You can now bring home a 3D printer that dishes out custom chocolates at your whim and fancy. And that's just the beginning. Experts believe a wholesome 3D-printed meal could land up on your plate soon. Just not in the way you think.
"Over the past decade, 3D food printing has progressed from a novelty to a serious research field with actual industrial applications. These include [customized] chocolate and pasta applications, commercialized by Mondelez and Barilla spin-off BluRhapsody," Kjeld van Bommel, senior consultant, 3D Food & Pharma Printing, at the Dutch Organization for Applied Scientific Research, told Tech Times in an interview.
And therein lies the rub. 3D food printing is already a reality at a commercial scale, but isn't feasible for our kitchens just yet.
Personalized Nutrition
Listing commercial applications for 3D printed foods, Bommel points to Magic Candy Factory, which sells 3D printed gum candy selfies, and Nourish3d, which doles out personalized nutraceutical gum candies.
Bommell believes the success of the UK-based Nourish3d clearly shows that the creation and successful commercialization of personalized food is already possible.
"People are willing to pay a premium for a product that was uniquely made for them. Additionally, they themselves played a role in the creation of the product as they decided which ingredient should be involved," said Bommel. He shared that over the years, TNO's focus has shifted to areas of personalized nutrition. As part of the EU-funded Performance project, between 2011 and 2015, TNO helped create a printer that creates medical nutrition for people who have trouble swallowing (dysphagia).
Now, as part of the Digital Food Processing Initiative (DFPI), TNO is working on a printer that will be capable of printing food products with personalized levels of a large number of ingredients.
Users will be able to adjust the amount of macro-ingredients such as fats, proteins, and carbohydrates, as well as micronutrients, like vitamins and minerals. Together with personalized flavoring, the device will let them dial in the caloric content of their creations.
He expects the field lab trials for the printer and its printed products to be conducted later this year
"We hope that the results of this project will lead to more personalized 3D printed food products making it to the market," said Bommel.
Off the Table
As things stand, it won't be long before you'll be cooking with personalized 3D-printed food products. But printing the ingredients in your own kitchen is still some while away.
"I have a 3D printer in my home that prints toys for my kids, so the capacity to get a 3D printer in our homes isn't far off! To make the jump from toys to foo, though, will take time," Rosalyn Abbott, Assistant Professor of Biomedical and Materials Science Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, told Tech Times in an interview.
Bommel agrees and shares that at the beginning, they too envisioned 3D food printers to end up in our homes. But they now see them as being far more useful and practical for centralized production or for the creation of food products in a professional setting, like in restaurants.
He illustrates this by pointing to the chocolate printer, which might not find much use in a house once the novelty wears off, as opposed to it being used by a baker who'll use it every day for this single purpose.
"In order for a 3D food printer to "earn" its space in a home kitchen, we feel that such a printer should be very versatile and should be used (nearly) every day," said Bommel.
Such versatile printers bring with them their own set of issues. For starters, Bommel points out that many companies must offer compatible cartridges that can print different types of food.
And even when they are available, producing such "off-the-shelf" food bioinks will require an infrastructure of manufacturing, quality control, and distribution that is not currently developed, said Abbott.
Even when these approaches are developed, Abbott said further studies will need to determine how long and at what temperature we can store these 'food grade' materials, how to safely cook them at home, and, of course, how much all this is going to cost consumers.
"Templates that consumers can press "print" on will also be required where sophisticated products will likely have more than one bio-ink to provide flavor and texture," said Abbott.
Considering all this Bommell feels that 3D food printers will continue to exist in a commercial setting in the near future.
"This also matches quite well with the altered manner in which people shop (more online), that matches with the ordering of (personalized) food products that will be made in a [remote] central production hub, and then delivered to your home," said Bommell.
Mayank Sharma is a technology writer with two decades of experience in breaking down complex technology and getting behind the news to help his readers get to grips with the latest buzzwords and industry milestones. He has had bylines on NewsForge, Linux.com, IBM developerWorks, Linux User & Developer magazine, Linux Voice magazine, Linux Magazine, and HackSpace magazine. In addition to Tech Times, his current roster of publications include TechRadar Pro, and Linux Format magazine. Follow him at https://twitter.com/geekybodhi
