Apr15

Stymied by Snow

by Kaymee Photography on April 15th, 2012 at 2:05 pm
Posted In: Uncategorized

So on Sunday I was lounging on the couch, finishing up the first of usually two barrels o’ coffee, not feeling particularly motivated to do much of anything when the weather report came on: upper 60s to low 70s and lots of sun Sunday and all week. Well that would be just fine. I had a lot on the DVR to catch up with and would just lazy the day away. Could I? Sure I could. Darn. I should get out. Hopping up before the inspiration left me, I got ready, grabbed my gear, did a quick look at the maps, and headed out.

Mountainous Streaks

Clouds, roads, trees

The goal was the Placer Big Trees in the Tahoe National Forest. The Placer Big Trees are apparently the northernmost grove of giant sequoia and a sight to behold. The trip took me east towards Reno and quickly off towards Foresthill, across the new Foresthill bridge, which, oddly, I hadn’t driven across, or at least that I remember. Driving through woodland landscapes on mountainous roads with perfect weather was fantastic. Simply enjoying the drive was enough. I was noting some places, like the roadside waterfall as I went. One more turn in Foresthill and I was looking for the Big Trees.

Middle of Middle

A bridge over the middle fork of the middle fork

As I wound my way through the mountains, I stopped a few times where the light and view made for a nice shot. Coming around one bend, I spied a bridge spanning a ravine with a river below. The river turned out to be the middle fork of the middle fork of the American River, yeah say that 5 times fast. The light was nice and the view spectacular. With a wide spot in the road right before the bridge, I slid to a stop. Hopping out, I looked for a good angle and found one on top of a flat rock at the edge of the road. Seeing that standing on the rock would get me a little above the foliage, I moved to jump up. Without providing the details of why, I made note of the spiderwebs spanning the length of the rock about a foot in front of it…and yes, I also saw the man-eating spider inhabiting the web. Stretching out to make the leap up, a new airflow location was created in my pants. For those not following along, I ripped my pants. Well, I was solo and wasn’t planning on meeting up with anyone, so I got the shots and headed on. Sigh. The things we do for our craft.

The next miles went by uneventfully. Well, almost. As I went up the mountain, patches of snow began to appear until all but a lane and a half of road was visible. Okay, sure, I was pushing 5000 feet but there really was a lot of snow. There was so much, that upon getting to the first possible turnoff for Grouse Overlook, I had to chuckle. The road was completely snowed over. Only a four wheel drive was getting through and even that was questionable. No matter. My destination was only 5 miles up the road.

Lingering Snow

Patches of snow hanging around in the Spring weather


Yeah. Read the title of this post again. Instead of getting another 5 miles, I made another 1, maybe 2 before the road was totally snowed over too. There was, in fact, an RV parked and deployed right in the middle of the road just before the snow bank. I was going no farther, nor was the guy in the compact car. The guy in the huge four wheel drive truck, however, was just coming back from some foray into the snow. Foiled again!!

I did drive down a side road to a PCWA dam, get a few shots, hike up a small hill to see the view, and have a deer wander 30 or so feet from me. That latter event did not net a photo as I had just stopped and the camera was not set with the proper settings to capture it. Take my word for it. The deer was there.

Little Falls

A small waterfall right off the road


The drive back was very uneventful. Pretty, but with the sun at near apex, the light was not good. Oh, remember the roadside waterfall I mentioned on the way in? I did stop on the way back and enjoyed the shots there.

So, should I have stayed on the couch and just lazy the day away? Oh heck no! Like the silly fishing shirts, any day shooting is better than any day not. Or something like that. :)

Enjoy!

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Apr10

Another Pinned Dish: Shrimp

by Kaymee Photography on April 10th, 2012 at 6:33 am
Posted In: Uncategorized

This may come as no surprise, but I really do like Pinterest, Kaymee Photo. It sets up a single location for a wide range of information and cool things. From recipes to home stuff to locations and photos, a lot of new and interesting things can be found there. In fact, almost every dish I’ve made as of late has come from Pinterest. I’ve made a few of my own of course, and they have gone up on the site.

Take for example, this latest dish: Baked Italian Shrimp. It doesn’t appear to be from some cooking site or celebrity chef. However, after navigating down the list of 20+ repins, I was unable to find the original poster. But, this is what the site is all about: finding new things that people have actually done that you haven’t and trying them yourself.

As the pin explains, this shrimp dish would be good over rice as a main dish. I, however, made it as an appetizer and it was devoured. It was gobbled up so quickly, all I had time for was this quick iPhone snap…snap, gone! It was very good and very flexible. I could see it as a fix it and forget it type ingredient into a larger dish, like over rice, or a stew perhaps.

