Carrie Brown

Hello!  I’m an {ex-professional} pastry chef , turned freelance photographer, with a crazy 4-country, 3-continent-spanning resume which includes such things as a chocolate TV show, a chocolate cookbook & making pastries for the Queen of England.  I trained at the National Bakery School in London & spent 3 years there playing with baking supplies while wearing white aprons & a funny cap.  I still wear those same aprons when I am in the kitchen now.  Not the hat though.  Those aprons are stained with vast quantities of pastry-cheffing passion & a not insignificant amount of chocolate.  I expect I’ll still be wearing them when I am 87.

I *love* food, love photography, {love} travelling, LOVE writing.  So one day I mixed it all together & dished up Foodie Footnotes.  I have several internationally-read blogs, although I am slowly merging them all into one, since I am just one small human being with multiple facets rather than several different people. 

I photograph, travel & eat.  Then I write about it all.  I love discovering new joys to share with the world.  My cats, for the most part, appreciate neither my food, my art nor my writing.  They really don’t appreciate my traveling.

Here’s a few cliff-notes:  British American living in Seattle.  Love eating.  Have an accent like crack (apparently).  Go on {very} long, crazy road-trips regularly.  Live with a large camera, a pile of cats & a ridiculous amount of chocolate.  Have a propensity for driving on anything that even vaguely resembles a dirt road.  Especially if it is not marked on a map.  Leeks are the finest vegetable on earth.  Started this thing called the Big Breakfast Adventure & now entirely unable to stop.  Adore daffodils.  Dream about eating expeditions in Paris & Bruges.  Couldn’t do a push-up if my life depended on it.  Have Had Chiko the Cat for a soul-mate {My beautiful boy: 7/4/05 – 11/04/11}.  Driving solo for 14 hours straight is pretty much nirvana-on-wheels.    Wear a lot of black & white…that’s how my brain works too.  Like to get up at 4 am to photograph the sunrise and be first in line for breakfast.  Believe that mashed potatoes are proof that God exists.  Go completely gaga over the scent of roses.  Known for my disarming honesty & openness:  I say it how it is.  Especially about me.

And there’s more:  {Fat} Dr. Pepper is delicious.  My kitchen is yellow, like butter.  Believe Really Raw Honey & Bragg’s Apple Cider Vinegar could cure a lot of the world’s ills.  Have a fondness for sitting on the edge of large bodies of water.  Avid label reader.  Non-swimmer.  Sunshine gets me {very} happy.  Refuse to use my microwave unless it’s a National Emergency.  Have a secret crush on tractors.  {Home-made} Chocolate Milk paramour.  Do not have a TV.  Recently added a confusing amount of pink to my wardrobe.  Consistently failed Mind Reading 101.  Crazy about smoked trout.  And white.  Hopeless at sewing.  Instigated a kitchen-wide ban on all plastic containers.  Would drive a really long way for really great food.  And do, often.  Eat flax seeds daily.  I am * in LOVE * - with my life.

However, no {wo}man is an island.  Shout-outs below. 

 Geoff Nyheim - without you, these food, travel & photography passions would still just be buzzing around inside me.   You gave me the most precious gift of time, even though that made life more difficult for you.  You selflessly pushed me to follow my dreams & expand my talents when it was entirely not in your best interests to do so.  I don’t think you understand the impact that you have had on every area of my life over the last 2 years.  Everyone needs a Chief Cheerleader.  I had to wait a lot of years for mine, but once you showed up, it changed my life, entirely.  I believe that I can do anything, because you told me so.  Your presence will reverberate throughout the rest of my life.  You also rave about my ice cream, my art & my food blog to anyone who will listen.

Eric Swift – you support me in ways that most of the people who know me, don’t.  And you do it despite the {potential} risks to you.  Your level of trust in me is empowering, enlightening & {very} humbling.  You also let me sass you on a daily basis, laugh about it & then sing my praises to anyone who stands still long enough.

Mark Groom - you always get wildly excited about everything that I ever cook for you & that is the best encouragement & inspiration to carry on.  We share a passion for {great} food that I am sure started with a box of chicken & chips in the back seat of the car when we were young children.  Either that or the infamous apricot teabread & blocks of frozen spinach committed us to developing extraordinarily finely tuned palates & a desire for excellence in all things “food”.  You also introduced me to “the Chinky” for which I will be forever grateful.

John Marchant – you believed in me & mentored me when the entire staff of the National Bakery School just thought I was the biggest pain in the a**.  Which I was.  But you took that attitude & talent & pointed it in all the right directions & I became the Top Student in the Country for my graduating year.  You also taught me how to crack crab claws & gave me permission to eat with my fingers in public.

Bob Neal – you taught me to stop living life by only following the rules, to stop cooking by only following the recipes & to stop looking at the world through only my parents eyes.  If there was anyone that set me on the road to adventure, it was you.  I would never have jumped out of an airplane if you hadn’t been on the ground cheering me on.  I would never have followed my passions if you hadn’t given me the idea & the courage.  And you once gave me 14 chocolate Aero bars hidden inside your {fabulous} pottery.  They are the best chocolate bars I’ve ever had.  And that pot is proudly sitting in my lounge.

Rick & Teresa Lukens - You gave me an opportunity that I doubt anyone else ever would have;  and you were always so incredibly enthusiastic about every recipe on every show that we ever did together.  I am still making those chocolate treats I created for you…they are some of my favorites. ”We love it when cb comes – she talks so cute & she always brings chocolate”.

Miss Kathy – you have been one of my biggest supporters & encouraged & inspired me to just keep on going.  You got excited about every last little thing that I did & I can’t thank you enough for that enthusiasm.  You also consumed a lot of {great} food simply to further my little food blog.

Alisen Peterson – you are a ROCK.  You help me in so many ways I don’t even know where to start.  You get excited about every last little thing that I do & I can’t thank you enough for that enthusiasm.  You also roast a most fantastic chicken.  And your pork ribs are ridiculous.

Larry & Susan Shaw -  you read my foodie ramblings religiously, every single time I post one word.  You are also so willing to try new {weird} foods, cook different ways & eat things you either never knew existed or would never dreamed of trying before.  Larry, you are also the best griller I know.

Lovely Readers – plus the friends, neighbors & colleagues that get to be my ice cream lickers, chocolate chompers & art critics – what would the point be, if not for you?  Thank you.

 photos by: Michael Stearns – Hybrid3 

My photography website can be found at:  http://www.crazyfeetphotography.com