Beautiful surroundings really feed my soul.

Marty, Mara, a group of friends and I just got back from an all-too-short stay in a classic Umbrian villa. We stayed at la Fatta del Gelso, “an oasis of tranquility nestled in a valley in the shadow of Assisi, the birthplace of St. Francis.” Fom this villa in Cannara, we visited several other Umbrian towns, including Montefalco, Norcia and Deruta. I wanted to bottle this feeling so I could have it anytime I wanted it. The only way I know is through photos. Photography is like writing…making images with emotion that are tactile, that you can smell and taste.

We were a merry group of 12 interested in cooking, eating, conversation and relaxing.

Each sunset was different and beautiful!

Doesn’t Marty look happy in this Italian kitchen?

Now that I am back in my work-a-day routine, I am so glad to have these photos to remind me of the serene time we enjoyed in this gorgeous part of the world.

Who knew beans could taste so good? I do, now! I learned how good they can taste last summer, working with food writer Kathy Hester on her new release, The Great Vegan Bean Book. As I mentioned in a previous post, for this book, we shot 110+ recipes that featured 15 different types of beans.

[Win a copy of The Great Vegan Bean Book: To celebrate the book’s debut, Kathy shares a recipe below and generously offers one of you a chance to win one copy of her new book! To enter, please see details after the recipe, at the end of this post...]

I also discovered how incredibly versatile beans can be, and I was very impressed with Kathy’s imaginative recipes. It seems more conventional to incorporate beans into savory dishes such as soups or dips, such as “Bean Queso,” but, this book also includes such unexpected sweet dishes as “Vanilla Rosewater Parfaits,” “Enchanted Vanilla Pancakes” (above) and “Black Bean Fudgesicles” (below).

Other recipes include “Almond Cheez Spread” and “White Bean Basil Cheezy Spread” (seen below).

A real expert on vegan soups and stews, Kathy also wrote The Vegan Slow Cooker. In The Great Vegan Bean Book is her recipe for the vibrant “Thai Coconut Tongue of Fire Soup,” shared here, just under the photo of the dish, below. If you try it, please let us know how you like it!

Entries will be accepted until 11:59 p.m., Sunday, June 9, 2013. A winner will be chosen at random from all qualified entries, and will be announced as an update to this blog post, and via Facebook and Twitter by Tuesday, June 11, 2013.

Thanks for playing, everyone.

Update, 6/12.13: Congratulations to the winner of The Great Vegan Bean Book contest: Mana McNeill. Happy cooking!

Summer means grilling! When warm weather arrives, we are always happy to move our cooking and dining outdoors. Marty is really looking forward to firing up his Big Green Egg again this year, so we can enjoy our grilled favorites and maybe even try some new recipes.

For several years, I’ve been happy to shoot summer grilling features for USA Weekend Magazine (with styling by Lisa Cherkasky). This year, they spotlight Chef Bobby Flay, who offers grilling tips in “All Fired Up!”. Our photos help to feature these recipes from his cookbook, Bobby Flay’s Barbecue Addiction: “Nectarine, Black Pepper and Blue Cheese Salad” (above), and “Fire-Roasted Baby Lamb Chops with Smoked Paprika-Orange BBQ Sauce” (below). This book is offered as part of USA Weekend’s weekly cookbook-giveaway sweepstakes.

In the interview, Flay says he loves his Big Green Egg grill, too—just like Marty, my favorite chef. Maybe one of these recipes will inspire new summer favorites for you, too. Happy grilling!

Shooting for the Washington Post 2013 Spring Dining Guide gave me the chance to explore and learn about The Restaurant at Patowmack Farm.

Located 50 miles outside of Washington, DC, in Lovettsville, Virginia, it makes for  a special dining excursion. Established in 1986, it was one of the first certified organic farms in Virginia. I shot their space on the rustic, rural grounds—the entrance to the dining room is shown above. I also photographed several dishes representing Chef Christopher Edwards’ “local, organic, seasonal cuisine.” At top is a “Spiced Carrot Torte.” “Seafood Stew with Puffed Rice” is below. The farm provides “the majority of the vegetables, and some small fruits including blueberries, raspberries and blackberries” for the restaurant.

It was a lovely time of year to visit there—everything was newly green again for Spring, and the colorful trees were just blossoming.

Below is a plate of “Oyster Gratin.”

I hope to go back to visit Patowmack Farm again soon—looking forward to see how they showcase the summer and fall produce!

My kids, my favorite subject!

I think that Anna Quindlen said it so perfectly in her  article,“On Being a Mom.” A friend sent it to me as our daughters were graduating from high school. It is just the kind of article that makes you stop and reflect (and cry).

Quindlen said: “But the biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while doing this. I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs.”

I am having so many good moments now with my kids as adults, and I’m savoring every minute. For me there are not words for the emotion that is inside that I feel for Mara and Dov. They are amazing. Marty and I gave them what they needed to flourish. Outside of work, they are my favorite subjects to photograph.

Olive Oil, Sea Salt & Pepper is a collection of simple, basic, healthful recipes and cooking tips using those three versatile ingredients, written by chef/author Jenn Crovato. The look and feel of the book go with the philosophy of the author. It is for all of your senses.

The straightforward, elegant design was created by my longtime friend and collaborator, Kate McConnell, an art director and fine artist. This was one of those projects where everyone was perfect for the task. The success of the whole package comes down to the design—attention to detail, the color palette and the type. The design makes my photos look so good.

Look how simple and elegant the recipe page is.

Olive Oil, Sea Salt & Pepper is simple, easy and beautiful, through and through.

