Nine Meals Too Cute to Eat

Jessica Hlavac is a master chef–serving up everything from tacos, to caprese salad, to homemade Twinkies–in a most unconventional way. Her ingredients of choice? Clay, pastels, and varnish. And Hlavac eschews fine china, plating her dishes atop the tip of a knife, the edge of a chopstick, or the face of a coin.

Hlavac's clay meals are in fact too cute (and too artificial) to eat. The Los Angeles-based micro-sculptor has been creating and posting images of her miniature meals since January, on the adorable blog i'm so tiny. Since then she's produced a calendar of her photos, held an art show in a lingerie shop, and began marketing her photos on Etsy.

"There is something exciting about seeing an everyday object, which is inherently comforting, in a new perspective," Hlavac told Crushable. "It makes them wake up for a second, like a magic trick."

Hlavac's transformation of the normally mundane Twinky is a perfect example of what she's talking about. The photo of the familiar childhood snack has become one of her most popular prints among fans, Hlavac wrote in an email.

Hlavac herself doesn't personally eat Twinkies, or many of the other foods that she creates. The inspiration for a piece usually comes from the method itself, like "realizing a way to create citrus skin, or the cut side of bread, or how to color a cheese rind," Hlavac wrote.

While Hlavac considers herself only an "eager beginner" when it comes to cooking people-sized, edible meals, she'd love to partner up with a restaurant or chef to create miniature versions of their signature dishes.

Whose food would you like to see Hlavac miniaturize? Send suggestions below. Also, be sure to check out the slideshow of Hlavac's images above, the i'm so tiny blog, and her Etsy store.

Images courtesy of Jessica Hlavac