Not everyone loves Gordon Ramsay but his image definitely precedes him. So much so that even kids have gotten in on the act. I found this video early this morning and thought it might help to give someone else a chuckle. It did me.
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This year is not only our last year at Sheppard Air Force Base, but very likely the last year for the BMET Christmas party as we have known it. (For those of you not familiar with the acronym, BMET stands for BioMedical Equipment Technician, and it’s what my wife does for a living when she’s not instructing or writing.) Knowing that it could be the last of these get-togethers was the only reason we needed to attend and I’m glad we did.
My wife was lovely (as usual) in a little black patterned A-Line cocktail number and a set of killer stilettos. Myself… well, I’m not as pretty as she is. I also have an aversion to formal attire, so I just plopped in in a set of khaki’s, black oxfords and a hunter green microfiber shirt.
The party started with the usual poorly made production-line barbecue (with sauce! Gag!). Dry brisket, destroyed pork and under smoked sausage were the main course. Sides were a nasty potato salad, horrible beans and an even more disappointing something-or-other I can’t even remember. I shouldn’t be surprised that I was not impressed. I’m particular in my BBQ and these people apparently don’t believe in smoke.
The rest of the evening was dancing to some pretty random club music and a raffle (which we were not fortunate enough to win.) There was much drinking and carousing and several fools were made, but I won’t highlight that here. In the end, it was a good evening with good friends and people we may never see again. We made the most of it.
We sat with our friends Erick and Brie and even though I said I wouldn’t be caught incriminating myself, I couldn’t pass up a chance at a group hug with our newest friends. (I told you I’m not as pretty as my wife is! And yes, that’s Erick holding his wife, not me, LOL!)
In all it will be a party I remember. Not so much for what was scheduled to happen, but for some of the more spontaneous moments that occured along the way. It’s a good way to say goodbye to the place we’ve called home since 2005. I can’t say I’ll miss the base, but I will always miss our friends.
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This is a true story sent to my wife. It was so hilarious I just had to pass it along!
*PREGNANT TURKEY STORY *
One year at Thanksgiving, my mom went to my sister’s
house for the traditional feast. Knowing how gullible my
sister is, my mom decided to play a trick.She told my sister that she needed something from the
store. When my sister left, my mom took the turkey out of
the oven. She removed the stuffing, stuffed a Cornish hen,
inserted it into the turkey, and re-stuffed the turkey.She then placed the bird(s) back in the oven.
When it was time for dinner, my sister pulled the turkey
out of the oven and proceeded to remove the stuffing.When her serving spoon hit something, she reached in and
pulled out the little bird. With a look of total shock on
her face, my mother exclaimed,‘Patricia,
You’ve cooked a pregnant bird!’At the reality of this horrifying news, my sister started
to cry. It took the family two hours to convince her that
turkeys lay eggs!
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Thanksgiving this year was both a challenge and a pleasure. The pre-Turkey Day prep didn’t go as planned, which left us making a full dinner, both indoors and out in less than four hours. (And Thank God for smoker grills!) I’m not totally used to our new oven, and there just isn’t enough room for the two of us in that kitchen. Thankfully we’ll be looking to buy a home at our next duty station.
The meal, however frazzled its prep may have been, was fabulous. I started things off with something that was traditional at all of my holiday gatherings as a kid. Growing up in a predominantly Italian community, the antipasto platter was present at any large gathering, and I couldn’t have friends over without laying out one of my own.
This one featured Prosciutto, Mortadella, Sopresetta, Mozzarella, Italian Dry Salami, Garlic stuffed olives, ripe black olives, pepperoncini, pepper jack cheese (a nod to Sonoma, my home town and the place that pepper jack was invented) a variety of veggies and the ranch dip that came with the store-bought veggie platter. Poor thing never had a chance
From there we moved to an abridged version of my original T-Day menu, but really there was still more than anyone could have put a serious dent into.
This year’s dinner was turkey, ham, roast beef, traditional Southern cornbread stuffing, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, turkey gravy, ham gravy collard greens, rolls and twice baked sweet potato casserole. More than enough for four adults and 1 1/2 kids, wouldn’t you say?
The surprise star of the show was the ham. Since I didn’t have enough time to cook it as I had planned to the night before, I fired up my smoker and tossed its spiral-sliced butt (pun intended) into a tray and into a 350 degree smoke box. I’ve never had better, and it just became a hodidy prerequisite. It’s simple and its fabulous.
After several hours of chatting and absorbing good company, we went our respective ways and a good portion of the food was packaged up. The turkey I made the day before Thanksgiving, half the leftover dressing and the cranberry sauce was delivered to the dormitories for Airmen that could not make it home for the holidays.
