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Ink seems so retro now that machines can custom-print myriad 3-D objects, including snacks.
Open Wide: 3D-Printed Foods Made to Eat: Photos
Ink seems so retro now that machines can custom-print myriad 3-D objects, including snacks. Here are some of the most impressive edibles to emerge from 3-D printers so far. Cornell University’s Creative Machines Lab is at the forefront of 3-D printed food. The lab’s Fab@Home project led by PhD candidate Jeffrey Ian Lipton uses solid freeform fabrication to print interesting snacks. Lab researchers worked with the French Culinary Institute to print this space shuttle from cheese. 3-D Printing Is Getting Ready to Explode
Cornell Creative Machines Lab
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Printing with chocolate is a no-brainer given its consistency but what used to be a novelty has started going mainstream. Chocolate companies are using 3-D printing tech in new ways, like this tractor printed for Nestlé and Android KitKat’s Chocnology exhibition.
Paul Jacobson, Flickr Creative Common
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Using food like ink can be much trickier than generating a mold from 3-D tech. Several years ago Windell Oskay and his team at Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories custom-built a 3-D fabricator that fused sugar together into sculptures. More recently 3D Systems released the ChefJet printer to produce confections and cake-toppers.
Windell Oskay, Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories
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One day the pizza question could be, Fresh, frozen or printed? The Barcelona-based startup Natural Machines printed fresh pizzas using a 3-D machine prototype called Foodini in 2013. At the same time, NASA gave a grant to the Systems and Materials Research Corporation in Austin to develop pizza-printing capabilities for space. 3D-Printed Pizza to Feed Colonists on Mars
Youtube Screengrab, Natural Machines
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The crew at Cornell University’s Creative Machines Lab did print thick cookies containing the letter C but German designer Ralf Holleis produced fewer crumbs. He collaborated with a professor at the University of Applied Sciences Coburg to print holiday cookies from red and green colored dough.
Cornell Creative Machines Lab
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Printed meat doesn’t sound all that appetizing but that hasn’t stopped anyone from trying. The startup Modern Meadow is working on developing humane, bioprinted meat while Natural Machines used their Foodini to create real swirled hamburgers -- as well as the buns and cheese to go on top.
Youtube Screengrab, Natural Machines
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These chips might look like ramen noodles but researchers at the Cornell Creative Machines Lab printed them from corn dough. The flower shape allowed for even frying, Fast Company reported. If you want pasta, Natural Machines says its Foodini printer can serve up gnocchi and ravioli.
Cornell Creative Machines Lab
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NO Research envisions using 3-D printing to address world hunger, although some might squirm at their proposals. Their food printer can generate nutrient-rich snacks from alternative ingredients like algae and even mealworms.
TNO Research
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If telling kids to eat broccoli because it’s “little trees” doesn’t work, perhaps Natural Machines’ 3-D printed spinach quiche will. To tempt picky young eaters, the Spanish startup produced vegetable snacks in the shape of butterflies and dinosaurs using their Foodini printer.
Natural Machines
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A girl in Canada experienced an unusual allergic reaction to blueberry pie — she was not allergic to any of the pie's ingredients, but instead reacted to antibiotic residue in the food, a new study suggests.
Did you know that it's possible to be allergic to the sun? In fact, there are some very odd things that it's possible for humans to be allergic to.
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Shortly after eating a slice of blueberry pie, the girl experienced facial flushing, hives and abnormal breathing. She was taken to an emergency room, and treated with drugs used for allergic reactions, including epinephrine, and recovered.
A team of doctors then investigated what might have caused the girl's reaction. Although the patient was allergic to milk, an analysis showed the pie did not contain milk. Doctors also performed tests to see if the girl was allergic to other ingredients in the pie, such as blueberries, eggs or nuts, but the tests all came back negative. ( 8 Strange Signs You're Having an Allergic Reaction)
Further analysis showed that the pie contained residue from an antibiotic. The doctors tested the girl for an allergy to streptomycin, an antibiotic used as a pesticide on fruit. And, indeed, she reacted to streptomycin in much the same way as she had responded to the blueberry pie.
Although the researchers did not have access to enough of the pie to confirm that it contained streptomycin specifically, the study results suggests that the girl's allergic reaction was caused by streptomycin-contaminated blueberries, the researchers said.
Allergic reactions to antibiotics in food — such as beef and milk — are rare, but have been reported. The new study is the first to link an allergic reaction to antibiotics in fruit, the researchers said.
The findings serve as a reminder to doctors in cases of unexplained allergic reaction. "Don't forget to think about antibiotics," said study researcher Dr. Anne Des Roches, an allergist at CHU Sainte-Justine, a health center affiliated with the University of Montreal in Quebec.