Blogger of the Week: Claire Thomas of The Kitchy Kitchen
Every week, we’re spotlighting a different food blogger who’s shaking up the blogosphere with tempting recipes and knockout photography. Today, we chat with Claire Thomas of The Kitchy Kitchen.
Photo: The Kitchy Kitchen/Facebook
Claire Thomas speaks at a fast clip, which makes sense when you realize how busy she is. The auburn-haired 28-year-old manages her own daily food and lifestyle blog, The Kitchy Kitchen; directs web commercials for major brands; works as a professional food photographer; and recently wrote her first cookbook, The Kitchy Kitchen: New Classics for Living Deliciously. Until late 2013, she was even the host of the ABC Saturday morning cooking program, Food for Thought.
So, yeah, she’s busy.
How did Thomas come to have such success at such a tender age? It all hearkens back to The Kitchy Kitchen, which she started about five years ago while slogging through a mind-numbing administrative assistant gig. The blog’s snappy videos and vibrant photography entranced readers, and later, big business clients and publishers.
Thomas’s tale is a blogger success story if ever there was one. Here’s everything you need to know about her:
1. Her interest in food started with food history.
"I stumbled on food history as an arena and absolutely fell in love with it. It helps people seem so real and human, immediately. I started recipe-testing ancient Roman recipes. It was fun, and it made me feel like an archaeologist.”
2. She grew up with a charming birthday tradition.
"My mom is Australian, and growing up, every birthday I got to choose a cake out of the Australian Women’s Weekly Children’s Birthday Cake Book, and it’s amazing. For my 5th birthday, I had a swimming pool cake. My mom basically did two layers of a sheet cake, scooped out the middle, and put in a Jello water center. There were cocktail umbrellas and plastic dolls. To make it look like they had bathing caps, she dipped their heads in frosting and sprinkles.”
The original image from the Australian Women’s Weekly Children’s Birthday Cake Book. Photo: The Island Continent
3. She doesn’t have the most glamorous kitchen.
"You’d think I’d have all this awesome kitchen stuff. Nope! I have all of my mom’s reject, burnt awful pots. And I totally got called out on YouTube recently, which is so embarrassing: My KitchenAid mixer—which is about 15 years old—walked off the counter. Like, the mixer shakes so much that it falls off if you don’t keep an eye on it. But it still works! It’s just bent up. And it’s very noisy. But [stand mixers] are a very expensive thing. Until it keels over, I’m not buying a new one.”
4. She loves a good breakfast-at-night for supper.
"When I’m cooking for myself, the last thing I want to do is anything complicated. I love doing scrambled eggs with leftovers: I scramble the eggs in coconut oil and then I add a lot of fresh herbs. Then I use a little bit of sweet soy sauce. It is not pretty, but [it makes for] the best scrambled eggs."
Photo: The Kitchy Kitchen
5. She’s a self-taught food photographer.
"I had a little point-and-shoot camera for vacation, and I would [use it to] basically shoot food from different angles and analyze it. I took a very clinical approach! I realized that it all came down to light. Once I started understanding light, I really started getting better and shooting food. All the photos from my cookbook, I shot in the same spot in my living room on a cutting board that’s maybe 18 inches wide. It’s just because I know where the light is best."
6. She’s very anti-flash when it comes to cameras.
“If I see someone shooting food with a flash, I just immediately want to slap the camera out of their hand.”
Photo: Kitchy Kitchen
7. She’s a huge fan of nonfiction books.
"I always read nonfiction! I love reading because it’s the only thing I can do that really demands my full attention. You can watch TVand be on your computer [at the same time], but with reading, that’s the only thing you can do. Right now I’m reading Quartered Safe Out Here, which is the memoir of George MacDonald Fraser about his experiences during the Burma campaign.”
8. Yes, she is a defender of cupcakes.
"Are they basic? Yes. But I also like a blow-dry bar, so I can’t sling stones, can I? I’m equal opportunity when it comes to carbohydrates. It’s cake in a small form! I don’t know if it deserves all the hype, but c’mon. It’s cake."
More food bloggers we love:
8 Things to Know About Joy the Baker
Meet the British Whiz Kid Who Has Her Own Cookbook
Thug Kitchen’s Identity Finally Revealed
Who’s your favorite food blogger? Tell us in the comments!
