Join professional food stylist Rishon as she uses her skills to make bland food look incredible. This weeks challenge, to turn an ordinary frozen dinner into an Instagram-worthy meal.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00 Hi, I'm Rashawn.
00:01 I'm a food stylist and I'm going to style a frozen dinner
00:05 and make it look like this.
00:07 And I only have one hour, so it's definitely a challenge.
00:12 Well, maybe, we'll see.
00:14 It's been so long since I've eaten a frozen dinner.
00:16 You've got your gravy, obviously,
00:18 this frozen deliciousness right here.
00:20 Potatoes, which have some browning on them,
00:22 which looks really nice.
00:24 Your meat, carrot sticks,
00:26 which still have a lot of their color.
00:27 I'm not seeing any celery,
00:28 which I'm a little worried about
00:29 because bright green things are really pretty.
00:32 I'm going to kind of do my best
00:34 to pull some of this stuff out of here
00:36 that's not in this frozen brick of gravy.
00:39 And we will try and thaw them out a different way.
00:43 So delicious and icy.
00:45 I know that if my husband wasn't married to me,
00:48 he would probably eat these all the time.
00:50 Don't tell him I said that.
00:51 He's an independent man.
00:52 So this block of gravy deliciousness,
00:55 I'm going to actually put in the microwave
00:57 and let it thaw out.
00:58 So then I can piece it back together.
01:00 We're just going to start on like a little bit of time
01:02 'cause I don't want it to cook all the way through.
01:05 'Cause once it gets all microwaved, it's soggy.
01:09 You don't have that crispy looking potato piece anymore
01:13 or that super brown and crispy looking beef piece anymore.
01:16 Beef piece.
01:17 It's just, it's fun when you come up with words like that.
01:20 Beef piece.
01:21 So 30 seconds did nothing.
01:23 So we're going to go for a minute
01:24 and just keep our fingers crossed.
01:26 Serious props to the Marie Callender's food stylist team
01:28 and food photography team,
01:29 because this really looks great.
01:31 I spent a lot of time on the frozen food aisle,
01:33 walking up and down, looking at all the different packaging.
01:37 People probably thought I was crazy.
01:39 Marie Callender was one of the best looking boxes
01:42 that I saw.
01:43 Just the picture on the box itself was really inviting
01:45 versus some other brands.
01:47 We won't speak their names.
01:48 Still didn't really do a whole lot,
01:50 but enough that I can probably pick
01:52 through the rest of this.
01:53 I think the biggest trick here is getting the gravy
01:57 to a good place too.
01:59 All the shiny graviness on here is really interesting,
02:02 but it probably wasn't gravy.
02:05 In food styling as a trade, there are a few tools.
02:10 We use clear corn syrup, which is actually edible.
02:13 And then you can also use glycerin,
02:16 like vegetable based glycerin.
02:18 This is really cold by the way.
02:20 My fingers are starting to be a little numb.
02:23 So now what I'm gonna do is put this gravy back
02:26 in the microwave for a few minutes.
02:28 Actually, it tastes pretty good.
02:29 I licked my fingers after stirring the gravy
02:31 with my finger as one does.
02:33 It tastes like grandmama made some pot roast
02:36 in the crock pot and now we're gonna eat it for dinner.
02:39 Okay, so here's the gravy.
02:41 It's pretty much thawed out.
02:43 So we're gonna put that right in there
02:46 and we're gonna say goodbye
02:47 to our recyclable tray dinner.
02:49 So this is basically like disintegrated potato.
02:54 Not what we wanna brush on top of the finished plate.
02:57 So with these other pieces from the box,
03:01 oil, pan, fire, heat.
03:05 Oop, that's not what I wanted.
03:06 It's supposed to, still waiting on that sound,
03:10 but we're just gonna put them in there anyway.
03:11 So while this cooks, we're gonna take a poll.
03:14 When was the last time you ate a frozen meal?
03:16 College, yes.
03:17 Like fettuccine, which you notice I did not pick for today
03:21 because fettuccine is white and creamy,
03:26 which is delicious, but it is challenging for food styling.
03:29 I grew up in restaurants.
03:31 I went to culinary school
03:33 and got an internship in a test kitchen
03:36 and lo and behold, they're like,
03:38 "Well, there's this other thing called food styling."
03:41 Okay, that sounds fun.
03:43 Okay, so we've got some brown meat pieces
03:46 and we also have brown potato pieces,
03:49 which look really, really nice.
03:50 Here, do you wanna see it in your house?
