The “Food Photographer of the Year” 2025? Xiaoling Li with “The Elderly Having Delicious Food”

Celebrate the best of food (and wine) photography from all over the world: this is the mission of “World Food Photography Awards” 2025, which awarded the most beautiful photos dedicated to food world in 25 categories, in the last days, in a ceremony carried out by famous chef, restaurant owner, and Israeli food writer Yotam Ottolenghi, who reunited stars of food and wine, and of art at Mall Galleries, in London. At the first absolute place, the winner photo of category “Food for the Family” in collaboration with The Felix Project, the greatest charity organization of London for food redistribution of food in excess to over 1,200 community organizations: “The Elderly Having Delicious Food” of Chinese Xiaoling Li, the “Food Photographer of the Year” 2025, in which the concept of family is meant in its widest sense, including all the people and animals with which daily life is shared; therefore, protagonists are five elderly men who are sitting together and eating happily the famous snack of Sichuan, spring rolls, and “are arranging the disposition of the Dragon Gate, an expression used in China to refer to quartier friends who meet to talk, gossip, and share histories”, explains the author, underlining that “food makes these people happy, and make they enjoy a beautiful and joyful life”.
It is the first time for category “Bimi Prize”, which awarded “Buddhist Offerings”, photo taken by Us photographer Ryan Kost, depicting monks of a temple of Angkor Wat, in Cambodia, focused on the preparation of traditional Buddhist offers where “intrigued disposition of flowers and fruits emphasizes attention and respect”, according to the author. Anpther first time is that of category “World of Drinks”, conquered by Italian photographer Alessandra Bartoloni with her photo “Sunshine Gin”: “sun, ice, and a gin tonic. With dripping condensation, table in disorder, and afternoon hot which are winning the battle. But, who cares? It is cold, strong, and it is exactly what this day needed – writes the photographer in the description of the image – a toast to simple pleasures”.
A simplicity which is taken also in the category dedicated to street food, food wih fast and daily preparations in the world, which doesn’t certainly want to say banality or absence of spectularity: “soon after midday, enormous ovens are opened, and giant paranthas for iftar are prepared. Not only Muslims, but people from all communities, crowd around food stands making it a food paradise”, is image “Ramadan Special Parantha Halwa”, captured by the lens of Indian Debdatta Chakraborty, in Calcutta, during Ramadan. The winning photo in category “Fortnum & Mason Food at the Table”, dedicated to the photos of commensals and food on the table of restoration locals, is, however, “The Last Supper of Ana” taken by French photographer Frank Tremblay (also winner of subcategory “Produce” del Wine Photographer of the Year, ed) depicting twelve dishes that Mrs. Ana prepared to celebrate Revol (the party celebrating the end of the harvest in the region of Beaujolais, in France) at Domaine Louis-Claude Desvignes.
The fundamental role of food in the daily life of each man, in any nation of the globe, is testified also by the winning photo in category “unearthed Food for Sale”, dedicated to the best photos about bought and sold food in any angle of the world. Photographer Kazi Mushfiq Hossain wins the first place with his “Double Decker Street Tea Stall” showing a tea shop which is unique in its genre: in a tight alley of Calcutta, in India, the tradition meets intelligence through a two floor small shop where, downside, chai master works, while, above, the seller of betel leaves is employed. Food American culture is celebrated by “James Beard Foundation Photography Award”, which was awarded to the photo by Us photographer Luke Copping, depicting “Tom Moriarty - Moriarty Meats, Buffalo Ny”, who, together with his wife manages also the adjacent restaurant, Moriarty Meats by Buffalo, a butchery implementing the entire animal purchasing local meats, and inspired to European traditional butcheries.
