Category Archives: photos

Portland Food Photography: Slappy Cakes

4 Replies

There’s this place in Portland that really has it figured out.

How do you combine pancakes and fun in a restaurant? I know what you are thinking, “Pancakes are already fun!”

And I say, “No, they get fun-er. More fun. Having all the funs.”

I introduce you to: Slappy Cakes.

Slappy Cakes offers several batters for pancakes, but the twist is THAT YOU GET TO COOK THEM YOURSELF AT YOUR TABLE!

You choose your batter:

Buttermilk
Whole Grain
Gluten-free
Peanut Butter
Vegan
Sweet Parsnip

You have choices of toppings and ingredients too! We picked lemon curd and blueberries.

You might be thinking, “I don’t really care for pancakes or waffles or any of the sweet breakfast foods.” And that’s fine, they have a full menu.

Portland Food Photography: Blue Star Donuts

7 Replies

First of all, HAPPY NATIONAL DONUT DAY!

I hope you got to celebrate! David and I had planned to visit our favorite donut place in all the land (so far): BLUE STAR DONUTS! But by 11:30am, they had sold out. They make fresh donuts everyday for that day, and they stay open until they run out. It’s crazy. They are crazy. The donuts are seriously the best I’ve ever had.

They use a French based brioche bread recipe to start. Then they craft their magical donuts in the open style kitchen. Everything is clean and modern. Very simple. They have maybe ten to fifteen flavors of donuts per day (and I think that may be overstating the number.)

We were fortunately able to visit Blue Star when David’s brother Thomas was in town. We shared five donuts, and all of them were super delicious. We could hardly decide which to get. May I recommend a donut party with your friends? Order a bunch and share! Seriously. You will want to try them all.

Lemon Poppy Seed

This was a classic fritter.

And a classic cake style

The famous Maple Bacon

Blueberry Bourbon Basil

Meyer Lemon & Key Lime Curd

Thomas’s face pretty much says it all.

Follow them on Twitter or Facebook.

And here’s a link to their Yelp reviews.

portland photography: new baby

Portland Photography: Lake Grove Upholstery

2 Replies

I grew up with a mother who loved antiques. For a time, she even ran a large Antique Warehouse on Apache and McClintock in Tempe, Arizona called Cheap Antiques. It was huge: one of those buildings filled with different vendors and rooms. It was unlike any other I’ve been in since though. The back section of the warehouse was a workspace for certain employees to refurnish the some antiques. I used to watch in awe as they dipped heavy pieces into an industrial sized tub to remove all the varnish. It smelled like stripper, oil, and wood shavings back there. I loved it.

It’s been a long time since then; my mother has long since changed careers, but I did inherit a couple of large chairs that wouldn’t quite fit into her house the way she wanted. I lugged them all the way up here to Portland. (Thanks David! I know they were heavy!)

One of the chairs in particular has always been ugly. The fabric on it, I just don’t even know how to describe it. Colorful?

I have provided evidence with a “vintage” photo of me and my cat taking a nap on it. As you can tell, it is comfortable. Definitely worth saving. MAKEOVER MONTAGE! (Just kidding, although if I already had photos of the after…sorry you will have to wait. JUST.LIKE.ME.

I took it to my local reupholster-er. These folks are legit. Alexander Baghdanov is the third generation in his family to practice this business. His wife Lyubov runs the front desk, and his children work in the shop as well. They have beautiful accents and are wonderfully friendly.

Part of what they do is give the furniture a little love. I look forward to seeing how they salvage what my mother’s pug pack did to this arm.

Alexander Bagdanov

There are A MILLION FABRIC SAMPLES. It was so hard to decide. But I finally did. EEEEEEEE!

I hope to have the “after” photos in another week or so!

Portland wedding photography: Matt and Christina

2 Replies

I received a call from a good friend; his cousin wanted to get married the coming weekend-could I shoot the ceremony? Of course! It was a small gathering, and their most special guests were their family of dogs. (I am sure some of you can relate!)

We met in one of the parks in Sellwood. They wanted to be surrounded by nature, so we had the ceremony near a small pond surrounded by trees. After, the dogs ran free near the river and they celebrated with (so Portland!) Voodoo Doughnuts!

Congrats to you both! Thanks for letting me be part of your big (little) day!

Portland Photography: Camamu Soap

4 Replies

There’s a little workshop in my neighborhood of Sellwood called Camamu Soap.

It smells amazing-and it should! They named it after a little piece of paradise in Brazil-a small port town inside an amazing mangrove edged bay. When you first walk in, you are actually standing in their workspace. If you are lucky, they’ll be pouring or cutting the soap into bars. I visited when they were doing just that! They take the soap out of the wooden molds and cut them into pieces with wires.

Sarah is pushing the soap through the wires here in the above photo.

After they cut them into bars, they go into a cool closet for about a month to cure.

You might think that handmade soap is just for little old ladies, but I was surprised at all the products they had. The soaps had all different uses-some were gritty for gardeners, but I could see mechanics and cooks using it too. They had shaving soaps, soaps for skin conditions, and gentle soaps for babies. They even had dirty dog soap!

I wish you could smell these hand poured soaps. So many different combinations! All made with essential oils, hand foraged herbs, and quality oils! (I’m hoping that Lori will let me follow along on one of her herb picking walks.)

They make more than just bar soap too! They sell some gorgeous Turkish towels-they are a smooth cotton, much different than the type of towel one normally finds in a bathroom. I think I may splurge on one.

Lori is creating an oil here that she infused with herbs. If I recall, it’s a hair oil-like a leave-in conditioner or for bearding softening. Mmmmm! Smelled lovely!

They also make lotions, toners, creams, and salves.

