Ink on Plates, or: Dining the Printed Way

Imagine this scenario: You are sitting in a nice restaurant, maybe celebrating your anniversary, maybe enjoying a long-planned evening with friends, but definitely looking forward to an exquisite meal. Then your food is being prepared by nothing less than … a printer. Dreams of the future?

Where Technology Meets the Art of Cooking

Well, no. At least not fully, and at least not if the world`s first 3D-printing restaurant FOOD INK is the place of your choice. Here, a Michelin-star awarded chef lets your taste buds indulge in fine cuisine while 3D printers literally put his creation on the plate – to perfection, of course.

Master chef Mateu Blanch who owns one of Spain’s best restaurants, “la boscana“, is in charge of preparing the ink with a difference: deliciously fresh food paste. This is then being filled into innovative printers such as byFlow Focus 3D-Printers or Foodinis which produce art-like meals in front of the guests’ eyes, accurate to the millimeter. And, as we all know: You eat with your eyes first, right?

From Bits to Cutlery

But this is not where the 3D-printed dining journey ends. FOOD INK takes a holistic approach to their unique event when they also leave the creation of cutlery or furniture to the established team of human being and machine: Their guests will sit on 3D-printed chairs, eat with 3D-printed knives and forks and will drink out of 3D-printed cups.

Again, while idea and design are left in human hand printers take over the execution, all thanks to the amazing possibilities of 3D printing. And as if this was not special enough, during the first course Virtual Reality headsets take guests even deeper into the sphere of technology.

FOOD INK on Tour

If the idea of printed food still sounds too futuristic for you to believe, this video from FOOD INK’s launch last summer might clear your doubts:

In case we wet your appetite, FOOD INK and their pop-up restaurant are on world tour in 2017. Locations can be found on their website, just have a look if they will stop anywhere near you. We are sure: This experience will exceed any expectations of what printers can do, with the possibilities seeming to be endless.

Which fields could printers be able to enter? Where could they take over from us? We’re looking forward to your comments below this blog post.