Sd.elicious / supriya damera

I have a sweet Surprise for you guys!!!!!!

I ordered Kimberly’s book “Creative Food Photography” a while ago and I was super excited when I got it. It is chock full of information, some soo surprising and so simplified it took my breath away.

So….

I decided to share this wealth of information with one lucky winner in a Giveaway I’m doing tomorrow!!!

💥💥💥Excited much!!!!💥💥💥💥

Leading upto that, I had this crazy ass idea to emulate one of my favourite picture of Kimberly’s, which is her hummus shot. Boy, was I in for a world of pain.

I set myself up for failure at the outset with props of all wrong dimensions. Background colour which was all wrong. Light that was overwhelming. Hummus that was drying up faster than I could say giveaway. Phew!

How imperfectly perfect is her picture. And mine, a hot mess. But lot’s of lessons learnt, so it’s a win win.

And now it’s time to WIN a chance to read Kimberly’s amaaaaazing book. One of you is going to get your hands on it soon!!!!! I strongly suggest you guys buy the book if you don’t get it here.

Watch this space tomorrow!

All the lusciousness of a buttery pound cake with the subtle flavours of lavender and blueberries, which I found is a match made in heaven. The pound cake was a bit too dense.Need to perfect this one before I can post the recipe.

Will try it one more time and put this up again. For the icing I used 1 cup icing sugar and two spoon blueberry powder. Add very little water so it can keep it’s shape.

for Negative Space .com_

Theme 2 of “Shoot Through Something” with judge sponsored by

Food Through My Lenses

for Sidelight .food.studio .table

Fall In Action

Moody Shots .mag

The final day of Eva’s with BIG ACTION and it’s been a super hectic week of trying so many different approaches and settings and seeing so many bloom and equal fails. But my mind was whirring with a million ideas and it was so much fun. Thank you Eva for the fun ride.

I always enjoy by challenges cos there are no winners here… it’s all done in good Community spirit and I really appreciate that.

However, kim’s challenge is coming up and I’m super thrilled about it. This is the first time I will be attempting it.

And last but not the least a super favourite of mine is run by Ritu Check out her community page for fabulous pictures and exciting new themes. This months challenged is judged by the super talented and very very humble

judged by sponsored by for the theme Only One Food

Food Through My Lenses

Shadows.

I have been very naive
I let shadows touch me
Touch me in places that should have been inaccessible
Each time I let it in, it took something of me
Some good, some the flaws
But it always took away tiny pieces
It reached deep and tried to steal the sunshine
Gripping it’s predatory claws
Around the embers of my peace,
It pulled till I unravelled like
Yarn than slipped from my fingers
The more I ran to fetch it, the further it went away
Till I was unspooled.

Months and years withered away,
In impatient anticipation
The heart always yearning for longevity
Always hoping against hope
Never acknowledging the dance of the dark shadows, leering and looming.
The shadow was always unsatisfied,
It thirsted for more.
More was never enough, the sponge unwetted in its appetite.

I thought it was a shadow,
But realised the shadow can do no harm.
The shadow only follows you around
With faithful servitude.

This was no Shadow.
This was The Fallen Angel,
Self-Doubt.

So… pushing that aside. And Growing from strength to strength. This picture was taken with complete natural sidelight. No visual effects either, the cocoa powder on the flames created sparks (makes me wonder?) and a smoky effect. Which one do you like more, pic 1 or 2?

For day 3 “Sprinkling” of hosted by

For Food Stories by .benet.ceramics

for Negative Space judged by .com_

For “Food Through My Lenses”

for Sidelight .food.studio .table

To

“Only One Food”

To Fall In Action

.mag for Moody Shots

To for

for Brown Food

I touched on Patriarchy once before. This is my second take on it.

We have made great strides in terms of gender equality and respect but there are still practices and rituals that irk me. In more traditional and conservative families, it is always the men who get to eat first at home and they are normally served by the women. Yes, one could argue that these are actions of love but they still ni**le at me.

To the Western world, you might not get or identify with what I’m talking about at all and that is ok. While I love my Country to bits and I’m super proud of it, there are always a few things about our practices that still bother us don’t they. This is one of them.

I usually over adorn my pictures but I left this one stark cos I only have one and only one point to drive home.

So in this visual, I wanted to depict a son lovingly serving his mother. In traditional households in India, we believe in sitting on the floor and eating with our hands (both practises have proven to be scientifically healthier ways to eat).

So there!

Thank you Eva for sparking this idea through the theme for Day 2 “Serving”.

To for the theme Food Stories, with judge sponsored by .benet.ceramics

for Negative Space with judge sponsored by .com_

To the theme Only One Food by judged by sponsored by

To Moody Shots .mag

Condensed milk on biscuits was an obsession when we were kids.

