Magic Fingers

Baker turned author Shivesh Bhatia is challenging the baking stereotype with ginger, matcha and passion fruit.

- Kangan Gupta

All of 22 years old, Shivesh Bhatia is a social media star. Why? Because his recipes are anything but conventional, and his food styling is anything but ordinary. Along with his chef’s hat, he also wears an author’s cap. In his book Bake with Shivesh (published by Harper Collins India), he demystifies the art of baking, food styling and taking fabulous food pictures. His dream? To bake with Nigella Lawson. Nigella, are you listening?

What are your earliest memories in the kitchen?

My earliest memory in the kitchen is sitting on the counter and watching my mum bake. My nani used to bake a lot too. Every time I visited my nani, she would bake the perfect chocolate cake for us, the best I’ve ever had. In 2012, she suffered a paralytic attack and couldn’t bake after that. I was with my cousins and we were talking about how much we missed her chocolate cake. We decided to give baking a shot. That was the first time I actually baked something. We made chocolate cupcakes and burnt the entire batch! But I enjoyed baking so much that I began experimenting and practising on my own. There has been no looking back since.

Were you ever apprehensive about taking up baking as a career? How did your family and friends react?

Not at all! My family and friends are my support system, my cheerleaders. It was not difficult to convince them at all. On the contrary, they have always told me I can do it when I am nailed down by self-doubt. When I graduated from Hindu College last year, I knew I wanted to blog full time. I was also able to support my decision financially because the revenue from blogging was already great.

What interests you the when it comes to baking?

That how simple and basic ingredients such as flour, butter, sugar and eggs can be mixed together to create something so magical.