Pickled Blueberries!?!

Yep, that’s right!

Mount Desert Island, Maine

Specimen Products

So excited to post these photographs of Ian Schneller, the mastermind behind Specimen Products based out of Chicago.  Ian was kind enough to spend a few hours telling me about his handmade Audio Horns, and most specifically his newest collaboration with Andrew Bird.  Both huge fans of each other, they decided to come together to build an audio installation called, Sonic Arboretum debuting at the Museum of Contemporary Art this December.    Ian builds his hornlings out of recycled newspaper, dryer lint, and birch plywood that is then hooked up to 1930′s-style amplifiers.  The sound is mind blowing. 

Deconstructing a Cheese Plate

What on Earth is better than CHEESE?!  Nothing!  So when Time Out Chicago’s Food & Drink editors decided to investigate the best cheese plates in the city, I jumped at the opportunity to photograph them….

HotChocolate’s Cheese Plate consists of Big Woods Blue from Shepherd’s Way Farms, Grayson from Meadow Creek Dairy, Ten-year-aged cheddar from Wisconsin’s Carr Valley Cheese, Capriole O’Bannon with Oat crackers, multigrain brown bread, roasted nuts, Concord grapes and apple butter.

Telegraph’s (one of my favorite new restaurants in town) cheese plate consists of Ascutney Mountain, Raw goat’s-milk cheese from Twig Farm, Le Vieux Berger Roquefort, Honeycomb sprinkled with Moroccon mint tea and Heirloom apple salad.  For more on Cheese Plates, visit Julia Kramer and David Tamarkin’s article here

Counter Culture

Now a days, it seems as if there are 101 ways to make a “good cup of Joe”, but the guys at Counter Culture have perfected the art.  They give demonstrations of pour over and percolating techniques to coffee snobs and baristas.  They were kind enough to give me  a quick tutorial, and now I am an official “pour over” coffee extraordinaire!  Took a little bit of an adjustment (certainly more time consuming), but now this new morning ritual leads to a damn good cup of coffee.  More on Coffee Culture here.  Check out this article by the NYTimes: You Are How You Caffeinate. 

An apple a day…

is just so so good.

The Trump Tower Penthouse

Yesterday I photographed the 14,260-square-foot Trump Tower Penthouse.  With 16-foot ceilings and magestic 360º views it is worth a whopping $30 million!  I guess you get what you pay for!  Check out more photos of the space here.

Drool

Jeremy Leven from Tuesday Night Dinner has done it again! This time, brunch.  And boy oh boy do I love brunch!  The nice folk at The Den were gracious enough to lend us their space.  Jeremy, my friend, you are genius and I love your food.  Thanks again for the grub.

Lobster Bake at Crowes Pasture

F.E.W Spirits

Illinois has just welcomed a new distillery to its roster of craft spirits.  F.E.W Spirits, located in Evanston is a quality operation, creating some seriously tasty Gin and White Whiskey.  Not only is FEW the first legal distillery in the city, but its name comes from the initials of Francis Elizabeth Willard, who lead the Temperance Party in Illinois.  I was fortunate to have the opportunity to document their process for Julia Kramer’s recent article in Time Out Chicago.  More info here.