Final Project on the Leiths Foodstyling course

For my final session on the Leiths food styling course, we had to style a food of our own choice and take along appropriate props, working with photographer Stuart Ovenden, to create a great final shot. After um-ing and ahh-ing for a good 6 weeks over what I was going to make, I eventually chose a lemon tart, as aside from loving a good tangy lemon tart, I wanted to create a simple, clear, uncomplicated and striking image. So on the Friday night before my shoot, I went out and bought all my ingredients, and baked about 10 lemon tarts...! (Slight over-exaggeration there, but I did bake alot of them- you need plenty back ups, especially with lemon tarts that crack so easily)

My un-pimped lemon tart

I used a Rachel Allen recipe, which includes some orange juice as well as lemon, and this adds a nice sweetness to the filling, whilst mellowing out the very tart lemons. I got alot of compliments on it from people on the course when we eventually got round to eating it, so I'd definitely use the recipe again. Find it here: http://uktv.co.uk/food/recipe/aid/607601

My work area...playing around with topings and props

My slot was in the mid morning, which was nice because I had a chance to see what other people were doing first. I thought about adding raspberries to my tart, or topping it with whipped cream for a kind of lemon meringue effect, but in the end decided to keep it really simple and just scatter pistachios over it, and use these lemons that were still attached to the branch that I picked up from Natoora (http://www.natoora.co.uk/shop/index.ep), a great little green grocers nearby to Leiths.

Shooting a Persian Love cake on the day

It was such a fun day- after I'd had my turn in front of the camera, I just sat around watching everyone else produce delicious looking food, chatting to the others on my course, and pretty much having a 6 course lunch (I felt it was important to try everything everyone had made...). I'm really sad my course is over, as I have absolutely loved it and learnt alot from it, but I'm keen to continue building on what I've learnt, and have already been assisting my tutor Katy Greenwood on shoots which has been great experience. So here it is, my final project from my Leiths foodstyling course:

My Final Project- Lemon tart with pistachios, food styling by myself, photographed by Stuart Ovenden.