance my early retirement in Bora-Bora.

And so I bought myself a new camera and a macro lens, and started shooting. The first few weeks of using that camera made me cry tears of intense frustration — but then again I cry easily — with a bit of swearing thrown in for variety. The colors were all wrong, the body was heavy and my wrists would cramp, I couldn’t understand what on earth all those stupid little settings were for and why my pictures looked so sad and crappy, and what do you mean I should read the manual, I don’t do manuals.

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You know how sometimes, you introduce two of your friends, and later find out they’ve clicked so well that they call and see each other without you? Now, as I understand (and this I gather from reading women’s magazines, so take it with a grain of Maldon salt), some people hate that: it makes them feel left out, or perhaps sligthly cheated. But I’ve never been of a jealous nature, and on the contrary such situations make me glow visibly (a bit freaky when you turn off the lights), thinking that I can take a little credit for the spark that ignited a new friendship.

And this is exactly how I felt last week at the Lafayette Gourmet store: I was browsing the organic aisle (right after bumping into Louisa, Paris is such a small village), when my attention was caught by not one, but two products that featured both chocolate and quinoa, two of my very favorite ingredient-friends.

“Chocolate! Quinoa!”, I exclaimed, “Fancy seeing you here! So, sharing the same package, now, aren’t we?” And indeed, they were, in the form of slim sticks of dark chocolate (by Kaoka), and a quinoa cocoa muesli (by Jardin Bio), both of which I promptly purchased to show how happy I was for them.

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[Pierre Hermé’s Rose Syrup]

I attended the two-day Omnivore Food Festival in Le Havre last week, during which a number of renowned chefs gave cooking demonstrations.

Among them was Pierre Hermé: he didn’t actually pipe the ganache himself, but rather commented on his pastries as his sous-chef expertly assembled them onstage. The main focus of the presentation was the Ispahan — his signature pairing of rose, litchi and raspberry — and the wide range of variations he has weaved around it over time: macarons, entremets, tarts, chocolate, jam, ice-cream, and even a (non-edible) lucky charm.

I was very interested to learn that Pierre Hermé invented the Ispahan as he was working for Ladurée. It wasn’t a popular pastry back then and he sold very few. But still, he persisted and kept making them, because he thought the flavor pairing worked well, and he felt sure the public would come around eventually. He was right of course: when he set up shop under his own name on rue Bonaparte, the Ispahan quickly became — and remains to this day — his absolute best-seller.

What I really enjoyed about Pierre Hermé’s presentation was how precisely he described the recipes that were being demonstrated, making sure he shared the ingredients and the corresponding amounts. He seems to have enough confidence in his team’s skills and his own resources of creativity not to hoard secrets: his latest book documents his work over the past ten years in great detail, and he has helped create a pastry course at the Parisian cooking school Grégoire Ferrandi.

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When we have friends over for Sunday brunch, the bulk of the meal is conveniently store-bought from the small shops around us. A generous cheese platter, a few items from the charcuterie (such as sliced bone-in ham, terrines, and sometimes eggs in aspic for a bit of harmless proselytizing), ample supplies of fresh baguette (usually a mix of plain and multigrain), and a selection of croissants and pains au chocolat (always a difficult thing to get right, as it’s hard to know who will prefer which, so you end up getting one of each for everyone, but you can make croissants aux amandes with the leftovers so that’s okay).

I like to throw in a couple of homemade items too, and for these I usually have wild ambitions. I picture warm quiches, elegant soufflés, golden frittatas, fluffy pancakes, moist yogurt cakes, plump scones, pretty muffins, or perhaps a few crumpets, which I’ve been wanting to make for about three years and still haven’t, for no apparent reason.

But the problem with brunch, really, is that it happens so early in the day — or more accurately, since 1pm is not exactly early, so soon after I wake up. By the time I’ve emerged, showered, hopped out to the bakery, waited in line while admiring the latest bread creations, and walked back home, chewing on the warm crunchy tip I’ve teared out from one of the baguettes, there is usually little time left to bring my edible projects to life.

And this is why, last Sunday, while Maxence was putting together a batch of simple but outstanding oeufs cocotte with foie gras, I decided to play the trump card of convenience, and use the cookie mix I’d been keping in my kitchen cabinet for such occasions.

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