'''Basic Trope''': Items that ''look'' like real food are used as a display to ''sell'' the real food.
* '''Straight''': A wedding cake displayed in a bridal magazine is little more than Styrofoam covered in fondant.
* '''Exaggerated''': When Alice orders the cake for the wedding, the actual cake is mostly fondant-covered Styrofoam.
* '''Downplayed''': A wedding cake displayed in a bridal magazine uses fondant while the real one being advertised would have buttercream icing.
* '''Justified''':
** The picture in the magazine is only an advertisement for a bakery, a caterer with a pastry chef on the team, etc.; it's just not worth making an actual cake (which costs more) that no one's actually going to eat just to take a few pictures of it.
** Cakes are fragile (particularly chocolate cakes and/or cakes frosted with buttercream frosting), and the hot lights of a photography studio could result in the cake melting and falling over, dyes running, etc.
** In order to save money,or to prevent a buttercream-frosted stacked-layer cake from falling over and/or guests coming down with food poisoning from leaving it in the summer or tropical heat at the outdoor wedding, Alice has opted for one of those rent-a-cake things: The display cake is mostly Styrofoam (with the exception of the bottom layer for the cake-cutting), and then the "cake" is wheeled back into the kitchen "to be served" and replaced with sheet cake in the specified flavor and style.
* '''Inverted''': The bridal magazine features a picture of a real cake, either made just for the occasion, or the pastry chef opted to have his/her work done for Alice's wedding displayed in the magazine.
* '''Subverted''':
** The fake cake appears alongside other foodstuffs on display at the wedding, and AliceAndBob cut the cake together.
** The cake in the magazine is indeed a real cake.
* '''Double Subverted''':
** But they only cut through the bottom layer, the only part that was actual cake and not Styrofoam. The cake served to their guests is sheet cake, back in the kitchen.
** But it is scaled down, and shot from such an angle that it ''looks'' like a full-sized cake, and/or any flaws have been airbrushed out.
* '''Parodied''': [[Literature/TheEmperorsNewClothes "It looks like Styrofoam, but it's actually the most delicious and moist cake in the world! Only fools will think it's Styrofoam!"]]
* '''Zig Zagged''': ???
* '''Averted''':
** See "Defied"
** The bakery or pastry chef relies on word-of-mouth advertising only.
* '''Enforced''': See "Justified"
* '''Lampshaded''': "This isn't cake! This is Styrofoam covered in fondant!"
* '''Invoked''': Carrie's Cakes is taking out an advertisement in ''{{Bridezilla}} Magazine'', to showcase her wedding cakes and hopefully get business from brides-to-be (and grooms-to-be)... But she doesn't want to spend all that time and money making a cake that no one's actually going to eat and will probably just wind up in the trash after the photoshoot.
* '''Exploited''': ???
* '''Defied''':
** Carrie takes pictures of the finished cakes ''just'' before they are put on display, and keeps them in a portfolio, so that couples will look at them and see ''exactly'' what kind of work she can do. She submits a few pictures to the magazine to be used in the ad.
** Alternatively, Carrie and her team make a completely real and edible cake (albeit on a smaller scale), and eat it after the photoshoot. That way, the photoshoot showcases what she can actually do and what the cakes actually look like, but the cake doesn't cost too much to make or go to waste after the photoshoot.
** AliceAndBob have a cake on display during the reception (and eventually served) that is 100% real cake. If the wedding is outdoors, and they are concerned, they may omit the display part until just minutes before the cake-cutting.
* '''Discussed''': "This doesn't look like the one in the magazine..."
* '''Conversed''': "Well of course it doesn't look ''exactly'' like the one in the bridal magazines; those are Styrofoam; this is real cake."
* '''Deconstructed''': The problem is, [[CaptainObvious Styrofoam is a vastly different substance than actual cake]]. What's pictured in the magazine is likely to be ''very'' different when translated into actual cake. Not many prospective buyers know this, and that can lead to disappointment and disillusionment.
* '''Reconstructed''': The pastry chef makes every effort to make the cakes he/she actually makes look as good as the ones in the magazine, and explains to customers that while he/she will put in a lot of work to make it look great, that it may not look 100% like the ones in the magazines.
* '''Played For Laughs''': The cakes Carrie makes are ''exactly'' like the Styrofoam cakes in the magazine... Because Carrie is a CordonBleughChef and couldn't bake her way out of a paper bag!
* '''Played For Drama''': Alice has a {{Bridezilla}} meltdown when she sees that the cake doesn't look ''quite'' as pretty as the one in the picture.
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%% Optional items, added after Conversed, at your discretion:
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%%* '''Implied''': ???
%%* '''Plotted A Good Waste''': ???