Food Paintings

Original Oil Painting

On Saturday mornings, I have time to make something special for breakfast. When we have muffin mix in the house, my children request that I make muffins. This is a simple breakfast I can make for them when my wife works on Saturdays. After Jude, Noelle, and I each eat three muffins, and my youngest son Luke eats two, we account for 11 muffins. This means there is always one muffin left in the pan. I often save the muffin in some sort of plastic container and put it on the counter for someone to eat another day, but no one ever does. That final muffin sits on the counter until it gets nice and moldy and has to be thrown away. I ask myself, why do I save it when I know it will just be thrown away?

Original Oil Painting

We celebrated my son’s 5th birthday with some birthday cake. After almost two weeks of trying to eat the entire cake, we just got tired of eating it. The last two pieces became so dry and stale that no one wanted them.

Original Oil Painting

The music students at the school I teach at sell cheesecakes as a fundraiser, and I bought a variety of cheesecakes, thinking that we could share them with my family the next time they visit. When my family came to visit, we offered the cheesecake to everyone. Everyone took a slice, except no one wanted the triple chocolate flavored one. Now most of us like a little chocolate, but no one was interested in the one that had triple the chocolate, so it just sat on the counter for hours. After everyone left, I moved it into the refrigerator only to watch it sit in the fridge for several days. Finally, I decided before I threw it away that I would try one bite of it.

Original Oil Painting

Pizza is a popular choice of food in my family. Every time we make it, there always seems to be two leftover slices of pizza that no one wants. I am the person that often cleans up after mealtimes, so it is my job to decide whether to keep the last two slices of pizza or throw them away. I know my family well enough that if I choose to keep them, they will likely never be eaten.

Original Oil Painting

On my eight-year-old son’s 7th birthday, he asked for a giant jar of pickles for his gift because he loves pickles. My wife and I gave him a giant jar of pickles for his gift but so did his aunt. So, to his surprise, he received two giant jars of pickles that he insisted he would consume himself. This is the last remaining pickle from those two giant jars.

Original Oil Painting

One afternoon, I made a couple of boxes of Kraft Mac and Cheese for my kids and myself to eat for lunch. We all enjoy eating Mac and Cheese, and we usually always have a significant amount of noodles left in the pot that I have to refrigerate or throw away. I hate saving the remaining noodles because no one eats the leftovers, and I hate throwing away food because I was raised not to waste it. So I often overeat because I have this frame of mind about the importance of finishing my food. So I ate two full bowls of Mac and Cheese, and I was so full that when I got to the end of the bowl, there was nothing left except one noodle stuck to the spoon. I just couldn’t pick up the spoon to take the last bite I was so full.

Original Oil Painting

One morning for breakfast, my son poured himself a bowl of fruit loop cereal and he ate the entire bowl except for one last loop floating in the bowl. I ask myself why? Why couldn’t he eat the last one?

Original Oil Painting

Original Oil Painting

My children love donuts, and whenever their grandfather visits, he usually brings each child two to four donuts. Despite my children’s love for donuts, they do tend to get sick of them after eating them several days in a row. Because donuts become stale after a few days, no one wanted this last donut, so it just sat in the box until it was rock hard and no longer wanted.

Original Oil Painting

Every December, it is a tradition with my family to make Christmas-themed sugar cookies that my kids decorate. There were a few cookies they put way too many sugar sprinkles on. Every Christmas Eve, my kids each get to pick a cookie to leave for Santa Claus on our special plate that looks like him. When Santa came to our house, he refused to eat the cookie with the absorbent amount of sugar on it and left it but enjoyed the other two cookies and the glass of milk that was left for him.

Original Oil Painting

Cherries are one of my 9-year-old son's favorite fruits. He gobbles them up like there is no tomorrow. He would eat a whole bag if he was allowed to. My family and I have been enjoying eating our lunches outside on our front porch this spring and we served cherries as part of one particular meal. My 9-year-old son was eating nothing but cherries and when he got to the last one it accidentally slipped out of his hand and rolled on the ground. He picked it up and was just about to eat it until I stopped him. I mentioned to him that the cherry was just rolling on the ground are you sure you want to eat it. He didn’t seem to care because he loves cherries and was so focused on eating them all. Luckily, he agreed not to eat it and set it on his plate. What is seen in this painting is the last cherry that didn’t get eaten and for a good reason.