And as with all my posts, if you try it, let me know how it goes.

Hot Shrimp

Hot Shrimp

Baked Italian Shrimp

Ingredients

  • Shrimp, fresh, thawed, peeled, and deveined – precooked is fine. I used 1.5 lbs of 51-60ct and it filled a large pan
  • 1 stick butter – please use butter and not margarine, you will notice the difference
  • Italian Seasonings
  • 1 large lemon

Directions

  • Place stick of butter on large jelly roll pan. Place pan in cold oven.
  • Preheat oven to 350.
  • Once oven is heated and butter is melted, remove pan and layer shrimp in pan, a single layer is best.
  • Sprinkle seasonings over shrimp. I like a lot of flavor so I used a lot of seasonings.
  • Slice lemon and place on shrimp.
  • Return pan to oven and bake for 10ish minutes for precooked (just to heat through) or 15 minutes for uncooked.
  • Remove from pan, plate, and serve.

The pin calls for 1 package of Italian dressing seasonings, but I have a good blend that I like. It’s light on the garlic which was better for this as I wanted the lemon and other flavors to come out rather than a garlic.

Enjoy!

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Apr06

Pizza…It’s What’s for Breakfast

by Kaymee Photography on April 6th, 2012 at 5:49 pm
Posted In: Uncategorized

Hi again! Yes, it’s been way too long since I’ve posted anything. Sure, I could give the same boring excuses, busy, working, traveling, etc, but really? I just haven’t been much in the mood. But I’m back for now to share the newest (a couple in fact) recipes and photos.

This first one was inspired by “Triple-D” and an episode in which he visited a wood-fire pizza place. Now the pizza the owner made was a breakfast pizza. What made it a breakfast pizza were the fried eggs on top. The rest of it was cheese and leeks and whatever. It was the eggs that started the planning.

If you didn’t know, I love biscuits and gravy. I make a mean one myself and love to order them at new breakfast places. Fantastic stuff! Another favorite food is pizza. I mean, come on, it’s pizza! It’s really un-American (let the flames begin) to not like pizza. Really! :)

The Breakfast Pizza Pie Slice

The Breakfast Pizza Pie Slice

So, with those two fantastic foods in mind and the planning for a good breakfast pie, it was just a matter of working out the minor details to make it work…and work out it did. As with most of my dishes, this one is not for the faint of heart. In fact, I had this just this morning and haven’t had anything since! The recipe is below for The Breakfast Pizza Pie along with some modifications for next time.



The Breakfast Pizza Pie

Ingredients

  • Pizza dough – use whatever you’d like. I used a biscuit package dough and won’t do that again. Premade or make my own next time
  • 1 lb Breakfast Sausage
  • 1 pint Heavy Cream
  • 2T Flour
  • 5-6 slices bacon
  • Cheese
  • 3-4 Large Eggs
  • Salt/Pepper

Directions

  • Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
  • Cover jelly roll pan with tin foil. Place bacon strips in pan and bake in oven for 10 minutes (I put a cooling rack in the pan and place bacon on top so grease drips down.
  • At the same time the bacon is cooking, in a large skillet over medium heat, cook sausage, crumbling into small pieces, until browned.
  • Pour flour over sausage and stir until absorbed, about 3 minutes.
  • Lower heat to medium low and stir in heavy cream. Stir frequently and cook until boiling and thickened.
  • While bacon and gravy is cooking, prepare pizza crust if necessary. I used a preheated pizza stone to cook on.
  • After gravy and bacon are cooked spread liberal amounts of sausage gravy on pizza crust.
  • Cover gravy with cheese. I used a Mexican blend only because it had cheddar and Monterey Jack.
  • Place semi-cooked bacon on cheese and sprinkle a bit more cheese on the bacon. This helps it from drying out.
  • Manage the cooking time per crust instructions. The crust I used needed 13-17 minutes. I cooked initially for 8 minutes and then removed for the next step. The eggs take about 8-10 minutes (see enhancement below).
  • After initial cook time, remove from oven and crack the eggs over the top of the pizza. Cover each egg with a bit more cheese.
  • Return to oven and cook until eggs are to desired doneness, about 8-10 minutes.
  • Remove from oven, slice and serve.

The Breakfast Pizza Pie Slice

All the good breakfast ingredients!

The recipe above was my first attempt at this creation. After seeing what worked and what didn’t, I would make some changes. First, I wouldn’t use a biscuit type refrigerated dough. I’d either make my own dough (which I’m not very good at) or used a premade dough like a Boboli. There is also a frozen loaf dough that can be defrosted and rolled out into a pizza circle. I’ve used that before with good results. Second, and most importantly, I’d precook the eggs. Upon cracking the eggs on the partially cooked pizza, the egg whites went all over the place. I thought first to make holes to put the eggs in and that would work, but a better option would be to precook the eggs so they have a solid shape. This would only take a minute or so. Once formed, remove the eggs from the skillet and place on top of the pizza to finish out the cooking. I’d imagine doing it this way would eliminate about a minute or two from the overall cooking time.