My wife was showered with thank-yous and even a few tears. Good wishes sent to me through her and in the end, a few people that would have otherwise had a less than enjoyable holiday got to go to bed happy and full with a home cooked meal to warm them. Whatever trouble I went through to make that happen was worth all the effort, and has already been forgotten. I’ll do it again, happily.
And there you have it folks, a perfect day of giving thanks. i’ll remember this one for a very long time.
Oh, and be looking for the perfect apple pie recipe to show on my front page very soon. The one our friends brought is the best I’ve ever had. Of course I got the recipe.
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Well folks, it’s that time of year again. parties, gatherings, family, friends and food are the order of the day for the next month and a half or so. The holidays are here, and here at CbsoP, we’re gearing up for the whole thing, both sweet and savory. It’s looking like there will be a flurry of recipes posted over the next week. Way more than my usual. I hope none of them get lost in the shuffle.
Dessert recipes are on the menu for the next few days. With Turkey day and thanksgiving approaching rapidly, we’re all going to be looking for all the sweets we can get, and I’m here for you… Or to defeat a year of getting in better shape, one of the two. We’re going to have a slew of tartlets, barks, cookies and who knows what else (I think there’s a pie or two coming… ) it’s gonna be great!
And I’m gonna be fat. But I suffer for my art, you know?
And it is all for you.
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As a first order of business for the day I would like to send my best wishes and heartfelt thanks to all of you who have ever donned a uniform in service of this great nation. This is our day, people. I hope that you have the opportunity to enjoy it.
Whether your service was long or short. Whether you served in peace or in war, each of us took an oath to “give” for our country, and we all know what it was that we put on the table that day. I’m glad that you are still with us.
You are an elite bunch of men and women. Be proud. It was you who vowed to stand in harm’s way so that others could sleep in peace. It was you who through your actions, whether they seemed important at the time or not, ensured that all of our children will have the opportunity to grow and pursue happiness in the greatest country in the world, secure in the knowledge that they are truly free to be what they want to be.
To all of my brothers and sisters, either currently serving or all of us who have served in the past, I salute you. Raise a glass today in honor and memory for all who have served, all who are serving and all that will come after us. They deserve our support and they have mine.
This sound is something that I cannot wait to hear every night. It’s the sign that all is well and that all of the men and women, at least at this station, are safe and secure for just one more day. Consider it a very small gift from one veteran to his country. Please take a moment out of your day to listen, it means a lot to a lot of people.
For all of you who are still on the front lines or otherwise somewhere that could put you in harms way, I hope and pray that you hear this tonight as well.
Respectfully yours,
Jerry Russell, Veteran : United States Navy
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I know a lot of people are going to think I’m out of my mind for talking about staging before either props or lighting, but there’s a reason that I feel that this is the most important place to start. As a matter of fact, both staging and props are the first two factors in any layout I do, whether it’s soup, a salad or a piece of toast. Experience has taught me that this is the case, and photos like the one below are the reason I’ve learned it.
The image above is horribly dark, under exposed and has far too much light coming only from the back of the subject. To top that off, the shot is too far out and at a bad angle. This is what you get for not setting your stage and then considering your lighting. (I was also horribly inexperienced at the time.) the recipe? It’s fabulous. but this picture isn’t going to convince anyone of that.
The photo at the top of the page shows what I’ve leaned put into action. I set a full table. The reason is that I wanted to shoot across the main dish and catch the serving dish and the other bowl in the final shot. In the end, this layout shot was all I got, as something or other came up and I had to scrap what I was going to make in favor of something quick. I never got back to it.
Here are my pearls of wisdom on setting up for a shot:
Note that in the layout above, I was planning on shooting with the focus tight in on the bowl toward the front of the shot, shooting across at a tight angle. Everything in the near background would have been slightly blurred, and anything in the far background would have been little more than colors and vague shapes. This method is ideal if you’re shooting across a room.
That’s it for this installment. I hope I’ve given you some little bit of inspiration the next time you decide to get a great shot of “that perfect dinner”. Any questions, leave a comment, i’ll get right to it.
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For a food blog, having a perfect recipe is paramount, but getting people to actually look at that recipe may very well hinge on having the perfect picture to go along with it. This is not necessarily as easy as it sounds. You would think that snapping a picture of whatever is on the table would be simple, but that is very rarely ever the case.
Snapping a great food photo isn’t easy. Food is dynamic, it has subtle textures and color hues. Too much light and it’s completely washed out. Too little and it all just looks like roadkill, regardless of how perfectly it was presented. I’ll lay bets that for every perfectly gorgeous piece of food porn you see on most food blogs that there is a slushpile of photos that didn’t make the cut.
