October 2023

3D Printed Cake

A team of food scientists has been working on creating 3D-printed food. Jonathon Blutinger of Columbia University is the leading author of a paper about how cooking may be software-controlled in the future. In this paper, Blutinger and his team provide information about past endeavors into cooking with technology and their project to 3D print a cheesecake.

This cheesecake is extruded into shape using 7 ingredients most of which are pureed to work with the machine. A big portion of figuring out how to get the ingredients to layer into a cake shape had to do with the structural integrity of each of the extruded recipes. The majority of the cake is made up of a graham cracker paste and is able to hold the much looser flavorings inside. Lasers were also used to help strengthen the graham cracker paste by solidifying it more through cooking.

The paper does talk of other challenges of implementing this kind of technology for cooking such as different ingredients can require different food handling methods and some ingredients can expire quicker than others. As for flavor, the scientists say it's pretty good, but also admit they are not chefs. See the 3D-printed cake and how was created below.

References

Blutinger, J.D., Cooper, C.C., Karthik, S. et al. The future of software-controlled cooking. npj Sci Food 7, 6 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41538-023-00182-6

Blutinger, J. (n.d.). A halved slice of edible 3D-printed cake. Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved September 25, 2023, from https://th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com/pm3tBrPTer1IqYhDIIxLd_nMQ2E=/1000x750/filters:no_upscale():focal(408x229:409x230)/https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/13/60/1360aba7-c4bc-4c81-833b-41fecbd25451/3d-printed-cheesecake.jpeg.

Columbia Engineering. (2023). The Future of Software-Controlled Cooking. YouTube. Retrieved September 25, 2023, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhVfU71tb2k&t=229s.

Sullivan, W. (2023, March 22). Scientists 3D printed a slice of cake. Smithsonian.com. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/scientists-3d-printed-a-slice-of-cake-180981862/