03:53 So this is just like a pre-potato
03:55 and this is a post-potato.
03:56 Non-brown, kind of flimsy looking,
03:58 and this is like crunchy, this is delicious.
04:00 This is like breakfast hash potential,
04:02 but we're working on pot roast, so don't get too excited.
04:04 I think that I am gonna add a little bit of cornstarch
04:07 to this gravy situation because it's really thin.
04:11 It's also kind of clear.
04:12 I'm gonna find some cornstarch.
04:14 Oh, I spotted it.
04:15 Boom.
04:16 Oh, this is my kit.
04:18 So my kit is my bag of tricks.
04:19 It's got all my little things in it that I might need.
04:22 Water mist, scalpel, tool, brushes,
04:25 which are so essential, tweezers.
04:28 I don't think we're gonna need a whole lot of it today.
04:30 We're just gonna make a tiny little slurry of cornstarch.
04:34 The good thing about cornstarch,
04:36 it thickens something, but it goes translucent.
04:39 So then you won't really be able to tell that it's in there
04:41 where sometimes if you do flour, it thickens it,
04:44 but it lightens the color too.
04:46 What's your opinion about staring into microwaves?
04:48 Don't do it, do it, don't care.
04:50 Global warming's gonna kill us anyway.
04:51 Don't tell my dad I said that.
04:52 Yeah, so we obviously went with a small plate
04:54 because crops are generally small
04:57 because it helps scale food in the set.
05:00 If you're on a photo set and you see a glass of wine,
05:03 it's probably like that big.
05:05 So this is definitely one thing that is misconceiving.
05:09 It's mounded, so it looks like there's a lot of food.
05:11 So even though you're only seeing like six pieces of meat
05:14 and like eight potatoes,
05:15 it looks like that you just like took a big old scoop
05:18 and put it on the plate.
05:20 One surefire way to make your plate of food look substantial
05:25 is just to like wad up some paper towels.
05:29 So it's all about angle.
05:30 So I think what I'll do first
05:31 is take some of the less attractive food
05:35 that I don't necessarily wanna use
05:37 and just start putting things.
05:40 Some people use instant mashed potatoes for padding,
05:44 which kinda might have been a better option in this case
05:48 because it would have actually allowed me
05:49 to have set things into it versus propping things on top.
05:54 And you know, paper towels kinda have a mind of their own.
05:56 I don't know if you did know that.
05:58 They're just like, you're trying to keep me down,
06:00 but I won't be kept down.
06:02 Because I didn't do anything with the celery,
06:03 it still has that grainy, schmaltzy gravy situation on it.
06:08 So I'm just gonna kinda brush it with some oil.
06:11 This is the most exciting part, I guarantee you.
06:14 Basically my goal at this point though
06:16 is to cover up all the paper towel pieces.
06:19 Just chugging away.
06:22 Do you guys have any questions?
06:23 Comment, ask me your questions.
06:25 It helps to be a perfectionist,
06:26 but admitting to it is the first step to recovery.
06:29 We're getting somewhere, people.
06:30 Really, like I'm kind of excited.
06:32 So I've been told that I have 10 minutes left,
06:34 but that's okay because I can do it.
06:36 I'm kinda just putting the finishing touches on it.
06:39 Where did I not put celery?
06:41 That there should be celery right here in the front.
06:43 It's very important that you see the green.
06:45 The one thing that I would really love,
06:46 like if I had a lifeline, I would be like, parsley.
06:49 Just like salt bang some parsley on this.
06:52 Kind of the last thing I really, really, really,
06:54 really, really have to do is gravy.
06:58 Magic.
06:59 So all you can see from there is like paper towel.
07:02 That's not what it looks like.
07:04 I feel pretty good about this, you guys.
07:05 Stop staring at me.
07:06 You guys have no respect for the arts.
07:09 Oh yes, cascading gravy.
07:11 Two minutes and 12 seconds.
07:13 I'm just setting in like a few more pieces.
07:16 Don't rush me.
07:18 Okay, so my hour's up and I'm all finished.
07:23 I personally am really happy with this.
07:26 I think that I did a really great job
07:29 for what I had in the single, single box of frozen dinner.
07:34 It's not obviously like piece by piece, an exact replica,
07:37 but no, I really am happy.
07:39 Let me know if there's anything you want to see me style,
07:41 something weird, something different, something interesting.
07:44 Just let us know in the comments below
07:46 and we'll see you next time.
07:47 (upbeat music)