I started snapping and placing my mother’s food on Instagram as part of an effort to help myself and others visualise what is possible with food.
It is about how individual ingredients come together to make something other than simply the sum of its parts. Through food, I wanted to highlight vision and improvisation.
This breakfast is where you see her preferences most clearly. It’s mostly base ingredients, unassuming little items like chestnuts, beetroot, lettuce, jackfruit, cherry tomatoes and even pine nuts.
However, she recognised that in order for everything to come together, the sausage couldn’t just be presented alone. At the same time, she couldn’t spend eons on a special sauce just for a sausage. She improvised (you’ll see it alot in subsequent posts) with an apricot jam from the fridge, made less viscous by a bit of water and heat from the sausage itself.
It was amazing to see the colours on one plate. Of course, when paired with a cup of brewed coffee, it gave everyone a great start to the morning.
The “Boat” is one of her favourite styles of presentation. She took a mix of fruits, arranged them carefully and placed a few meatballs from the night before amongst them.
This one takes a bit more effort and I zoomed in on the muesli balls she made because I thought it was genius. She used honey to hold them together and shaped them into balls. Satisfying to the finish.
This last one is all about presentation. The placement of the greek yoghurt, coupled with the underlying base of an actual chopping board, makes this look like a $20 cafe breakfast. That’s how you make breakfast appealing!
I’ll be sharing more on my Instagram as I go along, so follow me there for more! 🙂
