to be pigged off when my food looks nothing like the picture..

[IvorWindybottom]

.. in the recipe book

This happens quite a lot. Tonights chicken jalfrezi was nothing like

Do they really use the picture of the food they have made or do they get arty types to make a dish that is aesthetically pleasing?

I've seen some funny pictures somewhere online with the picture in the book or from pintrests or wherever compared to the actual picture of their attempt. Nailed it. V funny.

If they posted a picture of real food nobody would like to cook it/buy their book.
The same with vegetables on the seeds packets-the ones I grew NEVER look like these on the picture.
Pictures are not only heavily edited but also contain stuff you wouldn't guessed.For the purpose of taking a picture of food sometimes it is being replaced with inedible items,imagine using the glue to hold it together or lettuce leaf made of wax as I recall from TV programme more than 20 years ago

It's staged, it's made by professionals, it's well lit and photographed by a professional and it's not going to be eaten so they can varnish it if they need to!

It's like if you use some expensive make up that some model advertises you're not going to be transformed into a model, sorry to have to break that to you.

Apart form the varnish and all the other fakery, I think they also use mostly raw or close to raw food (such as raw vegetables, meat which is only quickly seared and so on.)