This website will be about Food and Photography. I love both things and want an outlet to share the things I love about them. I am hoping to learn more about both topics as well. I want to thank my Mom for being the catalyst for my love of food ( and probably photography). She gets the credit but it is not without some minor criticism. My mom came up with the idea, when I was around fourteen, that we would come up with a menu from different countries and prepare the food of that country for friends and family. We even got the countries flag and put it on the table. It fundamentally changed my thinking and sparked my love of cooking. Now while I fear posting this may crucify her forever the other driving factor in my love of cooking was her inability to actually cook. Flounder was the bane of my existence she cooked it on a faberware electric grill, wrapped in foil with a lemon. To say it was fully cooked was over stating it ... it was cooked tartar. This and several of her other "go to" recipes led me to learn to cook something edible. To this day I still choke down filet of fish but this unfortunate experience led to my very fortunate love of food and cooking.
Now with all that said my mother has grown to be an amazing cook. It turns out that cooking for us ( her family) was torture for her. I can say now in hindsight there was not a grateful soul in the house praising her for the time she spent cooking meals. Cooking for an ungrateful lot of people is not something that fosters one's love of cooking. The international dinners though almost always turned out fantastic and those meals were prepared together during long days of sometimes challenging preparation. Those days are some of the most fond days of my childhood. Now that her kids have grown and she can cook for the love of cooking she has become quite the accomplished cook. She is also the driving force behind our families recipe book. I can say without hesitation she made me who I am in food. It was only after a trip I took recently to Florida to visit my mother that I decided to create this website. Once again for that I owe my mother my sincerest gratitude for making me the best person I can be and challenging me to do things I would otherwise be to lazy or not think to do.
So.... now you know I am dedicating this site to my mother ( she deserves it) but thats not it is all about. I am a Marketing Associate with the largest food distributor in the world. I have been a marketing associate for seventeen years. What that means is I sell food to restaurants, yes I sell everything a restaurant could possibly want from lettuce to sanitizer strips. I did take five years off to own and operate a small chain of ice cream parlors and games shops. Before getting into sales I managed, bartended, waited tables. washed dishes and cooked in kitchens. I hope to bring all these years of knowledge to this site.
My love of Photography came about fifteen years ago, no idea why, but it did. Then after a few years of hibernation I decided it was time to get back into it. My step daughters are exceptional amateur photographers and during my hiatus my equipment was absconded by my youngest step daughter. I really look forward to learning and spending time with them taking pictures. So once again I must give Mom credit because on that same trip to Florida she challenged me to do more with it. I am never likely to be a pro photographer but she is right I can do more. I can mix both loves and create a website for my friends and family and anyone else who might seem to care to visit and see what I am doing.
I hope you enjoy my thoughts, ideas and experience either way I would love to hear your thoughts. Please share with me vittlesandviewfinders@yahoo.com. I expect once I get this website building thing down to have a comments and contributor page so stay tuned.
Thanks
Mike