To kick off my new Meet A Food Lover series I’m proud to present this interview with Sydney blogger Karen from Citrus and Candy.
When I started blogging in mid 2011 Citrus and Candy was one of the first food blogs I stumbled across. Karen’s mouth-watering photography immediately caught my attention and I remember being struck by how artfully she used light and shade to create drama in her photographs.
Later, I met Karen at Eat Drink Blog 2, and remember feeling slightly awestruck in her presence. At dinner we discovered we shared a passion for Penang Asam Laksa. Now anyone who loves Penang Asam Laksa as much I do immediately qualifies for lao peng you or ‘old friend’ status with me.
So without further ado, let’s get up close and personal with Karen from Citrus and Candy!
*Drum roll*
Karen, you’re an Australian born in England to Malaysian parents. So what’s on the menu when you catch up with your family? Who cooks?
Me! My mother is a great cook but she’s lost the love for it and sees it as a chore now so she doesn’t make a lot of the dishes I grew up with (gawd I miss her salted fish fried rice!). So I tend to take over but I only ever make assam laksa, congee or nasi lemak. And when it comes to English food, it’s me again. But I still rely on her for bak kut teh, beef rendang and curries.
What are your top 5 Malaysian dishes?
Only five? How to choose?!
- Assam Laksa (see below) – a thick murky fishy noodle soup that’s sour with tamarind and lemongrass, spicy, sweet and salty. It’s fresh, aromatic, pungent and flavoursome.
- Har Mee (Prawn Noodle Soup) – a spicy prawny bisque-like noodle soup with pork.
- Malaysian Chicken Rice – rice cooked in chicken stock with a tinge of ginger and fried shallots and served with either super tender poached chicken, roast chicken or char siu and siu yoke (chinese bbq pork and crispy roasted pork belly pieces).
- KL Hokkien Mee – fried egg noodles with a thick dark slurpy gravy flavoured with pork fat, cockles and sweet soy. A bib is recommended.
- Apam Balik or Ban Jian Kuih – Malaysian peanut pancakes/crepes; can be either crispy and thin or thick and bready. Like a pancake omelette folded over a mound of ground peanuts, sugar and melted butter (sometimes cream corn but that’s a big no for me!).
With lots of food blogs focusing on healthy food – not that there’s anything wrong with that! – I love the fact that your blog celebrates the joys of fat, sugar and salt. What are your favourite dessert recipes?
Oh gosh it’s terrible right? Whenever I’m brainstorming or looking at recipes, I automatically start thinking, this needs more butter/caramel or how can I turn this into a chocolate dessert?
I always tell myself to eat better but I have to be realistic (or rather accept that I’m weak-willed) because there’s no way I could ever live without dessert and fried foods so it’s everything in moderation (well at least try).
My favourite desserts are tarte tatins, chocolate fondants or anything with brioche. Actually anything with gooey chocolate, crème patissiere, salted caramel and lots of butter is fine by me!
What are the kitchen items and gadgets you can’t live without?
I love my chinese cleavers like they’re my family. I never realised just how valuable having a super sharp cutting instrument was until I cooked in other kitchens and had to use their crappy dull knives to chop (from then on I vowed to always travel with my cleavers if I’m going to someone else’s kitchen!).
I also couldn’t live without my silicone spatula, Pyrex measuring jug, measuring spoons, digital scales and Kitchenaid mixer.
What are your favourite cookbooks and blogs?
The books that I’ve thumbed through most are Heavenly Cakes by Rose Levy Beranbaum, Flour by Joanne Chang, Jamie’s Great Britain and Cooking For Friends by Gordon Ramsay.
For blogs, there are so many that I love that I can’t possibly list them all. Raspberri Cupcakes and Spicy Ice Cream are good friends of mine but they are just the most brilliant bakers and I’m always in awe of their work. I also adore Souvlaki For The Soul, David Lebovitz, Desserts For Breakfast, Bakers Royale and Call Me Cupcake.
