Carved cheese, modeling chocolate, powdered sugar – oh dear!
Dallas-based local food artist Dean Murray will be a familiar face on Disney + ‘s newest show, Foodtastic, which has teams of people from across the country hired to create fully edible sculptures. The full season will be available for streaming on December 15th.
Murray, who has been a food artist / sculptor for 20 years, has teamed up with Vivian Pham, a food artist from San Jose, and Matthew Stoddart, a professional ice sculptor from Kentucky, to star in two episodes of the show. The trio operated under the team name “Monster Sculptors”.
The show has a different structure than other reality shows, with each episode being standalone as the season progresses and not in the style of an elimination tournament. In each episode, three teams compete against each other to create “larger-than-life foodscapes,” which are themed around Disney intellectual property, including iconic stories and characters. Although the sculptures are completely edible, only design, skill and the story each one tells will be rated – regardless of taste. The winning team of each episode will win a limited edition pin inspired by Foodtastic.
“A dream came true for us,” said Murray. “Vivian has been doing food art for a long time and we’ve worked together a lot – whatever, we did it.
“We’re more than cake artists. We really play with our food and make art out of it.”
More:Oregon man wins Food Network Pumpkin Carving Contest
When Disney called the candidates, “people jumped on the phone” to put teams together, Murray said. He said he was glad Disney allowed attendees to put their own teams together, knowing he wanted to work with Pham. Murray turned to his ice carving buddy, Michael Stoddart, to get his son Matthew, also a professional ice carver, on the team.
“I think the allure of this show lies in the variety of products and techniques used,” said Murray. “People have seen pumpkin carving shows and carving shows that have cake in it, but this show is just completely different.”
The Disney experience
Disney pulled out all the stops in developing the show, drawing on talents like Keke Palmer as a presenter and professional bakers as judges. What amazed Murray most about the experience was the set and the competition.
“The food show set is beautiful; it was great for a food show,” said Murray. “The food art in this group of people from all over the country was also inspiring and really made me want to get even better.”
The food art community is both big and small, Murray said, recognizing all of his fellow artists in the Christmas episode, including Chris Foltz, a professional ice sculptor from Bend who was on the Lucky Charms team.
“The third team was a group of women from Michigan,” said Murray. “I knew them because I was a college judge when they competed as college ice carvers! That was a fun episode because I knew them and how good they are.
At a newer concept show like Foodtastic, some of the judges even learned some new things.
“If you just look at the option (of all the foods to work with) – there was cheese carving, chocolate modeling, ice cream, and some foods people wouldn’t have known if you hadn’t explained them,” said Murray. “We even had burdock roots and had to explain to a judge what it was.”
Burdock root is a root vegetable native to Japan with a slightly different texture than other root vegetables native to the region and a milder taste. Subsequently, Murray said he carved a mold into it to pour isomalt, a sugar substitute popularly used for decorating.
“I had never before seen anyone on a show try to use a vegetable as a form of sugar,” said Murray.
Food art?
When the term “food art” comes to mind, one might think of decorated cakes, pieces of sugar, pumpkin and ice carvings. However, what Murray and the rest of the teams can do goes well beyond this media.
Murray originally started out as a chef in the 1980s, studying at Portland’s Western Culinary Institute (which became Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in 1999 and closed in 2017).
Food art wasn’t on his radar at all, but the artistic aspect has always appealed to him. While at Western Culinary, he had to attend a garnishing course and was then employed as a teaching assistant to teach fruit and vegetable carving. After a while he was hired as an ice carving teacher, then the circle closes again as a garnishing teacher.
“I see cooking as an art form, and that’s how I got there: because it puts smiles on people’s faces and inspires me,” said Murray. “Making art is the same as eating, be it a sculpture or a zebra made out of pinto beans, they say, ‘Wow, how can you do that or do that?’ That’s the wow factor in cooking and the wow factor in doing something that drives me to do what I do. “
Before Murray completely devoted his craft to food art, he made ice sculptures professionally, carried out commissions and participated in national and international competitions. His awards include taking first place at the World Ice Art Championships 2015 in the Multi-Block / Realistic category and third place at the National Ice Carving Association (NICA) 2010 National Ice Carving Championships.
In addition to ice cream, Murray has done a considerable number of pumpkin carvings. He spent all of October last touring the country for various festivals, including stops in Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Other media Murray used for sculpting include cheese, fruits, vegetables, sugar, sand, and snow. He prefers to refer to himself as a “biodegradable artist” as all of his media are biodegradable.
“It’s about telling adults – or children at heart, since we are all – to keep playing with their food,” said Murray.
With filming long over, Murray is currently working with a cheese company in Wisconsin to make cheese sculptures for their ad campaign. To learn more of Murray’s biodegradable art, visit his Facebook page.
Em Chan reports on food and eating in the Statesman Journal. You can reach her at echan@statesmanjournal.com, follow her on Twitter @catchuptoemily, or see what she’s eating on Instagram @ sikfanmei.ah.
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