Condensed milk was a novelty, not something we would buy all the time or have at home. We would have access to it only on very very special occasions. And when we did, boy did we go to town with it. My cousins and I would pour it on stacked biscuits, pour it directly into our mouth, slide it down our fingers and hands. By the end of the tin, we were all a giant sticky mess but gloriously happy, with cuts on our tiny fingers from all the tin scraping we would do.

Shooting today was so so much fun for Sahana and me. We were laughing and licking and got our clothes and props and backgrounds and hair all sticky. The camera too! But what a blast. I’m glad I could be such a baby for a bit.

When the sweet got too cloying, we would throw in some cocoa powder and get back to business (as we did here too in pic 3).

No idea how these pictures will be received but what a day of happiness and memories!!!

For Day 1 of with Pouring hosted by

To my favourite challenge for the theme Food Stories judged by sponsored by .benet.ceramics

for the theme Negative Space judged by sponsored by .com_

by for Fall in Action

judged by .b.photography

.mag for Septembers theme Dark Food Photography

Happyyyyy Birthday Breezer and Cooper!!!!🎉🎉🎉🎉

The best best bois any mom could want. Cooper is a messy eater but soo protective and loving, he always wants hugs and cuddles and loves to kiss everyone on the mouth. Even if you evade him, he will eventually get ya. He is territorial, and doesn’t like any other dogs in his space. Anyone but Breezer. He is feircely loyal to Breezer. He cries if he doesn’t see Breezer for even 2 minutes. He chases birds, runs into ponds untethered and unbothered, is lazy af otherwise and is the best baby on earth.

Breezer on the other hand, is more gentlemanly. Calmer and more sensitive to my needs. He can sit hours with me if he senses distress, will singularly make a beeline for me whereever I am. He eats oh so elegantly and is so so gentle with other dogs. Both are boisterous and full of sunshine but so different from each other.

The one thing they have in common is their love for bananas. They literally go gaga over them.

I feel I have factually described them here. What I have failed to convey is how happy they have made us all and what a blessing they are! To many many more healthy years full of your miscief and love, Breezu n Coop!!!! 😘😘😘

I have been having a dream
So often.
It looks like paradise
I’m splashing my feet in a stream full of promises,
A strong smell of lavender and unspoken secrets
Surrounded by my furry friends
Sunlight dappled, giving life to fairies and mischievous woodland creatures,
Filtering through the leaves and tender twigs

The tall trees are beyond, reaching for the cottony clouds whose shapes I often tried to decipher,
The colours a soothing salve
My eyelids flutter faintly
I don’t want to wake up.

This was magical, everything I wanted wrapped up in a dream.
Time here was bookmarked, like old pages with reassuring words
Like music that makes us twirl with glee.
I flow with that stream
Easy and clear
Cleansing everything that left it’s slight bruises on me

I get up and start running
towards a strong pull of something I share a cord with,
My long wispy dress flapping like wings
Trying to catch my breath, heart full

And there is someone sitting on a picnic blanket
I run towards her,
She sits crouched, wearing a cloak despite it being a gloriously warm day
Looking at the exact same things with unseeing eyes.
Something stops me, an invisible wall
Between where I am and where I could be.

Inspired by Elisa’s recent “Dried” post. When I saw this lavender I knew I had to pay homage to her brilliance. One of my favourite people in this community, endlessly talented and so humble.

I have this really bad habit.

I take pictures and I don’t post them immediately. I keep them for a rainy day. This in itself might not be a bad thing. But what happens is, as my style changes and I grow with every picture I take, the previous pictures either don’t appeal to me much anymore or become obsolete in terms or season or my own mood.

This happens to anyone else?

I have been a vegetarian for the last 10 years. Almost on the cusp of being vegan. But my love for eggs (esp in desserts) and yoghurt (can’t live without!) is too great for me to ever go down that road. Yes, there are replacements but on days like this, when I can make my ruby eggs look so darn pretty, I know I can only dabble in Veganism every now and then.

Vegetarians out there… do you face this dilemma too?

.table .food.studio for Homemade

.com_





.mag

Vegan Wild Indian Java Plum/Jamun Tart- No Bake Dessert

The first time I tasted this fruit was in my school. Wearing our pinafore, hair neatly pulled back into pigtails, we had this huge tree in front of our school. My friends and I would gather and have competitions about who could collect more fruit.

It has a bite to it, not sour but a decidedly sweet-sharp taste staining our teeth and mouth purple. It takes me back to those times, awash with nostalgia.

When they came into season and my garden had the same coloured flowers I knew it was time to tie it all together.

Tart base
Plain or chocolate Vegan biscuits pulsed with coconut oil, just till it holds shape. Flatten it into a tart tin.