Some of those will be slightly out of focus. Others will have been too harshly lit or under-lit. some will have been over or under exposed. It’s very rare that the first shot we take is the shot that you’ll be looking at when you are drooling over some gorgeous piece of edible art on your favorite blog. As a matter of fact, sometimes what you’re looking at, at lest in the case of this blog, is no longer even edible.
There are tricks to food photography. They include everything from adding frozen veggies to the top of a cold soup so that everything in the shot looks completely fresh, to grabbing leftovers off the counter because those noodles will help to pad what you thought you had left. Just leave them underneath the edible stuff and nobody will ever see them. It’s all about looks in photography.
In the nearly two years I’ve been taking photos of food for this blog, I’ve learned a lot. I figure it’s time I go through some of my best pictures and show you how I did it. If you’re interested, that is.
let me know in comments!
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It’s Election Day 2008. All the buzz on twitter and everywhere else is about who’s voting for whom and who wants which candidate to win. For someone who’s seen a lot of elections in his livetime, it’s actually quite inspiring to read about the turnout this year. Peaople are fired up. People want to be heard. There’s almost a party atmosphere going on. It’s a good year to be an American.
So what are we doing tonight? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. I’m sure I’ll hear from someone about who’s forecast to be the winner before the evening is out. I’m sure if most of my online friends don’t get the answer they’re expecting, I’ll hear it from my living room, the shrieking will be terrible. But all-in-all the outcome doesn’t really affect me.
At the end of this I’ll still be a writer, a blogger and a father. The economy will still be in bad shape and regardless of who wins, my wife and my friends will still be out cleaning up their messes. I’ll still be at home supporting our military as I always have. She’ll still be watching any news she can get on foreigh policy so she knows when – or if – she needs to be ready to deploy. In short, life goes on.
I’m a cynic. I don’t think things will change all that rapidly regardless of who goes in to office. The reality is that Washington is a beast that’s mired in red tape and to affect any real change is going to be a monumental undertaking. People tend to forget that. People tend to forget that some of the positives of every presidency are because of programs the last guys got in motion. All they do is steward these projects and then take the credit.
I’m not going to tell you what side I’m on. My friends know already, acquaintances don’t need to know. The fact of the matter is, I’m not voting so it doesn’t matter anyway. My voice will no be heard. I would have preferred the Governator, or perhaps Ozzy Osbourne or maybe Bill Gates. Someone who might stand a chance of affecting real and rapid change, if for no other reason than they just aren’t versed well enough in politics to be polite.
In the end, i wish you all good luck with your choices. I wish us ALL prosperity over the next four years adn I hope the next yahoo in office doesn’t get my wife killed before she can retire.
As for me. I’m making a pork roast and some potato soup. Tonight I’m watching Food Network, Fine Living or HGTV. I am turning into an ostrich and burying my head as firmly in the sand as possible. I’m tired of hearing about the wole thing.
Wake me whe it’s over.
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This is definitely from the personal file, but i can’t help but spread the word. it’s actually troubled me since I left the military that I no longer had the right to salute the flag when it was being raised or lowered, or when the anthem played. I earned that right, as did every other man and woman in this country who ever wore a uniform. Now I have the wxtreme honor of passing this along to all my fellow veterans.
Note: The text in this entry is taken from an official US Government in-house email. It was not in any way marked so that the information could not be shared, but I have removed all references to officials on the list, as their email addresses were attached.
New law allows salutes in civvies during anthem
AFNS
10/31/2008WASHINGTON — Veterans and servicemembers not in uniform can now render
the military-style hand salute during the playing of the national
anthem, thanks to changes in federal law that took effect in October.“The military salute is a unique gesture of respect that marks those who
have served in our nation’s armed forces,” said Dr. James B. Peake,
secretary of Veterans Affairs. “This provision allows the application of
that honor in all events involving our nation’s flag.”The new provision improves upon a little known change in federal law
last year that authorized veterans to render the military-style hand
salute during the raising, lowering or passing of the flag, but it did
not address salutes during the national anthem. Last year’s provision
also applied to servicemembers while not in uniform.Traditionally, members of the nation’s veterans service organizations
have rendered the hand-salute during the national anthem and at events
involving the national flag while wearing their organization’s official
head-gear.The most recent change, authorizing hand-salutes during the national
anthem by veterans and out-of-uniform military personnel, was sponsored
by Sen. Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, an Army veteran. It was included in the
Defense Authorization Act of 2009, which President Bush signed Oct. 14.The earlier provision authorizing hand-salutes for veterans and
out-of-uniform servicemembers during the raising, lowering or passing of
the flag, was contained in the National Defense Authorization Act of
2008, which took effect Jan. 28, 2008.
There you have it, fellow Veterans. We have the RIGHT to salute during the raising, lowering, passing and the playing of the National Anthem. It’s our RIGHT. Please, exercise that right. We’ve earned it, every one of us.
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