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| "Castle" and "Last Man Standing" |
THANKSGIVING. Everyone's favorite meal... unless you are a food stylist and are cooking anywhere from 10-25 turkeys in one season, six weeks before turkey day.
That's 25 turkeys, 10 pounds of stuffing, 15 vats of mashed potatoes, dozens of pans of candied yams, 50 pumpkin, pecan, and apple pies; cranberry sauce, the list goes on. Not to mention the "Martha Stewart" version with roasted brussels sprouts, sliced fresh yams with honey, farm to table organic free range turkeys and geese that run around the stage before they hit the oven. Also sometimes the disgusting - including tofurkey, turdukin, and anything deep fried.
Complaints aside, it's actually fun to get to do it way before anyone else. To power through Pinterest, Google images, and the Food Network in search of the latest, greatest, and prettiest versions of a wonderful traditional meal. No wonder it takes us only five minutes to carve up a bird compared to your Uncle Ralph who takes 40 minutes. The truth is, our feasts mostly look great.. unless of course a big shot actor is eating... then it needs to TASTE great too.
Recently, we were lucky enough to create a turkey dinner for everyone's moms favorite show, "Castle" as well as for Tim Allen's "Last Man Standing". Castle was traditional with a huge turkey, and Tim Allen was "smoking" his turkey. There were 'manly hors d'oeuvres for Tim Allen's show including smoked meats, nutty cheddar balls, and ritz crackers. And girly ones too - burrata with prosciutto and roasted peppers. There were pies, oh were there pies. Pies that had to be tossed, pies that didn't have the exact dough leaf pattern we were searching for, pies that were beautiful, and pies that just were so happy to be sprayed with pam and left alone to chill for a while.
We also had yams with marshmallows, yams without pecans, potatoes with skins, potatoes with chives, potatoes with yams, and yams with cranberries. Cranberries on pies and well... you get the picture.
Here are some pictures of what we do to the poor turkeys, once they are ready for cooking, to make them look perfect. And some more pictures of what is done to make the rest of it look great.
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| Voila! |
If you would like to learn more about Food Styling classes and how you can learn about the fine art of culinary design... write us at ediblestyl@aol.com
