The images captured by people of their food, experiences and observations are connecting unknown worlds together. Be it the farmers from Uttarakhand winnowing rice or the arrival of kinnows from Nagpur, today everything reaches every quarter, thanks to this constant intrigue on what’s on the neighbour’s plate.
Earlier this year, when Russian baker Olga Noskova, started Instagramming images of her glazed marble cakes, she unsuspectingly, found herself catapulted to a status of Internet celebrity. Noskova’s Instagram, teeming with images of her uniquely beautiful cakes, inspired an entire generation of the ‘neo Internet food watchers’ and amassed her a prodigious fan following; leading a stumped Noskova to post on Instagram: “I’m shocked! My phone can’t deal with all the messages.”
As food posts continue to inundate us on social media, with everything from wilted salad leaves to a gourmet steak popping up on our feeds, with religious regularity, it won’t be an exaggeration to announce the emergence of Internet foodies.
As we swiftly seem to be transcending to a time where photos have become the preferred mode of expression, the numbers show the influence. According to a 2015 estimate by Photoworld.com, Snapchat with its 200 million users gets 8,796 photos shared on the platform every second.
Whatsapp, that had 700 million users at the time of the data collected for the report, had users posting 700 million photos every day while on Facebook 70 million photos get posted every day. In an interesting insight today more pictures are taken every two minutes than were shared in the entire 1800s.
Needless to add that a lot of these images shared across various social media such as Instagram, Pinterest, Google+, Snapchat, Twitter and others are of food. A 2014, New Mintel research showed that food pictures on social media have entered mainstream. It reported that 29.2 million amateur 29.2 food shots were posted across social media platforms in one month alone at the time of the research. A hashtag #foodporn on Instagram gave 99,990,948 results; the numbers continue to grow every second.
In a riveting way, food posts on social media have also begun announcing the mundane realities of everyday life in the most romantic fashion. So, while in the Northern Hemisphere you can tell that Fall is about to arrive soon as people start posting pictures of pumpkin pies and spiced pumpkin lattés, closer home in India the monsoon season is beginning to get marked by posts of ghevar (a flaky, sweet shaped like a bundt cake made in northern India during that time of the year).
The rise of camera cuisine – a new term that is described as the side-effect of the digital age in food photography where the dish aspires to be captured on camera and put on display for viewers to admire and like, has undoubtedly changed the food game as we once knew it. It has not just given a new impetus to eateries and lesserknown cuisines but has also snowballed to open a world of participatory technology with countless apps such as Yelp, FoodSpotting and SnapDish devoted to the culture of sharing and discussing food.
Mumbai-based homemaker, Hema Watchmaker, was always an excellent cook. On insistence of her daughter Jyoti Watchmaker she began posting her food pictures on Facebook and started getting rave reviews. A lot of appreciation and few requests later she diversified into a catering business. She credits her success to social media. She says, “The impact of food images is so far reaching that people from all corners would write to us asking for recipes.” Passionate about food, she continues taking baking and cooking classes while updating this on her social media.
Ravi Saxena, corporate chef, Dhaba by Claridges, Delhi, says, “From a principled point of view, the amateur food shots taken randomly of dishes at home and in restaurants may not do justice to the real and complicated world of food and how it should be represented. But in the digital age, food sharing through pictures does an extremely engaging job of hooking on more and more people towards food and subsequently the culture it has evolved from.”
ART ON MY PLATE
So, as an unsuspecting diner becomes a food marketer just by uploading a few pictures, the chefs and the eateries too are quick to position themselves to be instaready. Nishant Choubey, executive chef, The Roseate, Delhi says, “I endorse uploading my culinary creations on Instagram. Uploading our handcrafted dishes on social media gives us greater visibility and larger audiences reach. With the growing importance of digital media, I see it as a boon for both aspiring and established chefs.” Food trend watchers confirm that a growing number of eateries across the globe are also paying special attention not just to plating as it appears in the pictures but are also consulting photographers and interior decorators to install the best lights atop tables for food photographs clicked off smart phones.” Mehak Arora, a design student, says, “I was in a small café in Zurich this summer and was trying to click a few pictures of my coffee art on my phone. Just then the manager handed me a few coffee pods to be used as a prop with my pictures and requested to tag the location. It was then that I realised how seriously the eateries are taking amateur food posts too.”