But, there are also the photos narrating the histories behind product supply chains, from their production, to their transportation, up to when they become real dishes. From the winning photo of “Food in the Field”, “Hogging the Limelight”, taken by British Susan Lang, depicting a brood of Large Black piglets (a rare pork race, and the only one to be completely black in Great Britain, characterized by falling ears covering the eyes), raised outdoors, to the first classified in category “Bring Home the Harvest”, i.e. “Net Fish in Water Fields” by Chinese photographer Chang Jiangbin who took two children, who, after school, go together to paddy fields to fish, from category “Cream of the Crop”, dedicated to the photos about raw materials seeing on the highest step of the podium Dutch Dorien Paymans with “Flour Swirl”, which has, as subject, a cascade of flour that comes down from a sieve, to the one which awards the best photos of food preparations, “The Philip Harben Award for Food in Action supported by International Salon Culinaire”, recalling Philip Harben, first Tv chef of the Uk, won by Italian photographer Diego Marinelli with “La Matassa. A Real Work of Craftsmanship” which immortalizes the preparation of fresh pasta, symbol representing the cultural richness of Italian territory, and which becomes a means to narrate history, traditions, and centennial passions (in this case, the format is Matassa, typically produced in Irpinia). Arriving to the categories focusing on end products, such as “Marks & Spencer Food Portraiture”, won by photo “Crispy Kale” by French Simon Détraz, immortalizing a leap of black cabbage with a drop of olive oil, and cooked in oven at 180 degrees for 10 minutes with salt and pepper, and Tiptree Cake Award”, awarding the most incredible and evocative images of cakes, won by Canadian Audrey Laferrière with an image of a Pavlova, entitled “Pavlova’s Arabesque”; but also the category “Production Paradise Previously Published”, which collects already published works of photos, and, in which Max Jowitt triumphed with a photo without title offering a freeze image of the sauce coming out from his container during the filling of a hot dog; among the already published photos on social media, there is the winner in category “Food Influencer”, won by British photographer Paul Hughes with a front-row photo by Fergus Henderson, “chef, cooking revolutionary, mentor, I would dare to say - explains the author – icon”.
But, food is also “aestethic”, and categories “Hotel Art Group Food Stylist Award” award the attention to design, and innovation of photo contents, won by the series of photos “Spaghetti” by Costas Millas of “Food Photography & Food Styling by Costas Millas” from the Uk, and “Mpb Award for Innovation”, won by photo “Laundry Day” by Belgian Pieter D’Hoop, explaining how “I sometimes think about random ideas. I had the idea to put an octopus in a washing machine or dryer. This is the result”.
But, the categories dedicated to the most humanitarian aspects of food don’t miss, in which “World Food Programme Food for Life” stands out surely, in collaboration with World Food Programme of the Un, conquered by Bengali Md Rashid Un Nabi “Last Drink” depicting the drama of a son taking care of a father, who is seriously ill making him drink, but, who, as the author of the photo underlines, “could be his last sip”, and “Politics of Food”, which collects photo-journalistic images which show more the reality of political matters linked to food in the world: Jo Kearney won, from the Uk, with “Afghan Refugee Women Wait for Free Bread”, image in which he is testified as “Afghanistan women sit and wait for free brad to make charity to the market, because, according to them, it is very difficult to earn cash”.
In the end, “Claire Aho Award for Women Photographers” dedicated to women, and won by the photo by Lizzie Mayson, British photographer “Delfina, a Pasta Granny” immortalized in its house in Lazio, in Italy, while she happily looks to the great quantity of hay in Canepina which she prepared, put into fruit cases which positioned on her bed, and “the best part – explains Mayson – is that she will give them to the local church, where it will be cooked and distributed to homeless people”. Dedicated to the very young people in collaboration with one of the greatest chefs in the world, it is “The Jamie Oliver Youth Prize”, which is divided, in its turn, in subcategories “12 and under”, which is assigned to Maja Kowalczyk, with her “Family”, which narrates how, since parents began to curate a vegetable garden in her new house where thy moved to, “carrots are what I like the most to collect because we don’t know the dimension and form underground; and “13 – 17” conquered by the photo by Indigo Larmour, from India, depicting puri, “a typical dish for breakfast in curvy streets in Ancient Delhi, often cooked in enormous pots of boiling oil at the angles of the streets, and served with choles, a chickpea-based dish”, entitled “Early Morning Puris, Delhi, India”. In the category which awards students attending a course, “Student Food Photographer of the Year”, with the support of Royal Photographic Society, British charity association to make photography accessible to everyone, Spanish student Eva Maté Fernández with her photography “Strawberry Juice” wins, in which, some strawberries, left fallen in containers fulled with limpid water, create a moment of light and movement plays. And, last but not least, the category for photography enthusiasts which can’t afford a professional equipment, “On the Phone”, won by photo “Squash Blossom” by Linda Repasky from the States, depicting the first front-row of a courgette flower with its “curly tendrils”.