WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF

Move over Heston Blumenthal there’s a new printer in town.

Later this month, a 3D Printing pop up restaurant, called “Food Ink”, will open in London and settings start at £250 per head.

The restaurant promises to offer a completely different dining experience, rather than being served food that has been cooked and prepared by a chef, customers will be offered a selection of 3D printed food items by the British tech company.

3D printing food as a concept isn’t new but Food Ink have taken it to a new level and pushed it into the public eye with a pop up restaurant where all of the the food on the menu will be made using 3D printers operated by chefs who are all using their own original, 3D printing specific, recipes. And, just in case that wasn’t enough for all the technophiles who are no doubt beating a trail to the door all of the restaurants furniture, from lamps to chairs and cutlery to glassware have been 3D printed for the occasion.

The whole restaurant has been designed by the owners from the ground up to feel futuristic – from virtual reality headsets and visual projections on the surrounding walls to Artificial Intelligence composed sounds and music.

The 3D Focus printers used for the event are manufactured by a Dutch company called Flow. Focus is a new line of portable, multi-material 3D printers and can print with over 20 different materials and anything that can be turned into an edible “ink” can be put through the its nozzles.

Meals will be printed layer by layer and, in true futuristic style will offer the clientele a unique taste experience that they won’t be able to find anywhere else – after all, not only does 3D printing allow you to print chocolate but it allows you to create and combine new flavors. Orange vodka flavored raspberries, perhaps or raspberry flavored steak? Forget what you think you know about food…

Even though this could easily be portrayed as a vision of the future, today the concept isn’t supposed to represent a model of a practical potential future but rather to serve as an inspiration for the possibilities that the technology might enable. And, perhaps more critically, it asks questions about the very nature of food itself and how it is produced.