Finalising layout & Choosing a background

Here I've experimented with some different variations of backgrounds. Since I'd previously mentioned the use of muted/pastel colours in my illustrations, I thought why not add a splash to the background as well. First off, the blank white and grey just don't work as they clash too much with the images. The pastel colours look quite nice actually and add a touch more life into the whole thing, making it feel more appealing to a younger/child audience. The browns at the bottom don't work particularly well as solid block colours, especially the darker tone, however the lighter, more beige-type one in the bottom left has a much more well-suited tone and is fitting with the recipe.

​All of the above however, felt to have been lacking something, so in the final test I used an original photo of my flapjacks and overlayed it on to the beige-coloured background I mentioned before, but reduced the opacity to about 25% so that it wasn't so textured to distract from the images, but not too bland to lack liveliness. This, I think, will be my final decision on this outcome.