For the center , use hung curd, either coconut yogurt (greek yogurt for a non-vegan version), about 2 cups with the Jamun roughly 2 cups, deseeded and pulped. Add enough fruit to get a rich colour and pronounced taste. Enjoy!

Seasonal produce, both flowers and fruits are so so beautiful.

A short break spiralled into a month long hiatus. Normally I do take breaks from social media every now and then. Especially when I stop feeling centered. This one just got too too long because life simply got in the way.

Anyways, I’m back. Rejuvenated and raring to go. I’m hoping to hear from you all. And to all of you who reached out to me in my absence here, thank you! 🙏🏻 your concern and love means the world to me.

This is me, in my favourite place, doing what I really love doing. Sipping on hot chocolate and reading. Also, I wanted to try out a picture in a different size format.

How have you all been?

I have missed you guys. This community has embraced me and given me so much. Would love to hear from you all. 👋

#𝕻𝖗𝖔𝖚𝖉𝖙𝖔𝖇𝖊𝕴𝖓𝖉𝖎𝖆𝖓🇮🇳

Mangosteens are hands down my favourite fruit. It brings back wonderful childhood memories as well.

We would go to a very popular hillstation called Ooty every summer. The mountains were full of surprises back then. Lazy afternoons of strawberry picking, driving down to find the freshest, just dug up carrots, unlike anything I had tasted before. Plums and pears that were so juicy, bursting in our mouth with flavour. Fudges and marzipan sweets, exotic local produce with everything tasting better.

And the mountains always gave us a bit of appetite as well. My dad would bring me Mangosteens and I’m not kidding, I would eat atleast 30 of them at one go! That’s how much I used to love them.

Isn’t it beautiful that food can invoke such amazing memories for us?

I have tried to capture the light and mood of those sun dappled early evenings, tasting of sweet anticipation and loaded with saccharine emotions. Do you like it?

for the theme Brown Food

To for the theme Sidelight by sponsored by Lucie 📸 Foodphotographer] Myluciebackdrops] judged by

with judged by .nikoo sponsored by .ocejo , for not following any rules at all in composition

Summer fruits .mag

.table .food.studio for Local

.the.baker for the theme Textures



Lucie 📸 Foodphotographer] Myluciebackdrops]

Fresh Cherry Vegan Coconut Icecream

250 g Cherry frozen or fresh, pitted
1 tin/400 ml coconut cream, chilled
3/4 cup organic cane sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
Juice if 1/2 lime

Method
1) Puree cherries and sugar until blended well.
2) Add all the other ingredients until smooth.
3) Transfer to a freezer safe container and place in the freezer.
4) for 6-8 hours, stir every hour so that the crystals are broken. Then leave to freeze overnight.

It’s Vegan and fairly healthy. Indulge your Icecream
Cravings this summer without any guilt. And homemade is always safer. I’m sure other fruits can be substituted instead of Cherrys but I haven’t tried it but give it a go and let me know.

How many of you are Icecream lovers here?

Recipe curtesy

I have to admit I clicked this picture a long long time back with my phone and just got round to posting it now. I feel I have changed a lot in terms of styling and photography but I also like to get hit by a blast from the past wave every now and then 😝.

.table .food.studio for the theme Local

with the sponser .com_ for the theme Cherries

for Moody Food Photos

Slowing down.

When I first started this page on Instagram, it was all about my Passion. My passion for baking/cooking, my passion for writing my passion for life, it all went here. As I gained confidence, it became a very very satisfactory outlet for my Creativity. I was happy and content.

I got drawn into this world… meeting uplifting fellow Community Creatives, it gave me a sense of being rooted but with all the creative freedom I needed. I thought this was all I needed.

And then came the Challenges. So much fun and for the most part they channelised things a bit too. But it all started getting a bit too much. The more the Challenges, the more the need for validation. I was spending hours preparing for these challenges, anxious to please and determined to get seen… the rat race to get on top left me feeling drained and restless.

This no longer seems my comfort or my outlet, it just became another place I stress and fret and lose my mind over. So I decided to slow down. I will take part in probably one or two relevant challenges, post once a week, not care about numbers and not dissolve into a puddle of anxiety to get it right.

So that’s the way I’m gonna roll.

Do any of you identify with what I’m saying or am I the only one going rogue on this?

To the theme Cherries for hosted by

Perspective.

There are times when I’m in over my head with Instagram. As it is in life, the more anticipation and expectations I have, the more the let down. These days I’m taking it slow and easy, chilling about the outcome. Not every picture will end up a masterpiece. And that’s ok!

We have all heard this latest bomb that they dropped on us. Ig is no longer an app for photography. It’s going to go down the video route to stay on par with Youtube and Tiktok. I’m cool about this too. There will always be a way. I feel this Community is too strong to take this lying down.

