If you thought portraiture was difficult, think about how perishable hot foods are. When you photograph it, you’ll want it looking fresh, happy, steaming, and appetising. A normal photo shoot – where you photographs something to perfection – takes a few hours, but the food will only remain good-looking for about 10 minutes at the most.

So what do you do? God knows, I’ve never tried. But my new friend L over at Still Life With laid down the gauntlet…

This month, I got inspired by Chez Pim’s post a week ago about “the ugliest food photo ever.” It’s stunning that a professional actually published this photo of Tuna Tartare in the New York Times, taking what sounds like a decent recipe and making it look just awful.

Of course, because this was a food article in the NYT, it also included a recipe. The challenge is obvious: Make the food (see, I knew there would be a DIY element to this, even though it is a food DIY rather than a photography DIY), and then take a photo that doesn’t look disgusting.

Read the challenge over at L’s blog, and then get cracking! If you get any good results, tell her, and me too!

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