I’ve done some real cringe stuff in my life and I get reminders of it whenever I try to free up space in my camera reel 🙈🙈

So right in the beginning when I first started a lil macaron home baking biz, before I was like famous-famous LOL, I worked with a fancy food photographer, let’s call him Pierre, to get some really fancy photos of my macs.

They were styled with ridiculous props etc, food art if you may. Pierre was pretty old-school, painfully snobby and one day said, in his exaggerated French accent, “Reshmeee, there eez thees French tv company filming  and interview weeth me and I theenk it will be good exposure for you if you came too with some macarons, maybe a 100”. I was pretty excited, whoa lil ol me and me macs on the telly (who cares if it’s in France right, it’s STILL tv!), so I jumped up saying yeah yeah, there like a bear. He told me to grab some props and dress well because “alors, it’s TV”.

I wore clean dark skinny jeans, my best smart loafers, and a trendy blazer, blow dried my hair, face full of make up etc and turned up with my hundred macs and a whole bunch of props like serving dishes, teapots, photography surfaces, driftwood etc and he says, “Reshmeee, I thought I told you to dress up?!”.

That should’ve been my cue to turn around and head back, right then. But like a mug I stuttered something inane, I can’t even remember, just mumbling something whilst feeling pretty cruddy. And then the filming crew of two camera guys showed up. They spoke to Pierre in French, ignored me, set up, started filming and I’m basically a glorified assistant, mute, and fumbling around Pierre with these stupid macarons and props whilst they interviewed him.

During a coffee break I got chatting to one of the camera men and asked where they were from and he said, “Geneve”. Ummmm, last time I checked Geneva was in Switzerland...not France, but never mind. “Oh! Cool! So you work for a French TV channel? Which one is this going to be shown on?”. He looked at me all confused and said that they don’t work for a French tv channel, and it’s going on their YouTube channel for Swiss expats. Oh wow, that’s some great exposure right there, I’m so glad I baked for two days and lugged heavy and fragile props across town all dressed up for this...

I was properly seething now. If I was a pressure cooker, my whistle would’ve been like a siren at this point. Four hours later just when I thought we were done for the day, Pierre says, “Reshmeee, for zees last shot you have to run down with thees piece of driftwood to zees coffee shop on Portobello Road, get two skinny flat white coffees, put zee driftwood on zee curb and wait for me”. I said yeah, like a mega mug, only because it was the last bloody thing and I wanted this over and done with without any drama. I ran down to this hipster coffee shop, bought the two coffees and warily placed the driftwood, that cost £15 from the prop shop, on the roadside curb watching it like a hawk.

Fifteen long minutes later, our man comes cycling down Portobello Road, wearing a trilby on his pushbike with the camera guys filming him. He stopped by me and said, “Ooh la la Reshmeee, so nice to see you!”, grabs a coffee from me and continues, “oh! Look!! Zees ees just perfect for that shot weeth the macarons!”. He picks up the £15 driftwood and turns to the camera saying, “Zees ees why I love London...inspiration can be everywhere...even just lying on zee street.”

Anyway, you’re probably cringing so hard for me right now and thinking, “Reshmeeee you absolute mug!”. Indeed, and you know what, I’ve done even more cringey sh!t in my life because I’m still a mug, but I blocked Pierre for good. And since then, have moved onto making cakes, cakes decorated with macarons sometimes. Like this beautiful 4 tiered wedding cake that’s a customised version of our Ivory Dreams wedding cake with pistachio and strawberry macarons. No fancy props, no driftwood, just gorgeous delicious cake.

I hope you enjoyed my story-telling. Keep it cringe people, keep it cringe.

Lots of love,

Reshmi xoxo