Overall the dish was fantastic! It definitely combined two of my favorite foods: biscuits and gravy and pizza. I will certainly be doing this again. Does anyone know how to keep sausage gravy on tap, or at least frozen? Would make the preparation so much easier.

I highly recommend this one! If you try it, let me know how it turns out and what you did different!

Enjoy!

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Mar14

Apples, apples, no where in sight

by Kaymee Photography on March 14th, 2012 at 6:43 am
Posted In: Uncategorized

Across the Pond

Reflections of the park folliage around the pond


I’ve certainly written about my trips to Apple Hill before. They never cease to be enjoyable experiences. I’ve only ever gone in the Fall for apple season, so it was a new experience going at this time of year when apples weren’t even a thought yet. It still wasn’t Spring so trees and vines were bare for the most part. There were some gardens with plants and areas with grass, but foliage was really few and far between. Did that detract? Oh most certainly not. The sun was shining and the skies clear blue (we have had an odd Winter season). At near 75 degrees, it was an absolutely gorgeous day. Add to that the company and photo opportunities (as well as the fun) and the trip to Apple Hill was just as good as the annual Fall trips.

Tools

Old tools outside the blacksmith's shop

When the weather is good, getting out and shooting is always pleasurable, well, almost. In this case, it was. Add to that the real lack of crowds, spending time just wandering around and even talking to the locals is very different. I spent probably 30 minutes talking to a local blacksmith at one place we stopped. We talked about his craft and the things he and other blacksmiths made in that shop. There was a pot rack that was just really cool. No picture possibilities as it was suspended way in the air.

While I’ve only really ever thought about Apple Hill during apple season, I’ll start to add it to the list of places for a quick trip when the weather is nice and I just want to get out. Getting out in good weather is always, yes always, a good idea.

Enjoy!

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Mar09

Good, but not the Best

by Kaymee Photography on March 9th, 2012 at 6:54 am
Posted In: Uncategorized

So, I recently pinned (on Pinterest) a pork chop recipe that claimed to the best ever. Of course with a title like that and a good photo accompanying it, I had to try it. Now, I’m not a bad cook and I kinda know what I’m doing. Upon looking at this recipe, something seemed a bit off, but when I make a recipe for the first time, I try to follow it fairly close. This one called for 3 cups of Italian bread crumbs, a small package of Italian dressing seasonings, some garlic, and shredded Parmesan cheese. The method was fairly easy: dredge the pork loin chops in ranch dressing and then cover with the mixed up dry ingredients. In looking at the combined dry ingredients, I knew something was wrong. The ingredients just didn’t have the right amounts. There was way too much bread crumbs and not enough everything else. There was going to be no flavor from the dressing seasonings, the garlic, or the cheese. Also, while the recipe called for 6 chops, it didn’t say how big so that was a big variable. So, while I try to follow a recipe for the first time as it says, I had to adjust this one right off the bat.

Now, don’t get me wrong. The chops were good. I have had better and I may share that recipe sometime in the future (if I’m allowed to as it’s a “family” thing). If you like chops, I’d certainly try these. My recipe modification is below. I’d call these Italian Breaded Pork Chops.

Italian Breaded Pork Chops

Italian Breaded Pork Chops with garlic pasta and fresh asparagus

Italian Breaded Pork Chops

Ingredients

  • 4 1/2″ thick pork loin chops
  • 1c Italian breadcrumbs
  • Italian seasoning blend
  • Garlic powder
  • Pepper
  • Shredded Parmesan cheese
  • Ranch dressing

Directions

  • Preheat oven to 350.
  • Cover an oven safe pan in aluminum foil and spray with non-stick spray.
  • If pork loin chops aren’t 1/2″ thick, cut them so they are close to that.
  • Combine in a shallow pan the bread crumbs and enough Italian seasonings, garlic powder, shredded Parmesan cheese, and pepper to taste – the more seasonings, the more flavor and more cheese worked really well.
  • Pour the ranch dressing in another shallow pan.
  • Dredge the pork loin chops first in the ranch dressing and then place in the bread crumb mixture to coat all sides completely.
  • Place coated chops into pan.
  • When all chops are dredged and breaded, put pan in oven for approximately 40 minutes. I put in for 45 and that was just a bit too long.
  • Remove from oven and serve immediately.

    • Enjoy!

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