What started off as a “gallery” to store food pictures occupying a huge chunk of space on Nowsin’s (@nowsin_prova) phone soon turned out to be a passion for trying out multiple cuisines all over the town. This is just one of the many stories of the 17 Instagram food bloggers who met up on 13th July, 2018 at Tao Town; meeting each other for the first time ever.
Bloggers present included the likes of iffybiffys, moretobrunch, foodieshe, howueating, mahbubhjoy, thefeastersbd, fooddiaries_mh, foodmaniactim, dhanmondifoodlovers,
__thesam.__, nowsin_prova, foodologybd, foodie_06
Food is at the heart of all they do and that was what really united them. A challenging part of food blogging is the feeling of not being able to reach out to the correct audience but this community seeks to change that by highlighting the similarities of like-minded people.
In uniting these bloggers, the community has been able to be a great motivation and support for them. Their dissatisfaction towards the reviewing culture of Bangladesh has also been a dominant factor on how this group came together. Whatever they post on Instagram is purely out of our love for food, unbiased, and unpaid and they take pride in that. They also understand that tastes vary from person to person so when they visit any place to eat, they don’t really rely much on ratings on their social media pages.
Even though their posts revolve around food, there is quite a bit of diversity amongst the community. For example, Moushita (@moretobrunch) and Ifreet (@iffybiffys) travel often, giving them the opportunity to showcase an assorted range of world cuisines. Moreover, there is @foodie_06 who posts about clean eats and fitness- with healthy food recipes and herbal benefits every now and then. Lastly, in case of diversity, there are foodies concentrating on specific areas, for example @dhanmondifoodlovers, foodstagrammers who are always on the hunt for yum cheap eats like @foodeinberg and so many more! Our community is packed with bloggers posting about food, yet with a different purpose or outcome, making it a diverse and enjoyable bunch!
Speaking to Ifreet Taheea (@iffybiffys) we got to know more about the get-together:
Dhanmondi was a convenient location due to majority of the bloggers living around that area and Tao Town was chosen as the venue. The owners were more than cordial to accommodate all of them. In fact, they included items on their bentos that are yet to be launched because they wanted their feedback!
It was an eventful occasion where individuals who are fond of each other’s work on social media got to meet each other in person. They shared their hearty tales of how their journey started, the stories behind their Instagram handles etc. over a hearty meal.
This was only the first of many such meetups as the community seeks to enhance a more non-commercial/unpaid/unbias food scene in Dhaka.