pretty as a picture

We want you to be proud of your dish as you carry it to the table, so we asked our food stylist Loryn to share her simple tips for making your food look as good as it tastes.

• CHOOSE YOUR CROCKERY WISELY Serve colourful food on white plates – you don’t want the two competing for attention.
• SPRINKLE AND DRIZZLE If the dish is looking a little bland, sprinkle something over the top to add some interest. It can be anything that will complement the flavours on the plate: herbs, nuts, seeds, coconut, cheese, pepper, salt flakes, pomegranate molasses, olive oil, balsamic reduction, fried shallots, chilli flakes, rose petals, icing sugar, fairy floss … you name it!
• GO ASYMMETRIC When garnishing, get a little creative with placement. Don’t just sprinkle herbs all over the place (although I admit, I can be a little heavy-handed with the micros) or place a neat pile in the middle. If you’re serving a curry, for example, perhaps try a big bunch of herbs in the corner and then some chilli and fried shallots piled on top with a lime wedge on the side. It’s not the nineties anymore – there’s no need for the mandatory sprig of curly parsley.
• CREATE TEXTURE Never flatten out your food (unless it is a tart or cake of course!). So often people serve risotto or a salad in a bowl and flatten the whole thing out; all this does is make the food look mushy and removes visual interest. Texture is so important so give the dish some height and variation.
• K.I.S.S. Never underestimate the power of keeping it simple. Food itself can be so beautiful – the colours, the textures, the variation – and occasionally we forget that. Sometimes the best styling is no styling at all.
• EMPLOY DISTRACTIONS However, sometimes food just isn’t that attractive, and this is when I pull out what I call the ‘distraction technique’, which means serving it with colourful garnishes and lots of little side dishes and accompaniments on a large wooden or marble board. When the food itself isn’t so easy on the eye, make the whole experience beautiful.
• COLOUR IS EVERYTHING When you’ve got green soup, don’t just garnish it with more green. Add some black (cracked pepper) or white (cream). If you’re unsure, dig out the colour wheel from high school art class (all jokes aside); you want to choose colours that are either complementary (either side of your main colour) or contrasting (on the opposite side).
• INVEST IN PLAIN CUTLERY AND CROCKERY Then add excitement with cheaper elements like napkins and salad servers. I wish I could buy a whole new set of plates and cutlery every season, but boy what a waste! So to keep things on trend, I purchase classic serving dishes, platters and crockery and add flair with small serving plates, ramekins, serving spoons and so on.
• CLEAN UP YOUR SLOPS Simple.

Remember … it doesn’t have to be perfect. It’s the imperfections of home-cooked food that makes it so real and unique. If your cake cracks on top, embrace it – it will still taste amazing. All the food in this book is real food, no fancy tricks, cooked exactly as the recipe says. Sometimes we cook something for a photoshoot and it doesn’t go 100% to plan, but we don’t recook it (who has time for that?). The show must go on, just as it does in your home kitchen. We either embrace that little crack on the cake, or hide it and highlight something else.