Storybook Thursday: Fatback!

Another installment of the poorly named Music and/or Storybook Thursday and/or Friday. Today is Storybook Thursday.

Unfortunately I can’t think of a good story, so I’ll tell a bad one instead. If you don’t come here for the minty fresh stories, skip it.

As some of you may or may not know, we have been working on a cookbook with an author/chef. He cooked for presidents and visiting dignitaries for 12 years.

Anyway, he’s been in this week making the dishes so we can style and shoot them. Once approved we can—here’s the good part—eat them.

So this week I’ve had some tasty morsels. The great part is that, since I built the chef’s web site, he always let’s know when food is available. He’s rather gruff when cooking and everyone else is nervous going in to the kitchen when he’s there.

Also, doing these cookbooks really sends you on weird chases. For instance, the paté needed veal, chicken livers, pork fat, and back fat.

Back fat is, dear reader, impossible to find. Heather was at wit’s end until I suggested this old-school classic meat shop that supplies a lot of restaurants in the area. Sure enough, they had it and I went with the designer to pick it up. When we gave them our full order, the guy looked at us and asked what the hell we were making.

But perhaps the most amusing part was trying to style the shots. Photoshop heals a multitude of sins, but there are some things that can’t be faked.

I have memories of trying to use a lighter to melt cheese during a burger shot, having to corral crabs that kept crawling off the set, continually re-wetting food with a spray bottle, trying to drizzle dressing strategically, blow torching things, and generally trying to create the perfect shot with imperfect food. I knew food styling was difficult, but man you have to do some weird tricks.