Congratulations again for being a NuffNang Best Photography Blog Finalist for 2011. What was it like attending the awards ceremony in your home town of Malaysia?
Thank you! It was a huge surprise but I was thrilled to fly home to KL! It was a bit of a surreal Alice-in-Wonderland kid of night with the whole glitzy Hollywood-esque ceremony and the buzz around some bloggers who are like celebrities over there.
The blogging industry is so huge, intense and competitive in Asia whereas it’s still a new thing in Australia and for most of us, it’s a thing we do quietly on the side. So it was a little bizarre but all in good fun. I’m just grateful that I was able to pop in a quick visit to my grandmother who I haven’t seen in 3 years (plus I couldn’t wait to get my fixes of iced milo and assam laksa!).
Karen, you are still using the same camera — a Canon EOS 1000D with a Canon EF 50mm F/1.8 lens — that you began blogging with in 2008. How did you teach yourself about photography?
You should’ve seen me on the first day I got my Canon 1000D. I was so lost with all the buttons and I had no idea what anything meant so it took me 5 minutes of fiddling before I threw the DSLR aside and pouted for my old point-and-shoot. Luckily I forced myself to pick it back up!
I made sure to read up on digital photography and the technical stuff; from online tutorials on photography blogs and websites to checking out photography groups on Flickr (there’s a lot of good advice and tips to be had from other photographers). Then it was just practice practice practice. I took photos everywhere I could under different lighting situations; outside, inside, portraits, pets, dinners and low light.
How long did it take you to get to know your camera and feel happy about the photos on your blog?
It wasn’t until recently that I was happy with the photos but then again, I’m always striving for more so even though I’m happy now, I know that I can push myself to do better. I’m not even a perfectionist by nature but having great photos is a huge motivator and there’s always more to learn. Just learn the basics then practice your butt off (and consider each ugly photo a learning curve).
Are there any camera accessories that you think are essential?
A diffuser and reflector are my best friends. Whether I’m using natural light through the glass door or artificial lamps, the light is always too harsh so a diffuser softens the blow and helps with over-exposure. If you don’t have one, translucent white fabric or tracing paper works too. And I need the reflector for bouncing light onto dark spots. This can either be a simple white cardboard, mirrors or (like me) one of those silver foil cake boards.
I also recommend a tripod if you have shaky hands and iffy light but personally, I don’t use it too often.
How do you get that beautiful lighting in your photos? Do you have any food photography tips you’d like to share?
Natural lighting is the way to go. It shows off the food beautifully and it means less work tweaking with camera settings and photo editing. I like to do most of my photos in front of my big glass door around the late afternoon where the light is the softest and most diffused. Although lately I’ve been working with artificial light but I’m still a beginner with that.
As for the food photography tips, start with the fundamentals – ISO, exposure, aperture, shutter speed, light metering and white balance; how to adjust their settings on your camera quickly and knowing what each one does for your photos.
The other important thing is how to use the available light. This took a lot of trial and error for me because I don’t have an awesome studio, my house isn’t very well lit and I have ugly sponged yellow walls. But with a bit of diffusing, reflecting and white balance adjustment, I learned to co-operate with my house. I must’ve taken photos in all the rooms to figure out what worked best for me but everybody’s “studio” is different so you’ll have to see what works for you at your place.
You’re a proud Photoshop whore. Can you take us through the steps you’d typically go through when editing one of your photos?
Oh I love, love Photoshop because frankly, photos never look as nice straight off the camera without some kind of post-processing. I don’t do anything fancy, just noise reduction, sharpen, brightness and contrast, white balance, colour boost and resizing. Sometimes I love playing around with filters.
What’s next for you Citrus and Candy?
A holiday will be nice! I still ache for Malaysia like crazy. But for now, I miss my blog and kitchen so I really ought to pay more attention to it.
All photographs (c) Karen from Citrus and Candy. Republished with permission.
