When I was asked by Salir Restaurant in Newcastle Co. Down to carry out a day photo shoot of their new food and drinks menu, I was very excited, especially as Salir had recently rebranded and I was keen to discover their new offerings.

From my initial meeting with Cathy, the owner, and the talented chef Tadgh, I understood that they wanted the photographs to showcase Salir as a fun, family and friendly restaurant that offers a delicious sharing menu and also as a great place for fabulous cocktails.

In the past year, more than usual, I have been photographing a number of drinks and cocktails for various clients. In addition, I've been photographing alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks for iStock as one of their exclusive contributors. I very much like this genre of drinks photography. Styling drinks is always fun and as a photographer and food stylist you can be very experimental with cocktails.

The photo shoot started with photographing the bar and a number of cocktails first, giving the chefs time to do the initial preperation of the food.

It was great working with Salir’s barman - whose name unfortunately escapes me. His drinks looked fabulous, and he was very patient with me asking for more of frozen fruit and other props - I am always very demanding!!! He was so proud of his creations that he kept asking me to taste the drinks. As much as I would have loved to, I had to refrain and keep a clear head for the rest of the day’s shoot!

After the cocktails were photographed, we moved on to Salir’s Sunday roast, the amazing tapas menu and the sliders. Tadgh, the chef was an absolute dream to work with. He is very creative, has a brilliant eye for food styling and we worked really well together. I often find that the more relaxed, confident and cooperative the chefs are, the more we get through in a food photo shoot. Considering that the first part of the day was involved in photographing drinks, we managed to get through a lot of food photography by the end of the day.

All the dishes looked and smelt amazing. Every dish we photographed, we kept saying "we definitely have to come back and try these". My husband and I finally managed to book a table a couple of weeks ago and I must say, we were not disappointed. We treated ourselves to 6 off their tapas dishes and loved every mouthful. Definitely will be back for more.

Below are some examples of some of the food and drinks from the photo shoot and if you have similar requirements, Please contact us.

Cocktail and food photography