It’s so exciting to stroll grocery-store aisles and suddenly see packages featuring my photographs! Glutino is a major gluten-free product line, and I get the pleasure of seeing them often, as many stores carry their goods. For Glutino’s extensive rebranding campaign, my images are being used in their simple, elegant new packaging as well as on their terrific new website. I shot 75 of their delicious products, in many categories, from snack-foods to frozen meals to baking mixes.

Creating images that help to redefine an established brand is a satisfying project. Part of that challenge is to convey an impression of a simple, casual world—one that I want to hang out in. I start out with testing alone in the studio, taking the clients’ descriptions and layouts and interpreting them into  something remarkable. Lighting is my way into that world—the most important aspect for me. It is a language all on its own that communicates so much depth and feeling.

Next come the props and textures—the addition of something tactile that invites you into the scene. Then, the foundation is ready for the main course. I collaborated with expert food stylists Lisa Cherkasky and Debbie Wahl. Their casual styling perfectly complements Glutino’s foods, as well as the details in the fresh lighting and layering of textures—and you want to eat what is on set.

When the set is lit, props are selected, food is placed, details are scrutinized, adjusted and scrutinized again…finally, the camera captures that image. Then, the creative contributors step over to the monitor to see the results of their efforts pop up on the screen, in a moment of shared anticipation that Lisa Cherkasky calls, “waiting to be dazzled.”  I am dazzled everyday!

Thank you to Creative Director Eric Donsky and the rest of the talented group at Glutino for such a beautiful  project.

Mmm…Taxes… Everybody likes yummy chocolate chip cookies. Nobody likes boring old taxes. Making taxes yummy and fun takes real creativity. And, in tax season, advertising for tax preparation services and software inundates the media. My client, Ogilvy Washington Creative Studio  took on the challenge of making the Internal Revenue Service’s “Free File” program stand out. I shot a series of images for their creative campaign to promote this service, which allows taxpayers to choose from a variety of software to file electronically for free.

The campaign was mounted on several platforms in print and online. Additional variations in this campaign included coins, a stick of gum and French fries. The stylist for this project was Jenn Crovato, who created a tempting cookie that you really want to take a bite out of. The cookie and coin images were also used in clever animations (bite-by-bite, the cookie disappears, as above; the penny spins, as below).

I love this kind of assignment…making an object larger than life sing. It also helps that the object is stable so I can really look, think and see. Like looking through a microscope, something is magically transformed—in this case with lighting. The lighting on the penny really brings it alive.

The detail in the stick of gum is so crisp you can taste it. It took 21 separate shots to hold focus from front to back. By focus stacking, we merged the shots together for the final image.

Below is the stick-of-gum variation as a large-scale poster. The French fries appear/disappear on the IRS Free File website.

If anyone can make filing taxes sound easy and appetizing, it’s the clever creatives at Ogilvy Washington Creative Studio!

Passover is all about family, food and friends. For me, it’s a tradition filled with fond memories—and hope for a future of more good times. Assembling this montage, I reflected on our Passovers past, present and future.

Some photos were taken at our home:

• Dov making matzoh balls (which he won’t be home to do this year)

• Elan, our nephew collecting pinecones (He’s been cleaning out the pinecones in our yard for four years during his Passover visit.)

• Marty roasting chickens, the egg and the shank bone for the Seder plate on the big green egg

Some of the photos are from our trip to Jerusalem in 2011:

• A pomegranate growing at Bet She’an

• Spices at the Mehane Yehuda market

• Rosemary growing in Jerusalem

• Fresh fruit plate on a bench outside of our apartment

• Matzah Brei Omlet at a restaurant in Caesarea (This is something we make at home, but it was particularly delicious in the sunshine by the sea.)

• The spots of blue in the background are the Mediterranean Sea…a place I hope to return to soon

Some of the photos are recipes I shot for The New Jewish Table cookbook by Chef Todd Gray and Ellen Kassoff Gray of Equinox Restaurant, cowritten by David Hagedorn. We’re looking forward to adding some of the recipes from this great book to this year’s seder.:

• Matzoh Ball Soup, the cover image

• Tsimmes

• Poached Salmon Mousse with Cucumber Salad (see this recipe here)

I hope everyone has a great Passover with family, friends and food—and, that you’ll remember this year fondly at Passovers to come.

I love cookbooks! We have a great collection at the studio and at home, but always seem to be adding more. For people who love growing their cookbook collections, USA Weekend Magazine is running a great sweepstakes until the end of this year. In this contest, very week brings a new chance to win a featured cookbook—and the chance to be automatically entered into a drawing to win the grand prize at the end of 2013: all 52 featured cookbooks!

Having shot last year’s series of tasty, health-minded recipes by registered dietician Ellie Kreiger for USA Weekend (always along w/stylist Lisa Cherkasky), this year’s new scheme of shooting recipes from all different sources is a fun change for us. Some of the rich treats in the new cookbooks we are helping to show off include the adorable and just plain delicious “Brownie Roll-Out Cookies” from the very popular The Smitten Kitchen, above; and, The Liddabits Sweets Cookbook Chocolate Nonpariels, which I featured in my Valentine’s Day post.

Another highly popular cookbook featured is Ina Garten’s Barefoot Countessa Foolproof. My shot of her recipe for “Endive, Orange and Roquefort Salad” is above. Refreshing any time of year, the fresh, colorful combination of ingredients suggested Summer to me.

I shot “Baked Potato Soup” from Unbelievably Gluten-Free!—a hearty recipe, perfect for supper on a chilly night, below.

The range of specialities in the cookbooks featured is diverse—from Tequila Mockingbird “literature-inspired cocktails” to The Food Truck Cookbook Waffle Breakfast Tacos. Check the USA Weekend website weekly for new recipes—and enter for chances to win one—or 52—cookbooks!