completed lighting project and a chocolate pudding torte

Michael and I have been working on a project for better lighting for my food pictures. He designed two light towers that give me enough light to shoot without flash, even if it's dark outside. He is my hero, basically.

So there has been a lot of sawing and drilling going on lately. Also a lot of bicep muscles and forearm veins. It's more than my little heart can handle.

He attached the top and bottom of the lights to the base.

Can I just say - I'm so glad he knows how to do this stuff. He had to pre-drill holes into the wood and everything. I would have used the hammer and nail approach, unsuccessfully.

So we Michael built these lights and covered them in opaque nylon using velcro so I could take off the cover to change the bulb when I need to. After finishing both of them, we moved them to the floor in my room and started experimenting with camera settings.

The set-up looks like this. But now I have pretty fabric covering up the awesome 80's baby blue carpet.

They work beautifully. It is very helpful to have them. Thank you, Michael! You are the best, I mean it. I am so thankful for you.

To celebrate the completion of our 3 week long project (we are busy), I made a pudding torte very similar to the pumpkin pudding torte I made this past fall. I wanted to show you the difference between the lighting in my kitchen and the lighting with my new towers.

Indoor lights.

Light towers.

Awesome, huh? So much more clear, bright, crisp. It even looks more appealing to eat!

So with that said - I love this pudding torte. My Mom has always made it for us growing up and called it "Italian Wedding Torte" so that name lives on in my family.

It's creamy with a buttery crust, and also pretty low in calories. It's a win/win situation with this dessert. And you know how much I love win/win situations. Totally ideal.

I can't wait to share more clear, bright pictures of my food with you. This makes me SO happy!

Here's the recipe!

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Chocolate Pudding Torte

print this recipe

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 stick butter, melted
1 8-oz block light cream cheese, softened
1 16-oz container of light cool whip, thawed
1 tablespoon sugar
1 large package of sugar free jello instant vanilla pudding
1 large package of sugar free jello instant chocolate pudding
4 cups nonfat milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix together flour and butter in a small bowl with your hands until crumbly. Press into the bottom of a 13x9 pan, preferably glass. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown. Put to the side to cool.

To make the cream cheese layer: use a hand mixer to cream softened cream cheese and 1/2 of the container of cool whip. Sweeten it with 1 tablespoon of sugar. Whip until fluffy. Once the crust is completely cooled, dot the cream cheese mixture around the crust. Use a small metal spatula to carefully spread the mixture around the crust. Keep working with it until it's all spread.

For the pudding layers: start with vanilla. You can use the same bowl you used for the cream cheese mixture. Empty the package of vanilla pudding into the bowl and pour in 2 cups of milk. Beat with a hand mixer until combined, about 3 minutes. Evenly spread the vanilla pudding over cream cheese layer. Use the same bowl to make chocolate pudding, using remainder 2 cups of milk. Beat with hand mixer. Pour over vanilla pudding and smooth. Top with remaining cool whip. Spread until smooth and cool whip covers the whole torte. Wrap it in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour, or overnight.

weekend project: lighting

Michael has some creative ideas for making my food shoots better. My biggest problem is lighting.When I get home from work and start cooking, it's dark outside and I have nothing but super yellow indoor lights to work with.

Food bloggers everywhere are nodding their heads in agreement. I can feel it in my bones.

Michael's job is at a metal fabrication shop. But on the side, he is a wonderful photographer. Just scroll down while I brag about him for a little bit by showing you some of my favorite pictures he has taken:

Right? Serious talent.

He helps me so much with the pictures I take for this blog. He talks to me about aperture and shutter speed with all the patience in the world.

Last week, he stopped at Home Depot on his way to my house and surprised me with a solution to my dark picture problems: lighting! We did a few tests with special "blue" light bulbs. They light up the whole room just like outside, with a beautiful daytime glow. Michael gets upset when I say it's blue... but it really is blue...

So far, we have the idea to have 2 lights, so I can put one on either side of the food. We want them to be portable so I can take them in the kitchen. In the above picture, you can see the base we are using. The light will go inside and the front will be covered in an opaque nylon.

I keep calling these things "light towers" but I don't think that's the right terminology.

I don't really care what we call them. I just like watching him cut things with saws.

I kept asking him to take his shirt off. I think he pretended the saw was too loud and he couldn't hear me.

Or maybe he was just ignoring me since it was 20 degrees outside.

We have spent quite a bit of time on them. And by "we", I mean - Michael works on them and is doing all the work to actually make them... while I sit on my butt in the garage watching him work and taking pictures of his muscles.

Sometimes I offer suggestions like, "Shouldn't you use a clamp?" "Do you have safety glasses?" "Do you need any help?"

He just looks at me and smiles, shaking his head. Finally he said, "Jenna, I used to build houses for a living. I think I can handle this."

We are continuing this project and hoping to finish this weekend. I can't wait to share the results of our Michael's hard work!