While chef Saxena stresses that food photography is a studied art and amateur photos often do not do justice to the craft, he’s still approving of the social media food posts for its outreach. He cites an example saying, “To understand a cuisine you have to live that cuisine, understand the culture it came from, be informed of the ingredients it’s best placed with. It’s not about just knowing the recipe.” He further says, “Some time back we did a food shoot for a leading lifestyle magazine. It took us three days to take eight food shots. For every dish we took hundred odd shots before finalising the best ones. This is the kind of immaculate perfection food photography is about. However in defense of ‘foodporn’, I would still say that it wins because it brings back food stories and nostalgia across countries and continents.” For food lovers, the idea that they may not be breaking bread together but are at least sharing their plates through another sensory medium of eyes is a great starting point to promote the trend.
Fittingly enough, culinary circles are replete with interesting tales on how food imagery is bringing the world together. Chef Choubey says, “Some time back a homemaker won a chef competition, simply by reinventing an uploaded Instagram food picture she had seen. Also turmeric ice cream, my signature dish, was able to trend and reach even the rural parts of the world thanks to it being photographed so often.”
The images captured by people of their food, experiences and observations are connecting unknown worlds together. Be it the farmers from Uttarakhand winnowing rice, or the arrival of kinnows from Nagpur, today everything reaches every quarter, thanks to this constant intrigue on what’s on the neighbour’s plate.
Chef Saxena agrees by citing another example. “One of our most popular dish, balti meat is served in a bucket and makes for a cool photo op. The dish has been shared on social media so many times that it can become synonymous with our eatery. Paying our ode to this social media star we decided to put up hoardings of ‘balti’ to announce our upcoming restaurant in Hyderabad.”
One of the biggest recognitions of the power of social media and food could be seen when in an episode of Top Chef America, the contestants were asked to create a dish that was picture worthy and the winner was chosen depending upon the dish that got maximum likes on Instagram.
THE SACRED RITUAL
But as food imagery becomes pervasive with everyone wielding a smart phone feeling equipped to take a food shot and talk like a pro on it, there are inevitable industry concerns too. In what is termed as an anti-gram movement, chefs in France have begun talking of banning smart phones from their establishments.
The famous Grenovillere restaurant near Calais, France, no longer encourages patrons photographing the food. New York restaurant Tocqueville too has adopted a no picture policy as they think it interferes with the idea of enjoying food in an uninterrupted manner. The scared ritual of treating food is often seen as being reduced to a prized trophy to garner likes. Chef Saxena says, “The trend does reflect the-keeping-up-with-the-Joneses culture, where we want to tell the world that we have been there and done that but in the longer run one cannot also deny that it brings many rustic dishes back into the drawing rooms of cosmopolitan cities.” So for every post such as that of model Chrissy Teigen Instagramming an herb-roasted hassleback potato, there is also a post of say a homemaker in Kanpur displaying her humble chiwda recipe. Both are important in the world of food, chefs maintain. While one may also think that taking pictures distracts from the satiety that comes along while concentrating just on food, research may prove otherwise.
A research published by American Psychological Association says that people who photograph events usually enjoy more than those who do not. Chefs and restaurant owners maintain that often the craft of a dish and its presentation demand attention and they find it flattering that people take a pause from their dining and think it’s worth sharing with friends. Kazem Samandari of French patisserie L’Opera says, “The macaroons and the seasonal cakes are one of our most photographed items. Who wouldn’t go weak in the knees looking at those sinfully coloured macaroons and gooey delights?”
Another concern which is raised in the food circles is whether an overdose of food posts results in more gluttonous eating. A study of food posts by responsible bloggers shows that it’s not just pizzas or cheese that’s uploaded frequently. Grains such quinoa, ragi and barley are getting recognition given the new world’s intrigue on ancient eating. The Internet, according to experts, just aids in promoting the goodness of food. According to chef Tejas Sovani, “In the modern world food innovations are often patronised on the Internet.” True to the young chef’s words, as we discuss this, a yet new food craze called Ice Stream, a dish created by using noodles that are set in a traditional Japanese jelly, is on its way to become in what may be one of the most Instagrammable dessert till date!