Reinventing food to wow ... and feed the masses.
By Jennifer Reingold
By Jennifer Reingold
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These culinary stars wield a mix of chemistry, mathematics, engineering, and old-fashion ingenuity, lifting everyday meals to another level -- some times literally.
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"Lllleeetttt the battle begin!"
We're on the set of Iron Chef America, the campy Food Network cult hit, and Cantu is about to pull out the big guns in his battle with "Iron Chef Japanese" Masaharu Morimoto. Dressed in green to promote Cantu Designs, he calmly prepares a cocktail flavored with horchata, a rice-based beverage, pours it into three glasses for himself and his two sous chefs, and then, with the aid of the digital camera rigged up to his foil-covered "food replicator," takes a picture of the group clinking glasses. Next, he takes the drink and pours it into the machine. Soon, the replicator spits out the horchata-flavored picture, which is served to the perplexed judges along with a dessert of Mexican chocolate pudding with beets and caramelized popcorn. Jeffrey Steingarten, a cantankerous Iron Chef judge and noted food writer, professes himself charmed and delighted. "Some of us love eating paper," he says with only a touch of irony. "Because that makes the dish." The show will air in July.
While that's certainly an attention-getting novelty on a show like Iron Chef--"We've never seen anything so wildly original," says the show's host--it's Cantu's "edible surfaces" that may offer the best opportunity for achieving his global ambitions. He believes that they could be used to feed people on long space missions, for military MREs, or even as a way to get long-lasting food to people in refugee camps. "My goal with this is to deliver food to the masses that are starving," he says. "We give them something that's healthy, that has an indefinite shelf life, and that is supercheap to produce. A guy like Paul Allen could take this thing and wipe out world hunger if he wanted to."
We're on the set of Iron Chef America, the campy Food Network cult hit, and Cantu is about to pull out the big guns in his battle with "Iron Chef Japanese" Masaharu Morimoto. Dressed in green to promote Cantu Designs, he calmly prepares a cocktail flavored with horchata, a rice-based beverage, pours it into three glasses for himself and his two sous chefs, and then, with the aid of the digital camera rigged up to his foil-covered "food replicator," takes a picture of the group clinking glasses. Next, he takes the drink and pours it into the machine. Soon, the replicator spits out the horchata-flavored picture, which is served to the perplexed judges along with a dessert of Mexican chocolate pudding with beets and caramelized popcorn. Jeffrey Steingarten, a cantankerous Iron Chef judge and noted food writer, professes himself charmed and delighted. "Some of us love eating paper," he says with only a touch of irony. "Because that makes the dish." The show will air in July.
While that's certainly an attention-getting novelty on a show like Iron Chef--"We've never seen anything so wildly original," says the show's host--it's Cantu's "edible surfaces" that may offer the best opportunity for achieving his global ambitions. He believes that they could be used to feed people on long space missions, for military MREs, or even as a way to get long-lasting food to people in refugee camps. "My goal with this is to deliver food to the masses that are starving," he says. "We give them something that's healthy, that has an indefinite shelf life, and that is supercheap to produce. A guy like Paul Allen could take this thing and wipe out world hunger if he wanted to."
Already, Cantu is part of a group working with the Institute for Advanced Concepts, the futurist arm of NASA, to help rethink notions of food in space. Paolo Gaudiano, CTO of Icosystem Corp., a Cambridge, Massachusetts-based applied research company that has received a seed grant to explore the concept, says Cantu helped his company understand the various ways to manipulate food. "We showed NASA the edible paper, and they thought that was an extremely exciting idea," says Gaudiano. Icosystem is applying for a Phase Two grant to study the idea further.
A bit closer to home, it's not hard to see how the paper could be used as a marketing or advertising tool by anyone hoping to sell food. "We think there's a real big commercial opportunity here," says Michael Preston, the chairman of Fuse Marketing Group, a Canadian company that works with such clients as Kellogg's and Lindt and is exploring a partnership with Cantu Designs. "We were quite mesmerized by this. Imagine if a dispenser gave you a sample [to taste]?" Fuse is currently preparing pitches to several clients and hopes to have feedback soon. Already, Cantu says he is consulting for several Fortune 500 companies, although he won't name names.
