I am Samira Kazan, founder of AlphaFoodie – a Plant-based Instagram account that holds a mix of food artistry, experimentation, and culinary curiosity. This includes smoothie bowls, breakfasts, treats, and more (with lots of natural rainbow-colored food, avocados, and tropical fruits). Because everyone deserves to eat like a king!

It’s amazing how everything has developed during the two years I have been on Instagram, especially as it all started with me just photographing my own food art to share with friends. I suffered from severe mid-morning hunger pangs and loss of focus whilst doing my senior post-doctoral research so I wanted a way to keep focused in a healthy way and began to experiment with all sorts of new, exciting super-food ingredients I never heard of before like chia seeds, quinoa and other health foods (lots and lots of avocados always please!). Soon I realized that this could be healthy, delicious, and beautiful and I wanted to share this with friends online to encourage them to try these delicious foods too.

As someone who has a passion for maths and science (Oxford graduate with a doctorate degree in Engineering Science), I love bringing science into my edible art (a lot of mathematical patterns were inspired by a love for Mathematics); I use a lot of pastel colors and shapes in my smoothie bowls and, more recently, I’ve loved experimenting with dry ice – 10-second nice-cream anyone? Yumm! I also am obsessed with flowers so always have a fridge stocked with edible flowers for my colorful artworks. Another thing that I love doing and it's generating a lot of attention from the online community is the love for aloe vera (I started a series and one of my episodes was watched by more than 6 million people)! People look forward to the aloe vera videos and ask for them on daily basis (series 10 currently).

I’ve always gone by the 80/20 rule – 80% of the time I will try to eat healthy, balanced meals, and the other 20% I like to go a little wild and enjoy whatever I like so you’ll see a mix of the two of my feed.

People are becoming more in touch with their food on an aesthetic level and it’s lovely to be able to inspire other people to incorporate healthy, beautiful elements into their own dishes. The saying: we eat with our eyes first is so true! In my case camera first.

More info: Instagram | alphafoodie.com