Delicious-has been running one of the most popular cooking blogs in Poland for 8 years. Best-selling cookbook author. In 2017, he was nominated for a "culinary Oscar", that is, for the American magazine award Saveur in the category " Best culinary photography”" In the competition, he received two awards. Collaborated m.in. with Vogue, or British National Geographic Traveler. Recently, he made his debut as a presenter in the first Polish edition of MasterChef Teens. Who is Mikhail Korkosh, where does he get his inspiration from, and what are his plans for the future? You will find answers to these questions in the next conversation!
Zuza TvorogovskayaQuestioner: Hello, Michael!
Michael (Delightful) Korkosh: Hi there!
ZT: Our agency team manages the project on a daily basis Food and Design project. Without checking in the web search: what does this name tell you? What does food and design mean to you?
mkQuestioner: The first thing that comes to mind is the culinary style. Design is, in a sense, how to design the appearance of food on a plate, in production, or in a photograph.
ZTQ: Do you do this kind of styling yourself every day?
mkQuestioner: Yes, this is part of my job. That's basically where my career started, because it started when I won the Saveur Magazine Award for Culinary Photography, so it's always been an integral part of my personality. So I'm looking at Food and design in the context of image creation.
ZT: The goal of our project was to create a place that creatively informs about innovations, trends, marketing or news related to food, food industry and food design topics. So we created a project to inspire ourselves every day in our agency work. Where do you get your inspiration to work on your recipes?
mkQuestioner: There are many of these inspirations. Very prosaic-these are the new seasons. I really like seasonal cycles, such as now-asparagus appears, so I have a rush of inspiration: what can be done with asparagus, what I've already done, what I haven't done, what I've seen, what I've tasted, in what arrangement the asparagus hasn't been presented yet, what you could combine them with...my rush of inspiration is also walking for market halls, because for me there is a completely different energy. I like to walk through them and see what products are the freshest right now. I often come out of them with a sketch of an idea of what I would like to do.
Source: Facebook
Source: Facebook
ZTQuestioner: Is there more?
mkQuestioner: I not only cook, but also eat a lot in different places, whether in Warsaw or in the world. I travel through cooking, trying out the sensibilities of other chefs, other people in the industry, which is also enriching. It gives me feedback on what others have done and where things like asparagus are going in the modern culinary world! (laughter)
ZTQ: So your inspiration is mostly travel?
mkQuestioner: Traveling is not even about eating in specific places, specific restaurants, but about refreshing your mind, your vision of the world. Especially when you work with recipes every day, you are in such a rhythm. Sometimes it is worth demolishing how you see the creation of this recipe, and go to ... Japan! Just like I'm going to Japan right now to see how the product or food is treated differently.
ZTMichael, I found such a beautiful slogan on the Internet: "Harry Styles in the world of cooking"” That's what the media says about you. How do you respond to such terms?
mkQuestioner: You know, I am compared to many people. Here, Harry Styles in the world of cooking", sometimes Taylor Swift, because I sell out so quickly tickets to author meetings. I also often hear that I'm Harry Potter because of my glasses and similar facial features. Fortunately, I love, respect, and admire all of these people, so it's an equal satisfaction for me. These are big stars-it's nice to compare them to the biggest pop star. It's like I'm considered the biggest culinary star. However, at the end of the journey, I always think of myself simply as Michael the amazing.
ZT: Exactly, Michal of Rzeszow, who jumped to Warsaw. Many people move to a big city with the idea that they will make an equally big career in it. Did you also have such a plan? A plan to become "someone more"?
mkQuestioner: In high school, I dreamed of a career in culinary media. I worked in a pastry shop, I knew that not necessarily working in gastronomy is something for me, but it was in the culinary media that I wanted to work. Those were the golden days of Cookbook-I just wanted to work in Cookbook back then. I dreamed of such a life, but I knew that it was a very narrow world, and the chances of working in such a place were negligible. I was a realist, so I went to a college related to my interests, because I'm interested in politics, the world, and different cultures-hence the field of study-international relations. I don't regret this choice, because I learned a lot from it.