Important news alert: Anything is as big as we make it out to be. So I’m approaching life, issues, relationships, with this Perspective. To take things easy and let it be. What is meant to be will be. And also, love this hashtag that Bella .filled created

With my ongoing love for Stilllife , I’m submitting this to

for the theme Local hosted by .table .food.studio with guest judge

To

.lemon.tree judged by for Raw Ingredients



To ._photography

My Magnum Opus.

Read on to find out why-

1) I greatly admire the Dutch Masters and they are a great source of inspiration for me. This particular painting was my Everest that I had to conquer.

2) It took more than 5 days to make everything in the frame. I wanted to combine a stilllife with Indian sweets but not lose the aesthetic of the Old Masters.

3) In the frame are-
Ladoo
Pheni
Doodh Peda (bought)
Jilebi

4) From start to finish it took me 4 1/2 hours to set up everything. Right from plastering the wallpaper on, to arranging n rearranging everything till I was 100% satisfied.

5) Getting my Savage to cooperate n pose. He chased through all the fruits on the floor and did not disappoint as a super naughty boi.

6) After exactly clicking twice, I ran out of memory space. Sat and deleted all unwanted pics for another half hour by which time Savage fell asleep. Sadistically woke him up to pose and the saga continued.

8) This is not an attempt to recreate, simple because I did not have a violin or a bird or a monkey at home. Let’s call this an “Inspiration” rather than a “Recreation”. And shooting in portrait mode for Instagram had it’s limitations. Zoom in to the see the details. To see the original painting, go to my stories as I am having issues uploading two pictures in this post.

Please leave a comment and let me know what you all think, I would greatly appreciate it. God, the time and effort of it all. I’m wiped out. Signing off. Have a good one!

Very proudly submitting this to the theme Maximalism hosted by my favourite Seema and Rachna .247 .original.photolicious with the judge I look upto the most sponsored by

To the theme Fresh fir by .table .food.studio judged by

To the theme Circles for sponsored by .com_



To



.

If I were a painter, my outdoor painting would look something like this, but my skills don’t go so far, so I’m trying to recreate the painting that I sketch in my mind.

“Learn the rules like a pro,
So you can break them like an Artist”

I shy away from rule makers and rigid structures. Our vision shouldn’t have rules. Who is to tell us what is right or wrong. It is our life, our creativity, our art and our truth. To be edited and etched unshackled.

Are we always true to ourselves or do we aim to please? I have to be honest here, I do both. Fitting in seems essential but burning your own path is liberating.

Meraki.
(Mey rah kee)

To put something of yourself
Into your work
Soul. Creativity. Love

Where do you see yourself in life or in art… Are you trying to fit in or leap? Or a bit of both perhaps? Are you ok with rules? Or do you burn your own path?

#𝕻𝖗𝖔𝖚𝖉𝖙𝖔𝖇𝖊𝕴𝖓𝖉𝖎𝖆𝖓🇮🇳

To the last theme of the challenge Maximalism hosted by these two angels Seema .247 and Rachna .original.photolicious judged by my absolute favourite Stella sponsored by

To the theme Culture Food by judged by sponsored by .com_ (just a side note: I strongly consider Mangoes as Cultural food for a South Indian)



.table .food.studio judged by for the theme Fresh

Flowers in food Photography judged by prize by

sponsored by .com_

Which one are you?

The one’s who create and find themselves when they are happy or one of those who stare adversity right in the eye, letting the depths of despair making you rise like the phoenix.

Writers and music makers especially, say they have created their best albums/solo’s when they have gone through betrayal and heartbreak. Some of the best artists have commissioned their best pieces when their life is falling apart. And then there are some who cannot function in a disturbed state of mind.

I often wonder about this. Which type am I? Strictly speaking I have seen myself thrive in high pressure situations. And then there is happiness. That bursts in on our lives unannounced, when you least expect it. In the tiny moments or through unexpected people. That is a driving force too.

Which one are you? Even if the scale can be tipped a wee bit... which scenario brings out the best in you?

This is the last of my Minimalistic series. This one has been slow cooked in spiced mixed berry sauce. Use assorted frozen berries 2 cups, with 1 cinnamon, 3 cloves, 2 pods of cardamom, 1 star anise and 1/4 tsp ginger powder. Use honey/ maple syrup to taste. Finish with a squeeze of lime. Let everything slowly simmer for 20-25 mins with the pears in. Leave it on overnight in the liquid (refrigerated) to take on a deeper hue.

To the last day of the Minimalistic series for by .247 .original.photolicious judged by



.table .food.studio judged by for the theme Fresh



To .with.amee judged by for the theme backlight

judged by



hosted by judged by

To sponsored by .com_