Homework #4

I find Richard Whelan article to be convincing, he came across many people to find a more accurate conclusion for Robert Capa’s image “The Falling Soldier.” Everyone he came across with gave a different point of view, like Gallaguer who assures that the photograph was staged. Gallagguer says that he shared a room with Capa and witnessed how Capa went out with a group of soldiers to stage the image. However, there was never evidence that could prove it. Then, Franks chief homicide detective of the Memphis Police Department analyzes the image and finds that the fingers from the left hand are curled toward the hand. That means his muscles went limp and the body was already dead when the picture was taken. It’s hard to tell whether was staged or not, I feel the arguments suggesting it was not staged are more convincing than the ones saying it was. I think whether it was or not staged does not really matter, the point of the image is to bring reality of the war to the people. All this image is showing is a man dying at war and people are aware that hundreds of soldiers die at war! What is different is that people don’t feel empathy for them since they can’t witness the actual war. Images like the “The Falling Soldier” or the “The Valley of the Shadow of Death” by Fenton both images of war times that whether staged or not bring reality of the war to the people.  

Financier

Financier Patisserie first opened in the lower Manhattan near the stock market neighborhood. Named after the French Financier cake that originally was created for Financiers since they were very simple and easy to eat. Some Financiers didn’t have time for lunch so this little cake was perfect to for them to enjoy during working hours since they didn’t have any filling or topping that would leave their hands messy and sticky. At Financier Patisserie these cakes are sold individually and wrapped in plastic bags. They taste like almonds and butter, not too sweet and medium moisture! Delicious! They only cost $1.85.

Mayson Kayser also sells Financiers but they have a muffin-like shape, they come in plain, pistachio, raspberry and cherry flavors. They are very sweet, the dough tastes like almond paste and they have a lot of moisture. They are good but I prefer the Financiers at Financier Patisserie. The cost at Kayser is $5.35 which is I think is a little too expensive. One aspect I liked from Kayser is that they have a cozy and beautiful interior and the service is always on point.

Baking & Pastry I – week 6

Baguette-Making baguettes using the straight dough method

Piping cookies-Professor Warner showing us how to pipe cookies.

Creaming Method-Mixing dough using the creaming method

 

 

Chocolate tea butter cookies with sprinkles on them.

Knotted rolls-After baked!!!

This week we made cookies using the creaming method. We learn how to make different shapes by piping the cookies. some of the cookies we made were chocolate tea butter cookies, almond cookies & ginger snaps Also we learned how to make knotted rolls using the sponge dough method. The other to types of bread we made were french breads and baguettes.

The baguettes and french bread were delicious, crispy on the outside but soft on the inside. I would definitely serve these breads on my own bakery. Very simple to make using few ingredients, also the final product is of good quality.

My favorite was the french bread, it was very tasty! and I think very similar of what a french bread would taste in France.

Some of the trigger ingredients in the bread were eggs, milk powder, butter, shortening, gluten, sesame and poppy seeds.

Camila Fernandez/ HW#1: Photography, Instagram, and the Food Industry

Pisco cocktail and Truffle Ravioli

Osteria Morini

Rubirosa

Vegan Restaurant

Lady Bird

By working in restaurants for few years already I’ve notice many changes on food, style and marketing. In the past 10 years technology made huge advances, it has become part of our lives and actually have made things easier for us. For example now we can send or post pictures on social media and look up the best restaurants in the area just in seconds. Before people rarely took their phones out while dining at a restaurant and if you wanted to know about the food and experience you would’ve to ask someone who has been there before. Now days when people see a beautiful dish arriving to their tables the first thing they do is take a picture and post it on social media, and if you want to know what food is served at any restaurant you can look it up online and see how their food looks like. Chefs now not only worry about their food quality but the visual part of it, they work hard every day to create dishes that will strike people eyes. Restaurants owners think more about restaurant layout and decoration. Employees such as bartenders make their drinks look more interesting and they play with garnishes so cocktails look better on pictures and not only that but themselves promote their drinks by posting photos on social media. I think all the use of technology in the industry is an amazing opportunity for people to learn,socialize and for businesses to succeed. I use instagram everyday to see what are the new trends in restaurants, to see where my friends are dining or having drinks and to also share my own pictures with other people. I discover new places every day using instagram and when I see a photo a dish that looks amazing or a restaurant that looks interesting to me I definitely visit the place. I believe a lot will people agree with me and few others will disagree but reality is that technology makes part of our lives and instead of avoid it we should learn how to make good use of it.

I shared in this post some photos of food from just three of my favorite restaurants in the city so maybe some of you will be interested in visiting them.