ZT: ... and success began!
mkQuestioner: I wrote a thesis on culinary diplomacy, or how to promote a country through cooking. So you can always get what you want out of college. The moment I started learning, I had already achieved my first success because I quickly signed a contract for the first book. It wasn't what I thought to myself:,, oh! Great success is coming!”. I was just doing my own thing. I studied because I wanted to have a plan B, like it didn't work out"” Many people "don't burn out".
source: @Adorable
ZTQuestioner: But do you think it is possible to practice cooking without an innate sense? Such a feeling is necessary to have, is it possible to acquire it somehow?
mkQuestioner: Of course, you need to have a talent for cooking. I think a lot of people own it. In this job, I always say that I don't really like being called a cook / chef. I believe that such a person has slightly different skills than me. I'm not organized like Klim, I can't manage a group in the kitchen, but I can write, I can perform in front of the camera, I can mesmerize the audience, convey the content in an attractive way – that's the most important thing.
ZT: ...and as for your diet: have you always been vegan? After all, your recipes are mostly vegetarian cuisine.
mkQuestioner: No, when I started the blog, I wasn't a Vegan at all. There are meat recipes in its archives. With the development of my consciousness and maturity as a person, I began to explore Vega cuisine more, because it seemed to me more attractive and interesting. In the Vega kitchen, you need to do more to make the taste exciting, but it is elegant, fresh, new, very creative.
ZTQuestioner: So we can't count on your meat recipe book?
mkQuestioner: I feel that way now, but I won't say if I'll ever change my mind. I used to be strictly vegan, now I'm a flexitarian, meaning a person who eats vegetarian every day, but sometimes I eat meat, like when traveling or just sometimes I feel like my body says it needs iron. I think vegetarian recipes are definitely more necessary, and that's where I want to go.
ZT: Recipes, travel, books...or maybe your own restaurant?
mkQuestioner: No, no. Having my own restaurant is not something that concerns my dreams or interests. I've worked in gastronomy for a while, so I know it's a very heavy piece of bread. I admire the people who run their restaurants. It's a lot of stress, it's managing people, there's a lot of repetition of what's being done-the recipes that are being prepared. The work I currently own is more creative, requires more changes, but I also don't have to trust many things in it to another person. Maybe this is some kind of problem with me, because I just like to count on myself.
ZTQuestioner: However, that year, in a restaurant A sourceyou could be met not as an ordinary guest of the restaurant, but as a person working with its team!
mkQuestioner: Last year I had a pop-up window advertising my book in A source - a restaurant that I really like, I respect the quality that I represent. We had as many as 5 meetings before launching the pop-up window. we have refined the recipes so that the restaurant's chefs cook the way I would like them to. During the entire pop-up, which lasted 2 or 3 weeks, day after day, I wondered if the people who were cooking were cooking as I told them to. So I think I will continue to develop in a different direction, although again: maybe never say never? Maybe I'll change my mind sometime.
ZTNote, however, that Warsaw's Prague has never been filled with so many hungry foodies before. Throughout the entire pop-up window, before A source huge queues were forming, and our food and design team witnessed this.
Mikhail, thank you so much for talking and sharing your experience. I firmly keep my fingers crossed for your continued growth and next steps taken in this exciting culinary world.
mkA: Also thank you very much!
Junior specialist in Marketing Communications and PR.
He is a graduate of the University of Warsaw and the Main School of Agriculture. We have been in the HoReCa industry for more than 10 years. For many years, he has been associated with the Trip group, Sobienie Royal Golf and Country Club, and the Florentin Restaurant in Warsaw.
She graduated from the Faculty of Architecture of the Warsaw Technical University with a degree in Architecture for the Knowledge Society and Visual Communications at the Polytechnic University of Milan. A specialist in creating a mood. She has gained experience at home and abroad at numerous international seminars (Seville, Lisbon, Florence), fellowships at La Sapienza (Rome), etc. m.in. in Carmi e Ubertis and ADM Milano.
A manager with many years of experience in the cosmetics, food, and children's industries. During his career, he was associated with such companies as: L'Oreal, Samsung, Danone-Nutricia, Unilever. During his professional life, he was responsible, among other things, for the development of e-commerce sales and content in Poland and the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. 
