FFWD Cauliflower-Bacon Gratin

I don't think I've ever owned a camera.  Maybe a plastic one when I was very young.  I have used a couple of disposable ones over the years, but that's really about it.  For this blog I've been borrowing Paul's camera, but I am absolutely clueless when it comes to photography.  I had Monday off of work this week so I decided to make the Cauliflower-Bacon Gratin for lunch.  This meant that for the first time ever, I was able to try to photograph something in natural light.  As you can see, my pictures look mostly like shadows.  I could tell shadows were a problem but I had no clue what to do about it (should I have actually taken the food outside to shoot?) and was frankly too hungry to care, so my photos are quite shadowy. I do like the brightness, though.  I can definitely tell that if I had any clue what I was doing photos taken in natural light would come out much better than the usual ones I take in the dark.

 Luckily, the gratin came out much better than the photos!  I bought 2 cartons of eggs last week thinking for sure that would be enough, but when I opened the fridge to make this recipe I realized I was down to four eggs.  I guess I went through a lot of them making dinner for Christmas Eve!  Oh well, I just used the eggs I had and decreased the amounts of the other ingredients a bit to compensate.  I also increased the ratio of milk to heavy cream, wanting to feel less guilty about eating this after big meals Christmas Eve and day.  

Gratin and shadows

Even with the changes, I was very happy with how this came out.  I especially loved the edges.  They browned and got a bit crispy, which I just love.  I served this with some brussel sprouts that I roasted simply with olive oil, salt, and pepper and some gougeres that were left over for Christmas Eve.  They weren't quite as good as fresh, but they did toast up pretty well!  This recipe was easy and we both enjoyed it.  It's definitely one I'll make again.

Lunch