About Our Cover Artist, Judy Doherty

Judy Doherty paint a veggie burger as she prepares to photograph it. (Photo by Photo by Heather Amszi)

 

Not all surprises dished up in 2020 were terrible. For Edible East Bay, the year brought the start of a fruitful collaboration with expert photographer and credentialed culinary professional Judy Doherty.

This issue's Pizzapalooza is the third recipe feature Doherty has contributed to Edible East Bay. The first was our Summer Harvest 2020 Farmers’ Market Grilled Dinner and the second was the Holiday Pie Party. Both include videos Doherty produced to make the menus look like something anyone can do in the kitchen. (And you can!)

If you follow our digital channels you’re likely to have enjoyed our three e-book collaborations with Doherty: Pickle It Quick!, A Sizzle of Burgers (to commemorate the opening of the Castro Valley Marketplace), and Alice Medrich’s Chocolate Basket and Truffles, a visualization of a crafty recipe by our local chocolate diva on how to make a basket using chocolate and pretzels.

Doherty’s impressive client list features entrepreneurs, chefs, artists, and businesses ranging from Hilton and Grubhub Corporate to Red Boat Fish Sauce and Humble Nut Butter. She’s been honored with the American Photographic Artists Top 100, an American Culinary Foundation Gold Medal, and a juried fine art photo exhibit at Art Basel Miami. In her role as executive pastry chef at two Hyatt Hotels and Resorts, Doherty created desserts for celebrities, corporate clients, foreign dignitaries, and Super Bowl teams. She trained in Lucerne, Switzerland, and at the Culinary Institute of America, where she is completing a master’s degree in food sustainability and branding.

Doherty says that her focus is on “appetizing” and “enticing” for food and any other items she shoots in her home photography studio in Castro Valley. It’s her knowledge about ingredients, cooking processes, recipe development, and flavor pairings, she says, that frees her to “play in a most delicious way” as a food photographer. As a mom, she’s also an expert in creating meals that make others happy.

This issue’s cover is something Doherty did to amuse herself: “I wanted to give a big callout to an organic, plant-based vision of the summer burger.” She grilled some Beyond Burger patties and then set one up with all the fixin’s in her studio rig. “It’s just some clamps that stick out,” she says, adding that she removed the clamps from the image in Photoshop. Somehow that doesn’t quite explain it, but then that’s why she’s such a star in the photography studio while we can only dream.

Find Judy Doherty at judydohertyphotography.com and on Instagram @judydohertyphotography.