Outing at Pasar Borong Serdang - Students' Project

Desserts

Student' project

Above are some of the food styling works done by the Culinary Arts students of Department of Culinary Arts and Gastronomy, Faculty of Hotel and Tourism Management, UiTM

Several ways to present your steak...................

Question that always asked...............

I have always been asked similar questions every time when I told someone that I teach Food Styling at my university. ‘What is that all about?’ “What is Food Styling?’, ‘What really Food Styling do?’ and ‘Who is this Food Stylist?’. I guess this is due to the fact that Food Styling is totally an ‘alien’ subject for most Malaysian. They might not aware that how much they are been exposed to this food styling element almost everyday in their life. The TV that they watched, the poster and billboard that they stumbled on their way to work, or even food pictures and advertisement that they always encountered when reading newspaper or magazines, all of that are full with Food Styling element. Not to mentioned the menu card that they referred to order their meal. And all that are full lots of Food Styling elements.

As mentioned earlier in my posting Food Styling is an art of preparing and presenting food for the camera. It the works to make food look good and appetizing that will stimulates ones urging for it. So the work of food stylist is to create food and dishes that appear in magazines, cookbooks, advertisements, food packaging, television commercials, and sometimes even feature films. Using behind the scenes magic and culinary artistry, a food stylist is responsible for making food look exciting, enticing, and effortlessly prepared – in essence, seducing the viewer. The food stylist brings to a photograph a creative eye, expertise in food preparation, and artistic interpretation of the black-and-white words of recipe (Lou Manna, 2005).
What is need for a good food stylist? To be a good food stylist ones need to be ready to the challenges and endurances the trade demanded. Here are some attributes that are needed to be a good food stylist (Custer, 2010).
• Well organized
• A good cook and good baker
• A problem
• A good team player
• Someone who knows when to lead and when to take direction
• Confident
• Able to deal with stress
• Patience and tolerant
• Personable
• Professional
• Creative and artistic
• Physically healthy
• Able to see the humor
• Versatile
• Off course you must not be color blind! (me)

Food Stylist normally work free lance, they may be working based on assignment and task given to them. Food related company and even those company that might not have anything to do with food sometimes anggaged their service. Most of their work can be found in printed media such as magazines, nespaper, catalog, brochure and cookbook. Apart from that they also provides services for advertising, packaging and labelling. Below where you may find Food Stylist works:

•Editorial - Cookbooks, magazines
•Public relations – Newspaper, magazine, promotional material, recipe development
•Marketing – catalogs for food/equipments, Mini cookbooks, contests, point of purchase displays.
•Advertising – Ads, Commercials, Posters, Billboards, banners.
•Packaging – Food, equipment.
•TV and Film – Commercials, TV shows, movies, Training videos, Food shows, Cooking shows.

Pasta and Pastry - Styling Class

It Pasta and Patry workshop - students are exposed to techniques and trick of the trade in presenting Pasta and Pastry. Some recipes need to go through modification and adjustment in order to get the best result. Tart base recipe need to be adjusted in order to ensure the pastry stand longer and not easily turn soggy. Sauces and gravy for pasta need to be thicken to make it stand the way you want it to be.

Patience and pasionate in work will give good result. Adjustment and modification of recipes does not "degrade" the look of the food it will enhance and made the food look better infront of the camera. Meticulous and sharp eyes sight with critical mind helps a lot as food stylist.





The fruits for tartlet need to be glazed with a light corn syrup to give a fresher look. Over glazing will made it to shinny, be sure to glazed it evenly.

Food Styling Class

With final year students - BSc (Hons) Culinary Arts Management. Preparing fake ice cream as a stand-in or 'actor' to simulate the real ice cream. Fake ice cream help photographer to prepare photography setting before hand - before the actual or real ice cream being shot.

Students are also exposed to the basic food photography skill. As a food stylist knowledge on photography will help to enhance their understanding in preparing food for the camera.

Students are exposed to an hands-on experince. They are also taught on the do's and dont's, recipes adjustment as well as the tricks and techniques of the trade.

Understanding of food and it s ingredient helps in becoming a good food stylist.

Local Delicacies

Dessert, Pastry and Bakery Photo........

Yesterday, 10th Mac 2010, students were given a task to style and present dessert product of their choice. The class started with demonstration on how to prepare pie crust with techniques and tips. After demonstrating and explaining the important to understand recipe and the need to do some recipe adjustment......................students were busy with their task. I myself prepared some brownies for the styling purposes. Below are some of the pics that I took during the class.

Roasted Chicken.......

Almost a month I have not update this blog. Too busy with the teaching choas and some personal matter. I promised myself no matter how I have got to find some time to update my blog. So, today, after completing the seminar with e-pjj students, I hurrily went up to my room and update my blog............................here are some of the photo during the seminar.