Slow-roasted salmon

I absolutely love seafood. I can eat it raw, roasted, baked, broiled, fried (although not my favorite prep unless it's calamari), sauteed, you name it.

I recently found a recipe for slow-roasted salmon from the Cooking for Friends cookbook from Williams-Sonoma. My friend Steph is an avid cook and she and I like to scour the internet for recipes and trade. I saw this book at WS, fell in love with the photography first, and realized that this was a book we BOTH needed.

Chris and I decided to (and by Chris and I, I mean I decided to...he just agreed) try out this new recipe. It sounded healthy, very simple, and absolutely delicious. I paired with smashed potatoes from Simply Recipes, using red potatoes instead of new.

Verdict on the salmon was...well, let's just say Chris bought 1.8 pounds and we ended up eating 95% of it. It was THAT good (and good for you). Rubbed with olive oil and seasoned with only salt and pepper, it was simple enough to let the freshness of the fish shine through. We did squeeze some lemon on, after garnishing with chives and parsley, and pair it with a little bit of creme fraiche, and that just catapulted us into a whole other level of bliss.

these are a few of my favorite things

Ahh, olive oil and balsamic vinegar. I fell in love with the combination during our trip to Italy in spring of 2006, back when Chris and I conquered Italy with nothing more than a passion for traveling and a Canon PowerShot SD500.

I knew he was going to be my husband when we both went to Costco, very early in our relationship, ate our hot dogs plain (Polish sausage, yum!), and used the condensation on our soda cups to "wash" our hands. Of course, I didn't tell him that. But it was in Italy (Florence, to be specific) when I realized I loved Chris-- overlooking the Arno River just as the sun slipped below the horizon. Of course, I didn't tell him this either, but now he knows. ;)

Anyway, we went to Di Bruno Brothers on the way home from work today, and aside from the cheese samples they always have out, there was a table set up with pieces of bread, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar. "OoOooohhhhh!" we exclaimed, grabbing a piece and dipping generously. As I popped a dripping piece into my mouth, I prayed people were kind enough to refrain from double dipping.

The explosion of taste in my mouth took me straight back to Italy. Now, I'm no expert in olive oil or balsamic vinegar, but this stuff was GOOD.

A store worker came up to us and started explaining that the olive oil was Di Bruno's own, in celebration of their 70th anniversary this year. He hadn't even finished his spiel when I grabbed a bottle of balsamic vinegar and attempted to grab a bottle of the olive oil. I failed in that regard, because my vinegar-less hand was holding a container of shrimp doomed for tonight's dinner. Chris helped me out, haha. He also grabbed a loaf of Italian bread sitting in a nearby basket.

We're super full from dinner (whole-wheat spaghetti with vodka cream sauce and shrimp, heyyyy), but eventually, when we eat this wonderful combination, I will be taken back to Italy...to where I fell in love with my future husband.

backing up

I recently joined POTN and one of the very first threads I replied to was about archiving photos.

Now, I'm quite paranoid about losing photos. You can break my laptop, and I could care less about losing music, movies (unless they're home movies), or programs. But my photo collection means the world to me.

Chris and I were married on January 10, 2009. We were on such a high from a wonderful wedding; virtually nothing had gone wrong...or so we thought. On January 16th, we got a call from one of our photographers (a husband-and-wife team). The wife's first memory card was corrupted, and gone were the photos of my bridal prep, solo portraits, and most important to me, the shots of my parents walking me into the church, down the aisle, and meeting Chris at the altar.

Words couldn't express how I felt when I hung up with our photographer. I was blubbering in Chris' arms, trying to wrap my head around the fact that memories of our special day were lost. Our photographer apologized profusely and offered us a partial refund. Still, I didn't care about the money-- I wanted the memory card. We're still in the process of trying to get them to mail it, even after several unsuccessful attempts on their part to recover anything more than the middle portion of our ceremony (read: the middle of mass).

Anyway, that happening was a swift kick in the pants, reminding us to back up, back up, BACK UP. Granted, this loss of photos was due to equipment failure and not failure to back up, but nonetheless, I would hate for that same thing to happen with anybody we work with. Which leads me to our backup process...

1) Download photos to my MacBook Pro. Each event has its own folder, named accordingly. Chris also downloads the photos to his iMac.

2) DVD (either regular or dual-layer, depending how big the folder is) burn x3-- one copy stays with us in Philadelphia (or wherever we happen to be living), another copy is mailed off to my parents in Japan, and the third copy is mailed to Chris' parents in California. We don't mail the off-site copies every single time we shoot an event; once a month works well for us.

3) Every few days, Chris makes a backup of our computers using Time Machine, plus he copies the photos off both computers onto another hard drive.

I also save Photoshop files as I edit the photos, but this is mainly because sometimes I can't remember the recipe I used for TRA.

At the end of the calendar year, Chris does another FULL photo back up. Again, we have both on-site and off-site copies. Once we're absolutely, 150% sure that everything is good to go, that year's photos are deleted off the MBP and iMac. Ready to start the new year fresh!

I know, a little (or a lot) excessive, but I've lost photos before, and it was not my favorite thing in the world. I'd rather have 6 copies of a photo than realize later that there are some missing ones.

Come to think of it, my dad has a similar plan for backing up his machines (multiply and you can't go wrong). Maybe I got it from him? ;)

sayoonara, wordpress

I had the WordPress blog up for a couple of weeks, but I kept getting spam comments (to approve or deny)! Hopefully we'll have better luck with Blogger-- I don't forsee it though, as we've had good experiences with Blogger in the past!

Anyway, here's a photo of last night's dinner: flank steak with asparagus and bell pepper, tossed in an amazing stir fry sauce. According to Chris, this is one of his favorites. ;)



I think this tasted better than it looks; we have horrible lighting in the apartment. :(

In further preparation for our launch this spring (I'm keeping my fingers crossed), I calibrated my MacBook Pro a few days ago and am currently going through our portfolio images to see what's going on in terms of color, specifically warmth. Still getting used to the settings-- my images look way warmer than I'm used to! For example, Chris took a picture of the view from our hotel in Hilo, HI, last year...and the sky looks almost purple! Aside from that, it's very frustrating because what looks good on the MBP doesn't necessarily look good on another monitor and vice versa.

Oh yeah, and I have to brush up on post-processing too. :)