I may have turned a corner. It may be that after 21 days of limited social exchanges and virtually complete confinement to the first floor of my house, I’m becoming unhinged. Of course, not being famous means it is a singular process that no one finds the least bit interesting.
I love Pop-Tarts. Strawberry with strawberry frosting. Blueberry frosted or not. Cherry with Cherry frosting. Are they for breakfast? Dessert? A midday jolt of energy? See what I mean? They gloriously defy categorization. If in charge of Nobel prizes, I would award Kellogg’s one for inventing the Pop-Tart. They are singularly the greatest food invention of my lifetime. (Introduced in 1964, no coincidence that is just three years after I was born.) Please don’t lecture me about nutrition or sugar. I don’t care. Life is short and it is better with Pop-Tarts.
A few mornings ago of my confinement, I walked into the kitchen and found a partial Pop-Tart sunning itself on my counter. No, this is not an expose of a partially eaten Pop-Tart. I would never degrade a Pop-Tart in such a fashion. I honor this miraculous food by breaking my Pop-Tarts in half. It is a ceremony filled with respect and dignity.
Photographing this tanning Pop-Tart also taught me just how hard good food shots are to take. Sure, those shots are made in a studio with special lightning etc. and further retouched in postproduction, but be slightly off in the shade of one color, take red for example, and your food can look like it has a gaping wound as opposed to an appealing jam nestled inside a flaky crust blanketed in a toaster ready frosting.