some good cookbooks

This is a big year for me in the cookbook department----five of the books I have photographed over the past year or two are being released in 2012.

FIVE.

And out of those five, three of them are on Amazon and ready for pre-order.

The first, Washington Food Artisans, is coming out in mid April and has been a long time in the making. The book, written by Leora Bloom, beautifully profiles several Washington state producers, from cheese makers and meat & vegetable farmers to foragers and wine makers.

This project was an absolute dream to shoot because it gave me the opportunity to get out in the field (literally) and shoot in some stunning locations. I met so many incredible people and was floored by the passion and love they put into the food they produce. The time I spent on the road, taking photos of potatoes and farm animals, donning a bee suit and getting up close and personal with some hives, standing in the middle of a gorgeous field of lavender on a summer evening, and sampling warm fruit right off the tree, changed the way I look at food and the choices I make every day.

Thank you, Sasquatch Books, for giving me such a gift. Working on this book was a joy from start to finish.




Pike Place Market Recipes, written by the fabulous Jess Thomson, is another book due out this Spring.

As a Seattle native, I have spent my whole life going to Pike Place Market, and yet it wasn't until shooting this book that I realized how little I knew about the place. Walking through the market with Jess, sampling food from the various vendors and getting the chance to photograph so many Seattle gems, (like Market Spice, DeLaurenti, Don and Joe's Meats, to name just a few) was such a treat.
And the recipes in the book are delicious-- you will not be disappointed.



And last, but definitely NOT least, is Jeanne Sauvage's Gluten-Free Baking for the Holidays, due out in mid-October.

This shoot could not have gone more smoothly or been more fun. I hired the uber talented Helene Dujardin to do the baking/food styling for the shoot and she went above and beyond. It was on this shoot that Jeanne, Helene and I became great friends. There was a LOT of laughing and some fantastic collaboration.

If your experience with gluten free has equaled dry, crumbly, and grainy baked goods, then this is a perfect book for you.  Jeanne's gluten free recipes are the best I have ever tried, hands down.