Original Oil Painting

One morning I made some blueberry muffins for my family for breakfast. I served everyone their muffins with butter brushed on top and everyone except for my 5-year-old son normally eats the entire muffin. When I was cleaning up from breakfast it was no surprise to me to see my 5-year-old son’s plate still had one muffin remaining on it. But what made this muffin so intriguing to me was that there was only one bite taken from the top of the muffin. In looking closer at the muffin, I noticed he only ate the muffin where I put the butter. So, he ended up having a little muffin with his butter for breakfast. When I took the muffin to my studio to light and photograph it, I noticed how the bite taken from the top of the muffin cast a profile bite taken out of the muffin. I thought it was very intriguing and added to the narrative and helped define the bite taken out of the muffin.

Original Oil Painting

My five-year son likes to eat pizza but doesn’t like pepperonis on his pizza. He usually eats only one maybe two slices of pizza, but on this particular day, he ate the first two slices I gave him and wanted two more slices. I asked him if he was sure, and he said he was really hungry. So, I gave him his third and fourth slices of pizza. My entire family finished eating, and he was still working on his last two slices. I was working on cleaning dishes when he runs over and says, “Dad look, I made a portrait of you! The top crust is your hair, the pepperoni is your eyes, the other pepperoni is your nose, and the bottom slice is your beard.” I thought it was priceless that my son was creative enough to use the remains of his last two slices of pizza to make a portrait of me.

Original Oil Painting

My five-year-old son’s favorite meal is peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a banana. One day, after announcing he was finished eating his lunch, I went to throw his remaining food away; but when I took a closer look, I was struck by the way he ate his sandwich, leaving the crust and his last few bites. I found the half-eaten banana interesting as well. It made me question why he just couldn’t finish the last few bites of his food.

Original Oil Painting

I made grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch one day because my kids love them. They usually request two sandwiches each, but for some reason, my five-year-old son was not in the mood for grilled cheese sandwiches that day. I only gave him one because I knew he wouldn’t eat all of it. This particular grilled cheese caught my attention because he only ate a few bites out of the middle of the sandwich and left the crust, leaving an unwanted grilled cheese sandwich on his plate.

Original Oil Painting

This spring my family celebrated my son’s 9th birthday, and we were looking to do something different because we were limited with what we could do because of COVID-19. I suggested that we get an ice cream cake from Dairy Queen because he never had one before. My wife and I have not had one since we were kids and we both remembered them being delicious. He agreed that he thought it would be a great idea to try one. So, I called the nearest DQ which was about 45 minutes from my home to find out if they still sell them. They said they did, and they told me the different flavors they had. I asked my son what flavor he wanted, and he chose cookies and cream. I made the 45-minute drive to DQ to pick up his ice cream cake. When I got back from DQ we celebrated his birthday by singing happy birthday to him. I then cut and served everyone in my family a slice of cake. While everyone was eating, they commented on how delicious it was and how it was such a good idea to get this cake. As everyone finished their cake slices, they put their empty bowls on the counter. After I finished my slice, I approached the counter to notice several empty bowls except for one. I called out for the person who didn’t eat their entire slice. “Who didn’t eat the cookie crust?” My daughter responded that it was her. “Why didn’t you eat it?” I asked. “You said you loved it.” She responded, “I liked everything but the crust.” I said, “you love cookies, how can you not like the cookie crust?” “I don’t know I just didn’t like it,” she said. This last bite caught my attention and I thought it would be a great painting to be a part of my last series.

Original Oil Painting

One day my wife was in a mood to bake. So, she searched on the internet for a dessert that sounded good and used ingredients we already had in our pantry. She found a recipe for strawberry pretzel pie. The crust consisted of crumbled pretzels with a strawberry gelatin-like top. Which I taught was an interesting combination, but we were all willing to give it a try. Everyone had a slice and for the most part, enjoyed it. After everyone was served there was only one slice remaining in the glass pie dish and our main refrigerator was full. So, I put the dessert on the top shelf of our garage refrigerator. Our garage refrigerator is the place where leftovers get forgotten about. So about 4 weeks later I opened our garage refrigerator to clean it out and there on the top shelf was the forgotten last piece of strawberry pretzel pie.

Original Oil Painting

Apple pie is my wife’s favorite dessert, and she prefers to have pie for her birthday over the traditional cake. For her last birthday, we forgot to set a timer while making her apple pie, and the pie got burnt. We decided to try at least one piece of the burnt pie so it wouldn’t get thrown in the garbage. The apple filling part was still okay, but the top got so burnt that it wasn’t enjoyable to eat. This was the last piece of burnt apple pie that no one wanted.