Jacques Torres said 'Life is short. Eat dessert first'. He got that right. Oh well, if you don't know who he is — Torres is a pastry chef and chocolatier and a member of the International Culinary Center community.
Now let's get to the point, this quote pretty accurately sums up what many of us have lived by for most of our lives. It specifically makes sense in a world where it’s almost impossible for us to scroll through an Instagram feed without double tapping a photograph of some absolutely lip-smacking and drool-worthy confectionery masterpiece.
This applies to 22-year-old Shivesh Bhatia's Instagram profile that features photos of his mouth-watering dessert creations! Shivesh, who is doing his Masters in Advertising and PR at IIMC, Delhi, started baking when he was 16 and food blogging two years ago. "I have always seen baking in my family. My grandmom, mom I have seen them making cakes from scratch and that fascinated me. When I was 16, I started baking on my own as I loved being in the kitchen and loved baking. At first, it was a series of disasters but I didn't give up and eventually figured out the art," says Shivesh. He now has over 118,000 followers on his Instagram page, which is amazing because most of India's home bakers are women.
Shivesh started blogging when he was doing his UG at Hindu College, Delhi University. The social media sensation says that he never received any formal baking training — instead of which he practised regularly, watched tutorials videos on YouTube and read about baking online. His baking may be the bomb, but it was blogging to made him a celeb in his own right, "My journey started because of social media. I started posting pictures on Instagram and it was well-received. It helped me earn recognition in the digital world. There's so much you can do on social media. Making my food look as pretty as possible was a major factor as I wanted to gain more followers and recognition," Shivesh adds.
Given that he was studying Political Science at DU right until May 2017, it was a hefty task for him to juggle college, blogging and baking. Once Shivesh graduated, he’s been on the move as much as possible. "I have travelled a lot and I was working on my blog full time writing recipes, learning a lot more about food photography in the last year," says Shivesh.
Shivesh has also completed writing his debut book, Bake with Shivesh, which will be on shelves in October.
Visit Shivesh's website Bakewithshivesh.com to be a part of all his food adventures!
