Bacon Floating in Cola and Chips Baked Into Muffins: Just Eat's AI Food Photos Are Getting Roasted

Just Eat has paused a trial of AI-generated food photographs and issued a public apology after bizarre images of menu items spread across Reddit, Instagram and X. The company is removing the flawed pictures from live restaurant listings.

The trial was designed to help independent restaurants add menu images without paying for professional food photography. But the software generated pictures from menu names and descriptions, seemingly struggling with regional UK food terms and simple spelling mistakes.

The results included fried eggs, bacon and sausages floating in a glass of cola.

Regional Food Terms Leave AI Confused

A Northern Ireland café selling a 'bacon and egg soda' was shown with its fillings submerged in carbonated cola. The dish is a breakfast sandwich made with traditional Irish soda bread. In Manchester, a 'chip muffin', also known as a chip butty, appeared as potato fries baked inside sweet muffins.

Other listings produced equally strange results. 'Garlic Bread Plane', a misspelling of 'plain', became an aeroplane made from toasted garlic bread. A cheese roll was transformed into sushi filled with slabs of cheddar, while a Sauvignon Blanc described with fruity tasting notes appeared as wine containing chunks of watermelon.

A listing for 'burger sauce' produced a miniature hamburger inside a sauce container. A 'jacket potato' became a winter puffer jacket printed with a potato pattern.

Viral Images Force Just Eat to Halt Trial

Screenshots circulated on Reddit, including the Just Eat UK subreddit, and Instagram accounts such as @uknewestfoods. Some users mocked the results, while others questioned whether inaccurate photographs could mislead customers and damage confidence in restaurant listings.

Just Eat acknowledged that the technology had teething problems and apologised. The company said accurate representations of dishes were essential to customer confidence. It has paused the rollout while the software is refined, but has not abandoned AI-generated imagery altogether.

Food photographs can help restaurant listings attract customers and generate sales. But professional photography can be expensive for small independent takeaways with extensive menus.

Just Eat says it already works with tens of thousands of restaurant partners on food imagery, including funding professional local photographers. The AI trial was intended to offer a faster, cheaper way to add pictures to thousands of smaller listings that might otherwise lack them.

Realistic Mistakes Could Be More Damaging

Absurd pictures of sausages floating in cola or bread shaped like an aeroplane are unlikely to fool customers. More subtle mistakes could prove harder to spot. An image might show the wrong portion size, omit toppings or depict spiced salt and pepper chips as plain potato sticks.

Customers could then receive something different from what they expected, leaving them disappointed with both the takeaway and the delivery platform. Generative AI produces images based on patterns associated with words and other examples. It does not necessarily know what a specific restaurant actually serves.

Just Eat also allows takeaways to photograph their own cooked dishes and upload the pictures directly to the platform. That option remains available alongside the company's funded professional photography service.

The paused trial highlights the challenge of using automation to reduce costs without sacrificing accuracy in a business where customers rely on menu images to decide what to order.