Food selfies: London restaurant lets customers pay with photos

Who thought pausing to take a food selfie before digging into your meal could actually pay off?

A pop-up London restaurant will become the world's first diner where customers pay for their meal by taking a picture of it.

The eaterie, aptly called The Picture House, will open its doors to hungry punters keen to snap their grub on Wednesday.

Diners who visit the Soho restaurant, launched by food brand Birds Eye, have to settle the bill by taking a picture on Instagram and uploading it onto their social networks using the hashtag #BirdsEyeInspirations.

The pop-up diner has been set up after research reveals that more than half (52 per cent) of Britons regularly take photos of their meals.

While one in ten (11 per cent) take at least one snap of their food every week, and 9 per cent confess to not being able to go a single day without photographing a picture of one of their dishes, according to the Birds Eye survey.

And foodies have an eye for how to present their meals, with more than a third of Britons (39%) admitting they artfully arrange their food on a plate with the intention of sharing it online, while more than a third (34%) take pictures of their meals to flex their artistic muscles.

Some 16% of Britons admit they are obsessed with achieving the perfect food selfie, and 60% say their evening dinner is their favourite meal to snap and upload online.

Birds Eye is launching the novelty restaurant as part of its 'Food of Life' campaign - a major new advertising offensive aimed at changing people's perceptions of frozen food by focusing on how most
Britons eat and interact at meal times.

Birds Eye marketing director Margaret Jobling said: "Taking photos of food enables people to show off and to share their meal time moments - from the every day to the very special. We wanted to tap into this trend and create a new reason for people to talk about and sample our Inspirations range."

The Picture House pop-up restaurant also opens its doors at the Ice Tank in Soho on Wednesday 14 May.

Diners will enjoy a two-course meal and be treated to tutorials from top food photographer Marie Marte to learn how to take the ultimate food photo.

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