Design Food: Styled Ingredients.

Today we share the final instalment of our mini content series in association with Smeg, which sees us exploring the fantastical intersection of food and design.

By now you know the drill. Today’s story explores food that unites design and art – the kind of food with an unapologetically conceptual bend. This is not the sort of stuff you are going to be recreating at home, but it’s most definitely the stuff you will be seeking when dreaming up your next creative concept that goes beyond the obvious.

Today’s roundup delves into Recipe Styling – raw and cooked food that has been presented in fantastical, clever ways, elevating humble ingredients into sheer works of art.

While most of these examples negate any reference to traditional gastronomy, all of them seek to fuel our creativity and nourish our spirit, rather than just our bellies. I don’t know about you, but that’s precisely my kind of cooking. Giddy up!

Related:
Design Food: Raw Ingredients.
Design Food: Culinary Architecture.

Salads by Florent Tanet for Le Monde Magazine // In this clever photography series, French artists Florent Tanet captures the work of six famous Parisian Chefs – Erica Archambault, Simone Tondo, Elsa Marie, Adeline Godin, Nye Smith, Alessandra & Olivier Montagne. Each of the six salads captured is representative of respective chef’s signature recipe, where every individual ingredient is carefully highlighted. Genius.

Art Direction by Olga Bastian.

Visual Recipes by Mikkel Jul Hvilshoj for Liquidminds // Copenhagen-based photographer Mikkel Jul Hvilshøj is the man behind the OCD images which present various recipes as minimalist photographs that show all the ingredients that go into making each dish. From simple recipes like fried eggs and porridge to more elaborate meals such as fish stew and ratatouille, Mikkel has presented each dish in a graphic and clean style that looks good enough to eat.

Edible Cookbook by Korefe // German design agency Korefe has created the world’s first cookbook which you can read, cook and eat. Developed as a special project for a large publisher, “The Real Cookbook” is made out of 100% fresh pasta dough sheets. The book comes with a recipe on how to make a traditional lasagne, using it’s “pages” as the main ingredient. Awesomeness. And attractiveness.

David Ma Re-imagines Recipe Videos in the Style of Famous Filmmakers like Wes Anderson & Quentin Tarantino  // This series of seriously excellent short movies reimagines the standard recipe video format in the style of four famous film directors – Wes Anderson, Quentin Tarantino, Alfonso Cuarón and Michael Bay.  Referencing trademark signatures of each director, Food Artist David Ma translates well-known recipes into four 1-minute-long short films. Wes Anderson‘s signature narrative style is explored in the making of S’mores, Quentin Tarantino’s gory spaghetti and meatballs recipe culminates in a delicious aftermath, Alfonso Cuarón dishes up pancakes in slow-mo, while Michael Bay’s waffles make the most of the American director’s explosive blockbuster special effects. Srsly awesome!

‘Home Made Is Best’ Cookbook Photographed by Carl Kleiner for IKEA // When IKEA released their 140-page cookbook back in 2010, featuring photographs of ingredients laid out in patterns, little did they know they’d become responsible for the entire movement in how food recipes would be presented in the future. ‘Homemade is Best’ was a collaboration between creative agency Forsman & Bodenfors, stylist Evelina Bratell and photographer Carl Kleiner, where images of ingredients were laid out in a style inspired by Japanese minimalism, followed by photography of finished treats. Unreal, banana peel. (See what I did there? Cute.)

Floating Recipes by Nora Luther & Pavel Becker // Berlin-based designer Nora Luther and photographer Pavel Becker have combined their creative visions for a series of food art photos, which highlight the raw ingredients that make up each dish. Doing away with a usual list of ingredients, these Floating Recipes are captured mid-air in exact proportions. “The photographs tease the pleasant anticipation of fresh food and its preparation, while the look of the ready cooked dish is left to your own imagination and creativity,” said Nora Luther.

‘Argentina in Alcohol’ by Anna Keville Joyce & Magalí Polverino for Fernet Branca // This pop art photography piece was created for Fernet Branca, a brand of bitter herbal liqueur amaro, based on one of the brand’s main principle: una bebida UNICA (a single drink). Fernet Branca recipe has been kept a secret, which has awakened much curiosity amongst the consumers, sparking innumerable homemade versions of the famous liqueur.

“We appreciate this curiosity in our artistic approach, inviting the public to imagine with us what it might be that makes Fernet Branca so delicious?”, says the team behind these images. “We provide a few clues – spices, herbs, roots – and we arrange them in a modern art lab environment – pristine, contemporary, and experimental.”

‘The Anatomy of a Recipe’ by Leonie Anholts // Visual designer and a graduate of the Academie Artemis, Leonie Anholts, designed the ‘The Anatomy of A Recipe’ as a graduation project. The project responds to the realty of our busy and demanding lifestyles, which make it difficult to find the time to gather around the table. Anholts’ domino game is intended to bring the social element of dining back into our lives, deciding what we’ll eat for dinner. Each tile represents a recipe to follow from a cookbook. The first player who has used all of their tiles wins and chooses the recipe according to the last played domino. Brilliant! Except… Ummm, who’s got time to play a game of domino before deciding what they’ll cook for dinner? Not me.

Egg.

Fig.

Caramel.

Garbanzo.

Chocolate.

Peanut.

Potato.

‘Textures’ by Anna Keville Joyce & Magalí Polverino // These seemly simple and evocative images by art director & stylist Anna Keville Joyce and food photographer Magalí Polverino showcase raw food in their semi-processed state. From sugar to caramel, potato to mash, chickpeas to hummus, figs to jam, these images highlight raw ingredients’ transformative qualities we often take for granted.

This Yellowtrace Promotion is proudly brought to you in association with Smeg.

[Images courtesy of the designers & photographers as noted.]