Does anyone expect the food they’re ordering to look exactly like it does on the menu? Of course not. But we do expect that the pictures we’re seeing should at least be somewhat based in this reality.
On this issue, the customers have spoken. In San Francisco, a new restaurant has incurred the ire of hangry locals for using outlandish AI-generated images of its “food,” San Francisco Gate reports, putting a fresh-from-the-oven twist on false advertising. The backlash is so heated that the eatery, Grind & Unwind, was even defaced with graffiti.
Vandalism is a bit much, but it’s easy to see why the menu provoked some strong reactions. Rather than being appetizing — let alone giving you a realistic idea about what you’re going to be eating — Grind & Unwind’s menu images are a freak show from Food Uncanny Valley. The bread looks designed to trigger trypophobia. And the “pulled pork with slaw” resembles a writhing mass of coral tentacles.
Don’t just take our word from it. A recent thread titled “Yum, slop” posted on the r/SanFrancisco subreddit with a picture of Grind & Unwind’s menu has gotten nearly 700 upvotes, with the comments from locals tearing into it more ruthlessly than we ever could.
The bread “looks like reptile skin,” and the croissant was compared to “alien larva.” Two said the pulled pork looked like cordyceps, or just “infected.” It made one user’s skin crawl and the adjective “unsettling” was used to plenty of upvotes. All told, it was an overwhelmingly negative response.
“If they put this much effort into marketing, just imagine how much they care about food,” one commenter mused.
The owners AJ and Lyndsey Lozano weren’t “expecting” such a strong response, and don’t understand why everyone is up in arms about their AI food slop.
“I want people to come to our restaurant, but, like, why is this such a big deal that it influences people on such intense level,” Lydnsey Lozano told SFGate. “Like, is it really that horrific that you have to act on such a feeling?”
It clearly is for a lot of potential customers. In the thread, one would-be diner wrote that they “instantly lose respect for any business (big or small) that uses AI slop imagery for their branding, logos, advertisements.” Another said a restaurant using AI was an instant sign that “they don’t care about quality.”
And it isn’t just fake internet outrage. On July 2, Lozo discovered that someone spray painted the word “seriously” over their awning in red. Clearly illustrating its controversial staying power — and how immediately eye-catching the menu is in the bad sense — one Redditor snapped a photo of a passerby taking their own picture of the garbled AI menu.
That this is happening in San Francisco, a city overrun with tech bros and generally speaking a haven for pro-AI sentiment, is pretty telling. Some people may not care or notice AI slop, but there’s clearly a large contingent that find it instantly appalling. AI advertising local businesses in particular seems to be grinding a lot of people’s gears, with a recent piece from 404 Media documenting the growing backlash to AI-generated flyers for bars and restaurants that all look the same.
AI tends to be heavily marketed to small businesses owners, promising it can handle creative duties to help their business stand-out. Maybe as more realize just how provocative AI slop is, some will get second thoughts about letting ChatGPT choose how they want to present themselves to the world.
The Lozanos, for their part, have removed their AI menu display.
“Honestly, we just kinda wanna move forward and forget about the sign and hope people come try our quality food and really make it a cool spot that locals can gather,” Lyndsey Lozano told SFGate.
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