use real butter

I love a road trip with a good companion. Jeremy is my ideal companion. I love a photo shoot with a good shooting partner. Jason is a great shooting partner. But sometimes things come up and I have to go solo – like this week’s shoot. I left Jeremy at his conference and headed back north for a few days.

the road from new mexico to colorado

The fact that the American West is so big and spread out is both a blessing and a curse. More blessing than curse though. Sure, it takes a long time to get from point A to point B. I cherish the wide open space between them. People talk about what a small world it is, but if you drive the empty roads under big skies and through sprawling landscapes and really have a look around, you understand that the world is quite enormous and you are but a measly speck. It’s awesome.

fresh snow

Empty roads, wide shoulders, views for hundreds of miles. Out here, you can slow down to 15 mph and cruise for antelope or birds of prey. Pull over, step out, and take a breath of that clean air. The only sound is the wind racing across the high plateau. If you pass something interesting, it’s easy enough to take your foot off the gas and turn yourself around. Go back. Check it out. How many times do you continue driving and then think “I wish I had stopped”? When I tell myself I’ll go back later, most of the time I end up not returning. I’m trying to be better about this.

hasta, baby

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: carne adovada quesadillas

Reminder: You have until March 1, 2011 to get the early bird registration discount of $50 for the Food and Light food photography and styling workshop in Boulder, Colorado this summer!

California does it to me every time. I get a nip of the flowers, the greenery, the warmer weather and I start feeling excited for spring despite my sworn love of winter and skiing and fleece and down. Boulder will start blooming in April well before our early mountain flowers bloom come late June, so I can travel down the canyon to get my spring fix as necessary. The difference in the seasons from one place to another can be quite drastic all due to geography.

yosemite’s geography and weather dictated winter last weekend

I have mixed feelings about Yosemite. It is one of the most heavily visited of our national parks and in summer it is a veritable tangle of cars and people all wanting to experience the wilderness while loving it to death. We call it the sacrificial lamb. It’s the small area of wilderness you open up to the general public in order to save and preserve the rest of the park which sees far less traffic. Woodland critters run up and beg for food when they ought to be running away from people. Part of the reason I love these stunning natural places is because I want to hear the rush of the rivers and waterfalls, the chirps of the local birds, the breeze rustling the leaves – not some couple arguing over their broken marriage (yeah, we heard that one night in camp) or car horns bellowing because we can’t be courteous to one another. We bring our outside problems in and they are at their height in summer. Traveling to Yosemite in the off season reminds me of just how amazing this place is any time of year.

a squall blows through the valley

Have you been? The famous towering outcrops and sheer valley walls really work that third dimension. I was in awe the first time I laid eyes on the valley 18 years ago. It doesn’t fail to take my breath away today. It’s special and worth seeing at least once. The best part about the snowstorm was that it kept a good bit of the holiday weekend crowds at bay. Actually, that’s not true. The best part about the snowstorm was the snowstorm.

can’t resist a clearing storm

As the clouds lifted and sucker holes (patches of blue sky) materialized to the west, the wet snow on the trees began to melt under the sunlight and fall. It felt like the aftermath of a big spring storm as we walked through the stands, pelted by a never-ending snowball fight with the trees. I have always held the opinion that everything looks magical under a blanket of white snow. Yosemite valley looked candied, dusted, and ready to eat.

view from the gates of the valley

You can see more of the photos from the trip on my photo blog.

It’s still winter over here in Colorado, but the longer daylight hours and our bluebird days cue me to shift my cooking habits. I associate slow-cooked stews and soups with the cold and dark nights that seem to stretch on forever. Rummaging through the freezer recently, I found a jackpot of carne adovada I had prepared back in December to make life for Future Me easier. I love to cook, but if I cook and bake too much when the sun is up, I start to get ornery. I honestly don’t know how some of my friends like Shauna and Jennie crank through recipe after recipe (sometimes the same one over and over again until it’s perfect), but these ladies are dedicated baking and cooking machines. My hat is off to them. But me? I’m a lazy bum and sometimes lazy bums just want a quick and easy quesadilla.

you will need tortillas, cheese, and carne adovada

even distribution is the ocd’s mantra

**Jump for more butter**

Recipe: green chile hush puppies

It’s been quite a production these many days, cranking out cookies and confections for distribution. I’m nearly done and boy am I happy about that! The baking sheets and cooling racks are in heavy rotation and I won’t divulge the pounds of butter, sugar, eggs, flour, and chocolate I’ve plowed through in the past week. Thankfully, they’ve begun marching out of the house and into the hands of happy recipients.

chocolate chip cookies cooling

packaging

these went out tuesday afternoon

Tuesday was Kaweah’s birthday, but we had so much going on in Boulder that we didn’t get a chance to celebrate properly. So what better excuse than to host a giveaway in the pup’s honor? After all, she IS the official random number generator of this blog.

and official plush toy disembowler

It just so happens that my mentor, renowned landscape and nature photographer Michael Frye, has published his first ebook: Light and Land: Landscapes in the Digital Darkroom. In the book, Michael walks the reader through his digital post processing workflow in great detail on five of his stunning images. Michael uses Adobe Lightroom for his post proc, but the methods presented are applicable to any image processing software.



Now I’m sure some people are thinking that they don’t need a nature photography book because they shoot something other than nature. I cannot emphasize enough how much nature photography has influenced and improved my food photography, event photography, and well… photography in general. I can pretty much guarantee that Michael will teach you something you don’t know that will change the way you think about making a photograph. I spent one day with the gentleman in Yosemite and within the first hour he was challenging me to push my boundaries. Michael is an ideal instructor – methodical and clear, he never holds back from sharing his expertise, motivations, and inspirations.

So to celebrate the launch of Michael’s first ebook – I’m giving away three copies of Light and Land: Landscapes in the Digital Darkroom! The cool thing is this: even if you don’t win, it’s a mere $5 to purchase a copy of your own. Additionally, Michael has graciously agreed to provide a signed copy of his third book Digital Landscape Photography: In the Footsteps of Ansel Adams and the Great Masters to give away as well. Another gem of a book that I highly recommend.

FOUR BOOKS means FOUR WINNERS and here’s how you can enter:

1) Answer this question in the comments of this post: What special place would you most like to photograph?
2) One comment per person, please.
3) Comments will close Sunday, December 19th at NOON (MST).
4) Giveaway is open to everyone. All four prizes ship worldwide.
5) Winners will be selected at random by Kaweah and announced Monday, December 20th, 2010.

Full disclosure: Michael Frye Photography is providing use real butter with three copies of Light and Land and one copy of Digital Landscape Photography for the giveaway.

On to the recipe. You know how I moon over Hatch green chiles and hoard them when the harvest rolls around in late summer/early fall? This past summer we hit pay dirt and I bought many pounds of fresh Hatch chiles to roast and freeze myself. Well, when my in-laws were visiting in November, they brought us a cooler full of frozen roasted Hatch green chiles they had picked up for us around the harvest. Wow! But now I must inform you that my dear aunt ALSO purchased several gazillion pounds of roasted Hatch green chiles for us which are still residing in her freezer in New Mexico. That’s a lot of green chiles…

so let’s make hush puppies

mix up the dry ingredients

**Jump for more butter**