Practising my food photography

Been playing with my gear today, seriously considering looking into the food photography buisness as at the moment it combines my two favourite things! Click on the photos to enlarge

Salmon and spinach terrine, lime & dill creme fraiche, herb oil, pea shoots

Heres another starter from work.

For the terrine you need:
1kg salmon (about 2/3 of a side, make sure the entire piece is larger than the mould.
6 eggs
1 pint cream
50ml white wine
150g butter (clarified)
200g fresh baby spinach leaves
2 lemons
small bunch of fresh flat parsely, chives
seasoning

To make the terrine, first prep the fish (skin, take out pin bones, remove most of the belly and brown meat) cut up the fish in the shape of the terrine mould and make a 1cm thick piece of the same size, this will be the middle part of the terrine, then dice the remaining fish up and place in a blender, blend down for 30 seconds, then add eggs, blend, then add the cream, white wine and butter. Blend for a few minutes until you have a really smooth glossy consistency, pour this out into a mixing bowl, add the zest of the lemons, lemon juice, chopped herbs and season, wash the spinach, pat dry and coarsely chop, adding this to the mixture.

Once this is done line the terrine mould with clingfilm, add part of the mixture, then place the salmon piece on top 1/2 way down mould, press it in and then add the remaining mixture until the mould is full, then fold clingfilm over tight, then wrap entire mould in clingfilm a few times until fully airtight.

Cook the terrine in a steamer until a core temperature of 70 degrees is reached, for a normal terrine mould this is around 2 hours, once done, let it cool naturally for about 15 minutes, slit the clingfilm to drain excess juices from the fish & steamer, then add a folded cloth to the top of the terrine and weight it down with weights and leave to chill overnight.

Next day, unmould it, re clingfilm the terrine, tidying up edges, then leave for an hour then slice with a warm wet knife with the clingfilm still on.

For the Lime & dill creme fraiche:

50ml creme fraiche
zest & juice 1 lemon
dice a small bunch of dill

For the herb oil:

Blend 100ml olive oil with a handful of spinach leaves, and remaining dill parsely and chives (can use stalks of all these) blend with a small amount of salt and a squeeze of lemon or lime juice, then pass through very fine sieve (or muslin).