Bots & Pots presents itself as the first restaurant in the world where all the dishes are composed by robots, almost autonomously. This restaurant actually uses GammaChef robots, the work of the eponymous start-up, also from Zagreb (Croatia). At the same time, it makes it the best promotion possible.
GammaChef is a robot capable of preparing all kinds of unique dishes, as long as their recipes are programmed. The ingredients are first placed in dedicated compartments, then the robot takes care of selecting, measuring, seasoning, mixing and cooking them. The promise is to deliver absolutely identical meals, both in proportion and taste, where a human may not be consistently so accurate every time.
Rest day for robots
Currently, the restaurant’s menu features, among other things, chili con carne tortillas, Thai red curry, shrimp and zucchini pasta, chicken and truffle gnocchi, and a seasonal salad. Be careful, the restaurant is only open from Monday to Saturday, because on Sunday the robots “rest”.
This way of proceeding is reminiscent of Cook-e, a robot capable of measuring, cutting, mixing and cooking all kinds of ingredients to make good little dishes served in less than two minutes. This French invention caused a sensation at Viva Technology in 2021, proof that relatively simple recipes can now be entrusted to machines.
The increasingly important role of robots in restaurants is also tending to become more democratic, such as Pazzi, the robot pizzaiolo from the eponymous Ile-de-France start-up (whose two restaurants have closed), or even the presence in a fast- North American food of a robotic arm capable of preparing fries.
In Paris in particular, Eat Cala offers carbonara and Bolognese pasta prepared not by an Italian cook, but by a robot. The start-up has raised 5.5 million euros to sustain its pasta business, which began in the fall of 2020 via delivery platforms such as Deliveroo and Uber Eats, before opening a “hard” restaurant near from the University of Jussieu. At Eat Cala, we do not bet on robotization to seduce geek students, but we want to seduce the taste buds with sourced ingredients. For that, you still need humans to offer quality products!