Category Archives: Food

Just In Time For Summer – Kinder’s BBQ

Kinder’s BBQ is the classic American success story. Starting in a California meat market, Kinder Foods has grown into a three-generation family deli and catering business with award-winning rubs, marinades, and BBQ sauces made from their secret family recipe. If you are from the Bay Area, you already know their story; however, to most of [...]

Wrestling For a Good Cause

Multnomah County receives 15,000 reports of child abuse annually. Children’s Relief Nursery provides parents and children a connection to a healthier lifestyle. Every year they do a great fundraiser called the “Iron Chef” competition. As Polara’s main food photographer, my crew and I tried to help by photographing many of the talented chefs who donated [...]

The Bounty of Oregon – Eggs

One of the fun things about being a food photographer is that I get to experiment a lot. The Bounty of Oregon project is one of my favorite experiments. It’s a series of photographs and videos that I’ve made in collaboration Jeremy Dunham our in-house videographer/guru, conceived to feature local ingredients in their natural state [...]

An Apple a Day or More!

The Willamette Valley is painted with a green swath of farm and forested land, sitting between the Coast Range and the Cascades, making Oregon justifiably famous. In the last ten years, this cool and misty breadbasket of the Pacific Northwest has produced everything from Hazelnuts, Marionberries to award winning Pinot Noirs. Some people would argue [...]

The Bounty, of Oregon that is

One of the nicest things about working in a collaborative environment like Polara Studio is how we often “feed” off each others creativity for ideas, images and inspiration. Jeremy, one of our photographers, spent a weekend hunting for something that Oregon is rightfully famous for, mushrooms. He didn’t have much luck as these wonderfully tasty [...]

Pearfect – Pears and Vino Gelato

It hard to believe it’s been almost 3 months since I posted. Between the holidays and a great studio party of almost 400 people the first part of this year has flown by. But as promised here’s another recipe from the Ponzi Vineyards Cookbook and honestly one of my favorite photographs in the book. Hope [...]

Finally a recipe link

Here’s the first recipe from the new cookbook I promised to post. Everything shopped local and all the food photography natural, natural light, that is. I thought something hearty for winter…so to quote Nancy Ponzi…”Winter in the Willamette Valley is often, well, inevitably-cold, grey, damp and drizzly.It’s really not that uncomfortable outdoors, days of snow [...]

The Ponzi Vineyards Cookbook

Here a few of the photos from 10 amazing days my crew and I spent in the kitchen of of one of the most charming and self-effacing chefs I’ve ever met, Nancy Ponzi.  Matriarch of the Ponzi Family which is not only one of the pioneer wine families in the Willamette Valley but also founded [...]

Beer is serious business

Working in restaurants and pubs always presents a different set of challenges to the food photographer. First of all one is often not just showcasing the food in all its glory. Though most of us go to restaurants or pubs BECAUSE of the food there is much more that influences our decision of where to [...]

Thoughts for the end of summer

It been awhile since I made an entry..all thank goodness to the fact my clients have been keeping me very busy. With the end of summer I thought I post an image of one of my favorite summer appetizers, prosciutto and figs. A simple light dish prepared by my friend from portlandhomechef.com, Brittany Baldwin. This [...]