004: Trusting Your Instincts And Owning Your Brilliance

EPISODE SUMMARY

In this episode, Dani Colombatto talks about how to live a more colorful life by bringing color to your surroundings whenever and wherever you can. She discusses the importance of being your own champion and trusting your intuition. We talk about cultivating your own personal style rather than simply following trends. This episode is all about trusting your instincts and owning your brilliance.

Dani’s childhood influenced her career as an author, food stylist, and food blogger. We chat about it in this episode of the podcast. We also talk about how her first two cookbooks came to be and what she has planned for her third.

About Dani

Dani’s career began in 2014 as a food, fashion, and product stylist, and since then, has taken on many forms. Dani’s gone on to art-direct, photograph, and style campaigns, as well as develop recipes for many brands, including Veuve Clicquot, Urban Outfitters, SKYY Vodka, Method Home, West Elm, and many more. In 2020, she wrote her first cookbook, titled, The 30-Minute Pescatarian Cookbook. In 2022, she followed it up with her second, titled, The Complete Fish Cookbook, both published by Rockridge Press. She is known for her eclectic, vibrant, colorful style, and bright, punchy recipes. You can find Dani’s recipes on her Instagram and website, both titled “Dani Goes South.” She lives in Austin with her husband, Benjamin, and two cats, Greg and Lou.

Episode Breakdown

Dani started styling and shooting recipes back in 2013 during a much less happy time in her career. Dani takes us back to that moment in time and tells us what her life was like.
The moment when Dani realized that her work had become a calling instead of something that just made money.
How failure can be an underrated learning tool.
What Dani wishes the general public understood about what it’s like to work as a professional food stylist.
The frustrating thing about how much time it takes to be both food stylist and photographer on projects.
When Dani first discovered her love for vivid colors.
What it felt like when she first started developing her style.
Trusting your instincts and owning your brilliance.
How Dani balances her own personal style with the style of the publication or the brand that she’s working with.
What it was like to grow up with a family that loved food and how that influenced Dani’s writing.
How Dani’s cookbooks came to be and the best piece of career advice she received that’s helped her in her career.