Whipping up a dessert storm

Anandita Gupta

He failed miserably! Even the ants wouldn’t touch his cupcakes. In fact, the entire batch of the Betty Crocker pre-mixes that 16-year-old Shivesh Bhatia bought was burnt and had to be trash-binned. However, the young lad’s first-ever baking disaster did not dim his spirit. On the contrary, Shivesh had so much fun in the kitchen that he kept calm and baked on.

“My first few baking experiments failed miserably. I created one disaster after another. It was heart-breaking to discard something that I’d put so much effort into. But I was intrigued enough to keep learning. I began watching videos, reading blogs and researching on baking extensively to understand the science behind it,” confesses the self-taught baker, who now has millions of followers on social media.

Where there’s a whisk, there’s a way—believed the self-taught baker, who went on to smash stereotypes, one chocolate brownie at a time! Whether it was opting for Arts instead of any technical in-demand courses, being undeterred by a slew of baking disasters, acquiring photography skills from the internet or plunging head-on into food styling as a full-blown career, this Instagrammer was never scared to experiment.

His fearless adventures paid off. The self-taught baker has baked his way to the bank, with an impressive roster of brand collaborations in his kitty—including Grand Hyatt, Google Maps, Nestle and tourism boards of several countries. Bhatia went on to win several awards, including Vogue’s 20 under 26, Best Dessert Blog Award by Better Homes, the CondeNast Traveller Social Media Star of the Year and Best Instagrammer of the Year by Living Foodz, multiple times. On Instagram, he currently has 2.4 million followers, while his YouTube channel flaunts 1.6 million followers.

Shivesh credits his naani for stirring up his interest in baking. “Every time we visited my naani, we were always welcomed by two delicious, freshly baked cakes sitting on the kitchen counter. It was so fascinating— how you just picked simple ingredients like flour, sugar and butter from the kitchen shelf, mixed them all and put it in the oven— and it transformed into something so beautiful,” recollects the culinary genius, who baked for the first time to recreate his nani’s magic when she had a paralytic attack.

Shivesh started as a one-man army, posting pictures of his desserts on Instagram. He quickly earned a loyal following, his creations taking over the internet in the most fanciful way. “I began with posting pretty much everything—pictures of me and my cousins, selfies with friends and sometimes, what I baked. I realised my dessert pictures garnered a good response from Instagrammers. So, I started putting in more time into photography and styling to make my desserts look pretty. That is how a lot of people started following me,” says Shivesh, who started blogging and writing books when fans started requesting him for his simple yet enticing recipes.

And that’s not all. Shivesh now conducts styling and food photography workshops for bakers across India and worldwide. He has authored four successful cookbooks with Harper Collins and is working on his fifth. “Though writing takes much more time than digital content creation, it’s a cathartic process. I constantly push myself in an attempt to make my recipes stand out, and learn a lot in the process,” quips Shivesh, whose first book, Bake with Shivesh, got on to the Amazon bestseller list, the day the pre-order link went live!

But what was it exactly that transformed this neighbourhood baker into an Instagram sensation? “I don’t want baking to intimidate anyone. I encourage people to leave off their inhibitions and pick up baking,” smiles the self-taught baker, who makes baking accessible and doable for all. Also, he works really hard on creating cutting-edge content, “I ensure my content is engaging, original, crisp and shot beautifully! Moreover, I’m responsive to the feedback of my followers. A fan once messaged me that a certain recipe series was not interesting. So, I sat with my team and revamped it.”

However, with so much on his beautiful plate, doesn’t it get overwhelming? “Content creation is not a nine to five job. I need to work at odd hours and there’s a lot to research work. However, I’m big on gratitude. I keep thanking my stars for letting me do what I love the most.”