I asked Lori a few questions about how the business came to be and the inspiration behind it:

”I started the company 13 years ago after apprenticing as a cheesemaker on a biodynamic farm in the UK. I’d always been interested in both cheese-making and soap-making…ended up back in Portland without farm or sheep/goat’s/cows and so started making soap instead. I had no particular intention of starting a business but loved the process and the alchemy of it, the creativity and artistry involved and couldn’t stop making more and more batches. I worked for years out of my home until 2006 when the business had grown to the point that it could support a storefront/fabrication area. I have always loved the idea of having what we do be visible and the process accessible.

I have created most of the recipes. Sarah created the chakra soap line.

We source our ingredients and packaging supplies as locally as we can. The bulk of our base ingredients (fixed and essential oils) come from three local businesses. Our organic culinary and botanical ingredients come from a company in California. Items in our retail section are also primarily from other local artisanal businesses (Wild Carrot Herbals, Portland Bee Balm, Big Dipper Wax Works, Cusp Natural Products, etc.)”

paleo food photography: The Perfect Paleo Pancake

5 Replies

I read a lot of blogs about paleo/primal/caveman/whatever-you-want-to-call-it eating. THERE ARE SO MANY. One of my very favorites is The Paleo Mom. She’s someone who came to paleo eating because of a lot of health issues. Her writing comes with a scientific perspective; she has a PhD in Medical Biophysics. You can read more about her journey here and here and here. (That last link has some super inspirational before and after photos!)

She shares some great recipes and this is by far my favorite: Perfect Paleo Pancakes

They are super simple, only six ingredients: green plantains, eggs, coconut oil, vanilla, salt, and baking soda. You could always add extra spices like cinnamon or nutmeg. I topped mine with kerrygold butter and maple syrup. They really hit the spot when you are craving something special. I especially love how easy they are to make and flip. The texture is perfect and they keep well in the fridge for second breakfast.

Get out all your ingredients. Heat your pan with some coconut oil. Then peel and rough chop two green plantains. Throw them in the food pro with four eggs, two teaspoons of vanilla, three tablespoons of coconut oil (I’ve also used coconut butter here), a half teaspoon of baking soda, and a pinch of salt. Wazz it up until the plantains are all chopped up.

Then spoon it into the pan! The pancakes bubble a little and crisp up around the edges perfectly. Flip it! Cook the other side! Then slather them up with whatever paleo or mostly paleo ingredients you believe in! My vote is butter and maple syrup for the classic angle, but you could serve and eat with fruit or nut butters if you are into that sort of thing. I’d imagine that these pancakes (without the added vanilla) would be great as a bread substitute as well, although The Paleo Mom has some recipes for that too.

Portland Food Photography: The Sapphire Hotel

4 Replies

Last week, David and I decided we needed to celebrate so we searched for happy hours on Yelp and we choose The Sapphire Hotel based on the reviews and the menu. Their website claims long roots into the history of Alberta Street:

The Sapphire Hotel was originally a turn of the century seedy hotel in Portland, Oregon inhabited by sailors, travelers and ladies of the night. They rented rooms by the week, night or by the hour and spent long days and evenings in the lobby drinking, laughing, eating, talking and kissing.

Aside from entertaining one another you could count on the presence of a mystic, traveling musician or a handful of gypsies to lend some fun and adventure to your night. As the years went by, the area around the hotel grew more affluent and the ladies of the night took jobs as shop girls along the avenue. The artists began to sell their work at the galleries that cropped up along the Avenue and the rooms became upscale apartments leased to the people in the local community.

There’s a long list of signature cocktails, wine and beer followed by a shorter list of tasty food.

I ordered the hour hour special marionberry margarita and (I think) David got the Common-Law Girlfriend.

I couldn’t resist ordering a couple happy hour appetizers in addition to the food. We chose pickled veggies and nuts & olives.

Dinner was a seared tuna nicoise salad and a meze platter. Two thumbs up! Give them a try for some ambience and delicious drinks and food!

saint patrick’s day

2 Replies

Spent time with some of my best friends on Saint Patrick’s Day watching them get tattoos at Martian Art’s Tattoo Studio on Hawthorne Street. The lighting in the shop was lovely, and I managed to get some dramatic shots. (See the full set on flickr)

home sweet home

7 Replies

I love my new neighborhood. We live in the Sellwood-Mooreland neighborhood of Portland. We’ve already met new neighbors, many of whom are extremely active in the Sherrett Square street mural project. The corner of Sherrett and 9th Avenue was the first corner to paint a mural in the intersection. When they first did it, it was illegal. They eventually brought what they did to the mayor, and paved the way for street mural projects all over Portland! It now has a formal process where city officials help neighborhoods through the steps.

The four corners of our mural also have little pausing stations. There is a tea station with ceramic teacups, bags of tea, and a hot water dispenser. This station is checked and maintained daily.

Across the street is a children’s play area. An open air wooden “cottage” holds toys and benches.

Walk to the other corner, and you will find The Communication Station. This is a place for the Sellwood Bee newspaper as well as any neighborhood news.

The last corner boasts a tiny book lending library although other fun items sometimes find their way here.

We picked a part of town to live in that is extremely walkable. We have easy access to two grocery stores, a homesteading store, about five or six coffee shops, a tea house, many restaurants and more. People walk everywhere! There are a number of little surprises that make walking exciting too! I’ve seen a couple poetry stations, a seed sharing station, chickens, gardens, dogs, cats, oh and there is a river too!

This is the art store. A store that sells art. Dibs on the judgemental seahorse. (This store is not to be confused with the art supply store just down the street.)

This is where you buy rennet, sourdough starter, jars, and learn how to make candles.

Did I mention the Puppet Museum. IN MY NEIGHBORHOOD. This is not on a main street. This is a small neighborhood street. It is in the building that housed the first Sellwood grocery store. It is so charming.