Restaurant Photography in Cairo: A Practical Guide for Owners

Why Cairo's daylight decides your shooting schedule

In Cairo, direct midday sun in summer is almost overhead, so it throws short, hard shadows straight down and blows out pale plates. Around the December solstice the noon sun sits much lower, so light rakes across the table, casts long shadows and shows texture on grilled and fried food. The practical answer is to shoot in the morning or late afternoon year-round and treat midday as a last resort.

Window light is more reliable than open sky in Cairo because it is directional and you can control it with distance. Put the table about one meter from a north-facing window, or any window not receiving direct sun, and turn the dish so the light comes from the side or slightly behind. If the light is flat, move the table closer. If highlights on sauce or oil are harsh, move it back.

• June to August: shoot 8:00 to 10:30 or 16:30 to 18:30; avoid 11:00 to 15:00 unless you diffuse the window with a white sheet.
• December to February: the low sun reaches deep into rooms, so shoot 9:00 to 11:30 and again from 15:00; watch for long shadows across the plate.
• March, April, September and October: light is closest to neutral; 9:00 to 11:00 and 16:00 to 18:00 work for most dishes.
• Shoot each dish at 45 degrees and at 90 degrees overhead, then pick the angle that shows the layers, garnish or grill marks.

What to prepare before you shoot a dish

The photo has to match what leaves the kitchen, so shoot the actual portion with the actual plate and garnish. A guest who orders based on a photo and receives something different leaves a bad review, and on delivery apps that costs you repeat orders. Keep a small notebook or phone list of the exact plate, bowl or basket each dish is served in so the styling is repeatable.

Shoot more than one frame per dish: one clean straight-on shot, one overhead, and one close crop of the main ingredient. Clean the rim of the plate with a cloth before each frame, and keep a small spray bottle of water for herbs that wilt under light. For drinks and desserts, shoot them last so they do not sit while you work through hot dishes.

• Use a plain background: a wooden board, a linen cloth or a neutral wall. Busy backgrounds compete with the food on small phone screens.
• Turn off the phone flash and overhead fluorescent lights; mixed light gives food a green or orange cast that is hard to fix later.
• Use a phone at its main lens, not the wide-angle, and tap to focus on the front edge of the food.
• Photograph Egyptian and Middle Eastern dishes such as grilled meats, rice dishes, stews and mezze with the sauce and garnish visible, since those are the details guests look for.

Delivery apps in Egypt: Talabat and elmenus

Two delivery platforms appear in our Egypt coverage: Talabat and elmenus. This site has a photo spec page for Talabat Egypt at /delivery-photo-specs/talabat/egypt/. For elmenus, check the upload screen in your partner dashboard, because image sizes and cropping can change and the dashboard is the source of truth.

Delivery photos are viewed on a phone in a list, often at thumbnail size. That means one dish should fill most of the frame, with the plate edge visible and no clutter. Shoot a horizontal frame and leave space around the dish so a square or vertical crop does not cut off the food. Check every image at thumbnail size on your own phone before uploading.

• Match the photo to the menu item name and portion exactly.
• Avoid text, logos or watermarks burned into the image.
• Keep one visual style across the menu: same background, same angle, same light.
• Re-shoot bestsellers when the recipe, plating or portion changes.

Google Business Profile, your website and printed menus

Your Google Business Profile is often the first place a guest sees your food, and photos there are shown in different crops across search and Maps. Upload a mix: a few dish close-ups, a wider shot of the dining room and one of the kitchen or team at work. Keep the profile photos current, since old photos of a previous menu mislead guests.

For your own website and QR menu, use the same dish photos at larger sizes so the menu looks consistent from phone to desktop. Printed menus need the highest resolution and a crop that leaves room for the dish name and price beside the image. If your menu is printed in Arabic and English, keep the photo composition simple so it works in both layouts.

• Website hero: wide horizontal crop of a signature dish or a table spread.
• QR menu: square or vertical crops that load fast on mobile data.
• Printed menu: large file, generous margins, no thin text over the food.
• Google Business Profile: refresh dish photos when the menu changes seasonally.

Social posts and seasonal dishes

Instagram and similar feeds favor vertical and square formats, so shoot a vertical frame at the same session as your menu photos. For dishes that change with the season, such as heavier stews in winter or lighter mezze and grilled dishes in summer, plan a short shoot at the start of each season rather than re-shooting the whole menu.

Ramadan and other busy periods bring different menus and different serving times. Shoot those dishes in advance, in the same window light, so your feed and delivery listings stay consistent when the kitchen is at its busiest.

Editing phone photos without changing the dish

Good editing fixes light, background and crop. It does not add food, change the portion or make a dish look like something it is not. Straighten the frame, lift shadows slightly, correct the white balance so whites look white and greens look green, and crop to the format you need.

FoodPhoto takes a real photo of your own dish and improves light, background and crop for menus, delivery apps and social, keeping the food as it is, and every photo comes as a kit of sizes. Use it for your own channels such as your website menu, Instagram, Google Business Profile, QR menu and print; it cannot guarantee approval by any platform, so always check each platform's upload screen.