Cantu's creations have also attracted the attention of top executives at places such as Burger King Brands. Denny Marie Post, SVP and chief concept officer, sent a team to dine at Moto. They came back "floored," not only by the edible paper but also by Cantu's carbonated fruit, which had been stored in a pressurized chamber filled with carbon dioxide. When you bite into an orange or pineapple, you instantly feel a bubbly fizz on your tongue. "There's tremendous potential in this offering," says Post. "Wendy's offered fruit and failed. This, to me, is just a brilliant way to differentiate fruit."
Post was also intrigued by edible paper, but added an important reality check to some of Cantu's goals. "It's a neat idea," she says. "But our customer base isn't wildly experimental. Kids are much freer to use things, so maybe there's a way to use it in a kid's meal. But it depends entirely on how consistently it could be commercialized, and that is really his challenge."
Post was also intrigued by edible paper, but added an important reality check to some of Cantu's goals. "It's a neat idea," she says. "But our customer base isn't wildly experimental. Kids are much freer to use things, so maybe there's a way to use it in a kid's meal. But it depends entirely on how consistently it could be commercialized, and that is really his challenge."
Cantu admits that the cost of full-scale production is the $64,000 question, but he and Preston believe it's certainly attainable, if not now, then soon. "I've been losing money on my inventions for 5 years and will go another 20 if I have to," he says. "That's how much I believe in them." Yet he is hardly the first one to think about the applications for edible paper. Listerine breath strips use a flavored film, many pharmaceutical companies are working on delivery systems for medicines that don't involve swallowing pills, and a company called First Flavor claims to have patented the use of a similar film for the specific purpose of taste sampling. "[Cantu's] technology is a wonderful way of getting people's attention," says Jay Minkoff, First Flavor's president and CEO. "But there are hundreds of patents out there."
Although Cantu says he can deliver nutrients on the paper, he can't yet create the feeling of fullness. But that is hardly a deterrent to someone who thinks as he does. "This is where we get into nanotechnology," he says, warming up again. "Just look at those little dinosaur sponges in your bathtub. We're not that far away. If you have time-release pills, you could have time-release expanding cheesecakes." Paper cheesecakes that then expand to fill your stomach? Sure but before you can explore the concept further, Cantu's attention-deficit disorder kicks in and he's off on another tangent, an application for edible paper that will help avoid identity theft. "Okay, check this out. A whole stack of edible ATM cards. You slide it into the ATM slot, authenticate it (with a thumbprint and unique bar code) and the flavor is your PIN." When you're finished, you simply eat the card. Far-fetched? Well, yes. But when it comes from the strange yet wonderful mind of Homaro Cantu, you can't help but think: Why not?
Next: Weird Science: Eat This!
Back to: Reinventing the Future of Food gallery
Jennifer Reingold (jreingold@fastcompany.com) is a Fast Company senior writer.
Although Cantu says he can deliver nutrients on the paper, he can't yet create the feeling of fullness. But that is hardly a deterrent to someone who thinks as he does. "This is where we get into nanotechnology," he says, warming up again. "Just look at those little dinosaur sponges in your bathtub. We're not that far away. If you have time-release pills, you could have time-release expanding cheesecakes." Paper cheesecakes that then expand to fill your stomach? Sure but before you can explore the concept further, Cantu's attention-deficit disorder kicks in and he's off on another tangent, an application for edible paper that will help avoid identity theft. "Okay, check this out. A whole stack of edible ATM cards. You slide it into the ATM slot, authenticate it (with a thumbprint and unique bar code) and the flavor is your PIN." When you're finished, you simply eat the card. Far-fetched? Well, yes. But when it comes from the strange yet wonderful mind of Homaro Cantu, you can't help but think: Why not?
Next: Weird Science: Eat This!
Back to: Reinventing the Future of Food gallery
Jennifer Reingold (jreingold@fastcompany.com) is a Fast Company senior writer.
