of course we all do! How else can I explain my Donna Hay obsession???

Yes, I really, really like colored pictures. And I think it is charming to acknowledge (not admit to) liking them.

Couldn't agree more! If it doesn't have coloured pictures, what's the point?

Give me "Donna Hay" or "Delicious" any day. Great recipes and glorious pictures.

You just can't salivate over black and white photos. Sounds more like an art magazine.

how the heck can it be "Illustrated" if the pictures aren't in color?? hello? I want to see that whatever I make at least moderately resembles the picture. if in nothing BUT the color. B&W just doesn't cut it.

I love Cook's Illustrated because it has a television show (Live! Colored Pictures! Talking!) to go along with it. I think of CI as more of a monthly professional journal rather than a magazine. For food porn, I turn to Gourmet, Bon Appetit and Food & Wine.

You can't smell black and whites the way you can the colored photos of a good stylist. That's what makes me want to go to the grocery and get the items for a new recipe--I have to think I can smell it from looking at the photo.

Amen!

Not me. I like pictures as well as the next four-year-old, but I enjoy the technical feel of CI. It seems more workman-like to me.

Ohh color just makes the picture look more real and foody.. B&W and sketches just don't look like something i would eat!

I chose not to subscrube to Cook's Illustrated BECAUSE it didn't have colored pictures. I want to SEE what it is that I am supposed to be cooking and how it is supposed to look. Gives me something to aim for!

Oh please!

Give me coloured pictures everytime. I can even cook from recipes with no pictures. At least I can imagine what a recipe should look like. But never, ever give me a black and white photograph of a dish. It is off-putting and unmotivating.

I sort of like the "no-nonsense" feel of CI, and I guess the b&W is part of that. Truth be told, I'd rather have color pictures, though.

I suspect is has a lot to do with the cost of full-color printing, and the fact that they don't take ads. Most small-to-medium sized publications only use color when they have an advertizer who has paid for a color ad that will print on the same sheet.

If they would only send crayons along with your issue...or better yet, make them all connect-the-dots. Throw in a little mystery, you know?

I like color pictures, too. And glossy paper.

At least they don't use newsprint. Newsprint paper gives me the heebie-jeebies.

Mensch71 said it well; CI is not food porn, it is informative. Wanting it to have stylized, fake-food color pictures is like wanting medical journals to have graphic novel illustrations.

Exactly! The picture is what attracts my attention and ultimately decides whether or not I even read the recipe. The illustrations are kind of cool, but they're no food porn.

I agree with Kate. I like food porn. Who doesn't? But I like that CI doesn't feel it has to prove anything by including pretty pictures. Anyone who buys it,like me, buys it for the well-tested information.

I'm so glad I'm not the onnly one! I also extend this 'coloured picture' preference to cookery books. Otherwise, it would be much harder to apply my rule of thumb: if I see 3 recipes in a book / magazine that I would like to try, it justifies buying it :-)

Well, they do have color pictures on the last page. They have them all on one page though, not WITH the recipe.

Magazines are like heroin to me. And food magazines? The double whammy. And I have never been able explain why CI is the antidote. I don't buy it. I don't read it. I don't even leaf through it thinking that this time I might just be missing something. I don't know if it's the lack of glossy photos which clearly are important tom me. It's just unsatisfying. I'm glad it's not just me that finds it that way.

I hear you (pictures) and raise you one(laziness).

Using their cookbook as an example, (the first one) when I don't know how to prepare something, I always grab for Bittman's H2CE before I grab for Cook's Illustrated. Because I don't want to know exactly HOW to do it perfectly, I want to know *basically* how to cook it.

It's just not... inspiring. I mean, even the Kuma Sutra gives you multiple suggestions, granted detailed ones, but at the end of the day, what's the fun if someones already done all the off-the-beaten path stuff for you.

I'm all about the color pictures. It's the pictures that'll lure me into purchasing a new cookbook.

The real thing about CI is that it's just plain boring. The conclusions are interesting generally but to have to read the entire article? If I wanted to read exhaustive acedemic papers I'd be a thesis adviser.