Recipes Cooking: up

Showing posts with label up. Show all posts

Saturday, March 22, 2014

Do Your Recipes Measure Up

When a very positively reviewed cookie, cake, or other pastry recipe and gets an atypically bad appraisal, it can often be traced back to flour measuring technique, or lack there of. I did this video a few years ago to illustrate the point, and since we’re heading into holiday baking season, I thought it’d be a great time to review.

This isn’t to say that people don’t occasionally post recipes with ingredient errors [clears throat nervously], but if a cookie gets mostly rave reviews, and yet you thought it was a little dense, there’s a chance it could be this common culprit. Anyway, this clip shows you why weight is better, and also how to properly measure by volume. Enjoy!

Thursday, March 13, 2014

How to Bridal Make Up

Everyone, meet my beautiful friend Amy. She got married this past weekend (our trip to Maine over the past few days for the wedding was why Ive been absent from your lives here, and for that, I am deeply sorry) and asked me to be her make-up artist for the ceremony. Ive never been proposed to, but Im pretty sure thats one of the best questions you could ever be asked. The whole "will you do my make up" thing, I mean.

It goes without saying that Amy is a naturally gorgeous human being. Youll be equally jealous to know shes as nice and sweet a person as she is beautiful. So really, she didnt need any make-up on her special day, but as we all know, make-up isnt a matter of need, its a matter of LIFEeEEEE!!!!!!!! That said, I wanted to enhance Amys natural radiance as much as possible, while making her feel elegant, timeless, and I mean, lets face it, sexy for her wedding.

I think its imperative that a bride think about how she wants to look in pictures. After all, youll have them the rest of your life and you do not want to look back and wonder why you look so pasty or how in the hell you decided to sport a unibrow and red lips.

Make up for pictures is NOT the same as make up you wear to like, work, or your cousins bat mitzvah or whatever. But just because you might wear more make up than normal doesnt mean you have to look like this drag queen. It mostly comes down to the following:

A lightweight but full coverage foundation set with loose powder
Eye primer so as you weep with happy tears your eye make up doesnt drip down your face
Ditto for a waterproof mascara, but only if you use lash primer--otherwise theyll be too crusty. Sick.
A soft flattering lip color without shimmer. Shimmery lips dont photograph well.

So, we went with a simple but dramatic eye, fresh and dewy skin, and a soft pink lip.

And so yeah, there were some false eyelashes added on the ends. What??? I cant help myself!!! The end result was a gorgeous bride ready for her admiring groom--and a ceremony full of onlookers.

{A few tools of the trade}

Make up used on Amy:

Face
Bare Escentuals Prime Time Primer
Sephora Instant Radiance Foundation
Smashbox High Definition Concealer
MAKE UP FOREVER Sculpting Palette
Sephora Blush in Peach Fusion
Coty Loose Powder

Eyes
MAC Paint Pot in Bare Study
NARS Eye Shadow in Blondie
Sephora Kohl Waterproof Liner in Keep Black
MAKE UP FOREVER Shadow in Slate Gray
Smashbox Full Exposure Mascara
Ardell Half Strip False Eyelashes

Lips
Revlon Colorburst Lipstick in Soft Nude
YSL Rouge Volupte Lipstick in Lingerie Pink
Sephora Lip Liner in Native Nude

Thursday, February 6, 2014

Cutting Up a Chicken with Scissors Shear Genius

This video demo, of a chicken being broken down with kitchen shears, was down with the hopes that some of you will start buying fresh whole chickens, instead of previously frozen chicken parts.

Everyones trying to save a few dollars at the store these days, and what better way than buying a whole chicken; always cheaper than the same amount of chicken parts. If you havent been buying organic, free-range chicken, because it costs more, this new skill will allow you to get a healthier whole bird for about the same price as the regular package of pieces.

Im assuming that most people have a bit more experience using a pair of scissors, than a razor-sharp boning knife. So, this method of butchering a chicken is much less intimidating for obvious reasons.

Hopefully for some, the scissors will act like training-wheels on the path to eventually using a knife for this procedure. Sturdy scissor do work nicely, but nothing can match a boning knife for maximum yield. Enjoy!

Photo Credits: chicken guy (c) Fuzzy Gerdes; goatee (c) Im Claude; chicken case (c) jem