When you’re premiering a new idea to people, you have to spell it out for them — as my mother would say, dumb it down. A concept that I brush past all too frequently while reveling in my own wit.

If I was going to have one chance to explain The Palatte to the public, by George I was going to lower IQ levels with how simple I’d make it. The most famous work of art? Surely, the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. A dish to match it in color and feel? Fabulous, should be easy. Aaand we were off to the races, until I realized — this is me we’re talking about here.

It couldn’t be just any dish! This is the fucking Mona Lisa, my friends. It had to emulate the allure of, arguably, the most iconic woman in art history.

Let’s start with the colors. Warm, un-accosting, and familiar. She greets you as a comforting old friend and in that instance, the choice became obvious: pasta. Mona is one omnipresent entity and it was imperative that the plate reflect that in composition + emotion. So what began as ravioli inevitably became one large raviolo.

Historians believe the subject is Lisa del Giocondo, an Italian noblewoman from Florence. The artwork is likely a commissioned portrait by her wealthy silk merchant husband, Francesco del Giocondo. “Mona” is a short form of Madonna, meaning “my lady”. So it only felt right to hide a little luxury under the surface.

I decided to fill the raviolo with the traditional choice of ricotta + yolk, but elevate it with chicken liver pâté. To add further indulgence — because I just can’t help my damn self — I also created a pistachio pesto base while garnishing with saffron + black garlic.

Lights, Camera, Action…well, sort of. In all honesty, this should really be an article about making pasta on camera for the first time when you are terrible at it.

It was my first time filming an episode of The Palatte and I was truly questioning my sanity when I chose pasta as the first attempt at social media stardom. So many simpler dishes, but oh no a salad or common sandwich didn’t seem g r a n d enough + it wasn’t. Sometimes leading with the most difficult thing just makes all the choices that follow a cake walk.

Did we run into some technical hiccups? Do I still have to remind myself to not make crazy concentrated faces on camera? Was there a learning curve? Do I still suck at making pasta dough? All emphatically, yes. But as my pasta skills have gingerly improved, so too has my self trust in being able to do hard things.

I didn’t go to culinary school. I have zero technical training in the kitchen. I don’t know the rules, but when you don’t have any in place, you get to make your own up along the way.

I’m not a chef, I’m an artist and I think I like it better that way.

So here is the first recipe I ever dreamt up for The Palatte and a collection of photos that show you just who I was on day one — can’t wait for day 100.

x x

**Downloadable recipe below, because sometimes you just need to kill a few trees and print it out — don’t quote me on that.

PS — This first one is a freebie, it only felt right, but the next 11 recipes will only be accessible through a paid subscription! So, please feel free to share and consider joining me on the other side. Thank you again for all the support. Cheers.

The pandemic hit and suddenly I found myself in the company of my old faves like Gordon Ramsay and J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, but even more so with the new school kids like Joshua Weissman and Andrew Rea. I was literally Binging with Babish.

If you read my first post, you’ll know that I come from a history of food in both heritage and practice so I was no stranger to a kitchen. I could argue it was always my second creative space after fine art. Even in the early days of social media, I always shared my cooking, it was naturally a part of my brand long before I ever knew I was even forming one.

So the brainstorm began. If I was going to take on a secondary venture to my full-time art career it had to be great, because mediocrity doesn’t sit well with you when you’re a type-A psychopath striving for greatness. I couldn’t just share my food as I had previously, with no context, no purpose — that would be far too easy for me and if there is one thing I’m going to do…it’s make things more complex than is necessary (you learn more that way + the applied suffering is so much fun!)

For days and weeks I dedicated the spare moments in my mind to how I would fit into a food content world that’s filled with hunger, but lacked satiation. I’m not a chef, I wouldn’t dream to categorize myself as such. I’m a food enthusiast and a home cook sure, but I have far too much respect for actual chefs to take the title and I know my lane.

Do you ever have an idea that you just know is great? The one that itches a scratch so deep that you instantly scour the internet making sure no one has beat you to the punch. Ravenous for the glory that it’s an original thought. You are the genius you’ve been looking for. Well, that’s what happened. Maybe not to such an epic degree, but it surely felt that way.

The premise was simple: every episode I would introduce a famous artwork and create a complimentary dish that matched it in color and feel — all the while diving into the context of the painting and how it’s become a new work of art on a plate.

Boom baby! Brilliant! I am a legend amongst finger painters - right? Wrong. In true creative mental torture, the moment the concept came to me, it simultaneously felt like the easiest and most obvious notion I’d ever had. Of course it should be art and food — my entire life was a culmination of these two things and it was a sign from the universe that I did not intend to miss.

Two seasons, 12 episodes, multiple film crews, and a thousand lessons later — here we are. The Palatte has left my figurative world and become a reality. The funny thing about reality though, is that it’s where the true looking glass lies. In your mind you can theoretically prepare yourself for all that can go wrong, you can swim to shore, but you’ll never actually learn how to fix the boat unless your taking on water, paddling with a hole in the hull, just trying to stay afloat.

After careful consideration, I took some much needed time away from The Palatte. I invested time, money, and a dedicated part of my artistic soul to its creation. Seeing your idea come completely into fruition is reward enough in itself - that shit is spiritual. But the thing about not being complacent is that once you feel something like that, you won’t want to let it go. I didn’t just want creation, I wanted success.

