Cooking for Seven

It has been such a pleasure for me to host the DMBLGIT event. Seeing all of the lovely entries has been so inspiring.

First, let me introduce you to the wonderful panel of judges for this month’s event:

Meet the judges

Asha Pagdiwalla, of Fork Spoon Knife, is Indian by birth and now enjoys life in New York. She started her blog in 2008 as a distraction from the impending recession, but it turned into an obsession. There, she shares delicious dishes accompanied by gorgeous photos.

Jennifer Bartoli is a food writer and photographer. She has been running her blog, www.chocolateshavings.ca for 3 years and is an online editor for Tastepotting.com. She absolutely loves anything to do with cooking, food styling and photography.








Emma Gardner, of Poires au Chocolat, is a 21-year-old student who spends most of her free time baking, trying to attain some kind of perfection in the kitchen. She resides in Oxford (England) during term time, where she studies English Literature, and returns home to the Swiss Alps in the holidays. She was taught to cook by her mum and grandma, along with many cookery books.

.

.

Prerna, of Indian Simmer, is a learning wife, a learning new mom and a learning cook. She was born in a small town of central India. She met her wonderful husband and moved to the US where she cooks in the tiny kitchen of her small apartment in Charlotte, NC. She started her blog as a way to organize her recipes and make Indian cooking a little more approachable for everyone.

Overall Winners:

The judges scored each of the 39 entries in three categories: aesthetics, originality, and edibility. The overall winners were chosen by combining the scores from the three categories.

First Place: Pomegranate Rubies by Dario Milano of Food Pixels. Taken with a Nikon D700 and Sigma 105 mm f/2.8 lens.

Exposure: ~ ISO: 200 ~ Shutter: 1/200 ~ Aperture: 6.3 ~ No flash used ~

Comments:

“Love this. So rich and seasonal. Unusual too.”

“Great styling and perfect lighting brought the subject to life.”

Second Place: Spaghetti with Tomato Vodka Sauce by by Xiaolu Hou of 6 Bittersweets. Taken with a Canon EOS Digital Rebel XS with EF 50mm f/1.8 II Lens.

Comments:

“Beautiful compositon for a simple classic- especially when it can be difficult to capture the beauty of a plateful of spaghetti.”

“Gorgeous lighting/background tone. Like the styling too, especially the way the pasta is twirled. “

Third Place: corn bread, avocado, summer salad by Cathy x of aficionado. Taken with a Canon 450D with a 24-70mm lens.

Comments:

“This photo really caught my eye - very unusual. Love the colours. “

Individual Category Winners:

Excluding the overall winners, these are the highest scoring photos for each category.

Aesthetics Category Winner: Candied Orange Peel by Cookie of Cook, Snap, Repeat. Taken with a Canon T1i at 50mm.

Comments:

“Great composition - I like the choice of landscape. Lovely colours and depth of the white background. “

Originality Winner: Masoor Dhal Ingredients by Ananda Rajashekar of Pinch of Love. Taken with a Canon EOS 450D and an 18-55 Lens.

Edibility Winner: Shrimp with Scallions in Chile Tamari Sauce by Soma of ecurry. Taken with a Konica Minolta Dimage A200 at 40.3 mm.

Host’s Award:

As host for the DMBLGIT event, I am allowed to choose one winner that I think deserves a mention, even if it didn’t win in the main categories.

Noodle and Prawn Stir Fried by Asri of Food and Story. Taken with a Nikon D700.

My comments:

This is is very appealing to me. The lighting is very cheery and appetizing. I love the way the noodles and prawn are speared by the fork.

There were so many other wonderful entries not mentioned here. Please check them out here: {link}

Thank you to everyone who entered!

Next month’s edition of DMBLGIT will be hosted by Katharine of A Girl in Madrid

If you would like to host an edition of this event, please mail Andrew.

I am honored to host this month’s “Does My Blog Look Good in This?” event. DMBLGiT was started in 2005 by Andrew of SpitoonExtra. It is a monthly food (and drink) photography event open to all bloggers who have posted a food photograph on their blogs last month.

Photographs are submitted from blog posts of the previous months and these are judged, scored and the winners are selected in each of three categories (edibility, aesthetics, and originality). There will also be three overall winners.

To see the winners from last month’s DMBLGiT event, please visit My Diverse Kitchen.

General DMBLGiT Rules:

• Only one food/drink photograph may be entered per person.
• The photograph must have been taken by you.
• The photograph must have been posted on your blog between the 1st and the 30th November, 2010.
• The deadline to submit your entry is the 20th December, 2010 midnight, whenever that is in your part of the world.

Scoring:

A panel of five judges will choose six winners based on the following criteria:

Aesthetics: composition, food styling, lighting, focus, etc.

Edibility: Does the photo make us want to take a big bite out of our computer monitor while drooling on our keyboard?

Originality: a photo that makes you stop, look twice, and think “Wow! I never thought of photographing it like that before.”

Three overall winners will be selected and one in each of the above categories. As host I have the privilege of choosing one photo that I think stands out but wasn’t chosen as a winner.

My announcement post with the winners for this month should be published by the 1st January 2010.

How to Enter DMBLGiT:

Draft an e-mail with DMBLGiT as the subject line.

Attach one qualifying food or drink photo, no more than 500 pixels in width. Please ensure your photograph does not have any text or watermarks on it.

In your email, please include the following details:

• Your name
• Your blog URL
• The title of the image/what it is
• The URL of the post where the photo first appeared
• The camera and lens you used

Then send the email to me at ericalberge [at] gmail [dot] com

Please note that by submitting a photo, entrants agree to their photo being redisplayed and altered in size on the host’s page and on the SpittoonExtra DMBLGiT page.

I have created a gallery in Picasa where I will be adding your photos as I receive them. If you do not receive an acknowledgment from me within 72 hours, please leave a message in the comments section of this post.

If you would like any further clarification or have any questions, please feel free to send me a message.

If you would like to host a future edition of DMBLGiT,  write to Andrew.

Can’t wait to see all of your delicious entries!

The deadline for submissions has been reached. Thank you to all who entered!