Penny de los Santos- Food Photographer

If you've been following me here for more than a post or two, you'll know that food and photography are definitely in my top five list of favorites. Toss in a little travel and a language or two, and we've nearly hit all five.

Imagine my excitement when I read about an opportunity to take a class with Penny de los Santos, a food photographer, in Seattle. She shoots for Saveur (love it!) and National Geographic, has a picture of Frida in her kitchen, spent time in the kitchen with Rick Bayless and her first official food shoot was in Chile. She said she's calling all "food geeks." I mean, really. It feels like we've been leading parallel lives, or well, parallel interests!

But part of the deal to win a spot in the class was creating a video explaining why I'd be perfect for the job, along with five other lucky contestants. Enter husband, iphone user and budding videographer. It took a huge learning curve, and we're still not that impressed with the quality, but it was more than fun. A po'boy and beer out at Sea Salt while the kids were in school... mmm.

So here's the video, nervous me and all. If you're interested, you can stream the class live via Creative Live. Wish me luck... my first video and my first tweet!

p.s. Penny, if you do choose me, I'll bake you the most kick-ass brownie you've ever eaten. Promise.

New Sweets in Town

This is a wonderful time to be alive and awake in Minneapolis. We have THREE new bakeries in South Minneapolis. We're a bit sad that Rustica headed for Uptown, but are quite glad that Patisserie 46, Sun Street Breads and Sweets Bakeshop have arrived and are in a lovely bikeable proximity from our house.

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If you're in the mood, may I suggest the amazing raspberry scones at Sun Street, where I got to meet the baker Solveig herself. She must slice open the dough and slather in the raspberries before sending them off to meet their fate in the oven. At Patisserie 46, there are no wrong turns. The almond croissant made me moan (quietly, of course, I'm Minnesotan) and their open face sandwich special one day with blue cheese, walnuts, fig preserves and endive was swoon worthy. I've only ventured into Sweets once and was impressed, but could only afford the small cupcakes, as shown above. They did make for the perfect little treats for my kids for an afternoon of tea party fun. My green macaron, the french variety, not the coconut kind, was delightful, if not a bit spooky, due to the odd green color. Yum, yes.

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You may want to check out what the local blog Heavy Table has to say about the "trifecta" we've landed. I second that.

Chalk in the Late Sun

The weather has been on-and-off here lately in MN. Recently as I was trying to wrangle the kids into the house for a bath and bedtime, I spotted Louise in her studio, er, in front of the garage with a masterpiece.

A Belated 8th Birthday

Carl turned 8 recently and I missed the occasion to send well wishes out into the blogosphere. He said no to a cake, unless I could quickly whip up a crazy cake in an hour, so we went with his old favorite treat to bring to school on his birthday, donut balls. Yes, good old donut holes. They make for a great cake, don't they? This Carl guy isn't so little anymore, and is starting to do things in a very grown up way. He's speaking Spanish to me and Gus much of the time we're at home, has really taken to Harry Potter books (is almost done with #4 on his own!), takes charge of a few household jobs, and is really learning how to think about other people's needs. He loves legos, beans and rice, soccer, making scrambled egg dinner for the family by himself, reading, playing outside, fishing, drawing, wrestling with Dad, calculating money, homemade coleslaw and riding his bike, in no particular order. We're really looking forward to lots of free time outside this summer so we can ride bikes and work on growing a sunflower forest for the kids to play in, with the seeds that he picked out. . Happy Birthday, Big C. We love you!