I knew that changes had to be made, I needed to become unwaveringly clear on what I wanted the content channel to become and how I’d get there. Which is where you currently find me, the prodigal return.

There is no sugar coating it. If I want The Palatte to break through its whopping 1200 follower count to reach a million it was up to me to shift the concept. The only way to sustain this endeavor is with authenticity, I wanted the entire brand to feel more aligned and more genuine to who I truly am.

Cue the chopping block.

No more aprons. No more episodes. No more confinement to a singular concept. All of these things were the antithesis of creativity. I was snuffing out my own flame that I lit with my own fucking match.

So, at long last, here we are…again.

This time I’m filming, editing, and doing it all myself. Wearing all the hats. I’ll start to post content in the Fall — holding myself to October. But until then, I’m in that crucially formative period where I suck. It takes me forever to edit, I fuck up sound recordings, and I am not fluidly dancing through the kitchen when cooking as I’m typically used to. Did I mention my neighbor is redoing their roof? All tests from the universe that I intend to pass with flying colors.

See you cool cats in a few months, until we meet again, I’ll be in the kitchen.

x x

Seeing as this is my first ever Substack post, let’s paint the picture — shall we?

My name is CAYLA BIRK. (the period is stylistically and functionally required) and this is my 10th year as a contemporary fine artist — yes, it is my full time job and yes, I am typically very grateful for that fact.

I’ve spent the last decade showing my work with international and domestic galleries, collaborating with brands, and launching my own in-house immersive exhibitions to premiere new series to the public. But my story really begins waaay before all that.

At the age of 8, I vowed to become a creative director in the advertising world — I believed my technical art skills to be mediocre, but knew my ideas to be the better asset — so I set the plan in motion. I went to a High School of the arts majoring in Communications where I got my first taste of graphic design and my first lesson in humility. When you’re surrounded by other young creatives, you truly learn what you excel at.

I kept my goal in sight and went into university as a declared advertising major. For the next 4 years I served and bartended in restaurants while working towards my degree. I like to believe I was always a foodie — I grew up with a Lebanese mother who really opened our palates up at a young age, and the truth is that without that baseline I probably would’ve never delved into the culinary world the way I have. Working in hospitality instilled a whole new level of respect and curiosity in me. I always made my chefs let me taste ingredients I’d never heard of before, insisting that the only way I could sell them to customers was if I had the full experience.

The creativity of the culinary world felt like the first time I saw the Sistine Chapel — vast and impossible to absorb all at once, yet appreciated piece by piece as it reveals itself.

In my true type-a fashion, I graduated Cum Laude, worked in an ad agency, + became a junior art director by the age of 23, all while continuing to work in restaurants. What can I say? I couldn’t give it up and the hustler in me liked making more money. In an industry that is often seen as a means to an end I always valued the skillset it gave me.

Now, here is the part you knew was coming.

I had everything I thought I ever wanted and yet I wasn’t happy. As any good quarter life crisis goes I spent the next 3 years figuring out more of what I didn’t want — I think it’s a right of passage in every successful journey. I was a freelance designer branding companies, I went back to school for 6 months to become an interior designer, I ran a contemporary furniture store, I started painting series of artworks to keep me sane, and when I grew tired of every creative job I thought I wanted, I finally just went back to being a bartender.

Fast forward to when I’m 28 and I have my true fork in the road moment — more like a red pill blue pill scenario, but a gift from the universe nonetheless. No doubt a story for another time + post, so I’ll keep it brief. In the years prior, I occasionally sold one off artworks to interested parties, but this time an entire series of 6 works was acquired by one collector.

I took the biggest paycheck I’d ever received, opened an LLC, created another set of works from the same series and found gallery representation. I quit bartending and I burned the boats.

Here we are 10 years later and I could fill books with lessons the art world has taught me. I’ve seen the good, the bad, and the ugly — literally. Entrepreneurship is not for the faint of heart, but I’m no less grateful for the hard days than I am the easy ones. Throughout the last decade I’ve built a career that I intend to keep growing — I always want my collectors to feel that they bet on the right girl.

As trite as it may sound, I’ve got big dreams, like soul-crushingly large ones, and I intend to accomplish every last fucking one of them. I never stop wanting more — I like it that way. Quite plainly, I don’t feel good unless I’m chasing the next goal, the next success, the next challenge, because it’s what makes me feel most alive & if life isn’t meant for the living then I don’t know what is.

Which brings this entire verbose symphony to it’s crescendo — my newest (well, more like new + improved) endeavor: THE PALATTE.

A portmanteau of the words “palate” and “palette” & also the genuine dichotomy of my creative persona. The Palatte is a culinary content channel that lives at the intersection of fine art + food, which also happens to be the permanent residence of my brain.

After my first two seasons, I decided to revise the concept which is where you currently find me. This Substack will serve as the battlegrounds of my newest ideations — not to worry, you can expect an entirely separate post discussing this at length.

But for now, I’ve stolen enough of your time for the day. I look forward to sharing all the art, food, struggles, and successes that will undoubtedly come my way. Thanks for joining, it won’t be a boring ride, but something tells me you already knew that.

x x