Hi there!
I’m Rupa, I’m from Chennai, India and am currently working in New Zealand, post completion of my 2 and half year specialised culinary program at Le Cordon Bleu, Wellington .
Even when I was into my teens, I developed a keen interest, maybe a burning desire, to do something creative.
How I got hooked on to Food Miniatures is another story! As a kid, I used to love playing with miniature kitchen utensils, spoons, ladles, and assorted cutlery, trying to create a menu which my family would like and pretend to eat. For sometime, this was an obsession and perhaps that is where the love for miniatures in the food space began to grow in me.
With my mom in the kitchen, I would also act like I was a nice cook too and turn out ‘mini dishes’ of all sorts of food and vegetables. I would excitedly use the dough of wheat flour (atta)- with which my mother made ‘roti’s for us - to make miniatures of all sorts of things. I didn’t realize that over the years my hobby had grown into an all-consuming passion. Into my first year in college, I had also started to sculpt and replicated quite a few all time favourite items in miniature form. To be honest I was so pleasantly stunned at how well and near original,the dishes turned out under a magnifying glass, with all elements clearly visible in fine detail.
And here I am today, all set and ready to kick start phase two of my dream to become a full-fledged artist in the field I have chosen to shine – Food Miniatures! Off course this will run concurrently with my present profession as a Chef here in New Zealand.
I completely enjoy sculpting and I’m not even joking when I say, it takes me to another Universe, it is extremely therapeutic.
Charming Miniatures is a blog which has been re-designed to showcase all my realistic creations for you to see, feel and enjoy! I plan to begin uploading some South Indian dishes as well as all time favourite pan india food, for a start, and will gradually add on to the range, including some of the exotic global fare. You will be able to catch the passion of a foodie flowing through these artistic creations!
Creating food miniatures inspired me to grow to a next level where I wanted to be a professional chef creating some exotic food menus and trying to make a name for myself here too. With this in mind, I came away to New Zealand to join the prestigious Le Cordon Bleu’s 30 month combined culinary programme, to qualify to be both a patisserie and a cuisine chef. I graduated in April of 2019 and moved from wellington to another city Hamilton where I presently work for almost a year now.
What started off as a creative desire in food miniatures using polymer clay, took me all the way up the real food ladder. Even while working as a chef, in the future, I shall not let go of my passion of creating food miniatures of most of the dishes that I will be cooking on the menu of the restaurant that I work in.
I also intend to showcase those items for sale too at the restaurant. I am sure the the guests to the restaurant would be mighty pleased to view the artistic work and the effort gone in.
Hope you will find my work interesting and likable. For me it will always be “A beautiful journey without an end” as food creativity is limitless.
Rupashree Adam