3D打印食品是否會像微波爐一樣普及

Lynette Kucsma wants to sell the 21st century’s version of the “Foodini”—an automated meal-assembly machine that creates homemade meals faster and more efficiently than human hands—is the first product by Natural Machines, Kucsma’s company.

利奈特o庫斯瑪想要賣“21世紀版的微波爐”。作爲他的自然機器公司推出的第一款產品，Foodini自動化食品加工機，能夠更快、更高效地製作家常美食。

Natural Machines is marketing the Foodini as a 3D food printer. That sort of futuristic branding may scare consumers from the supremely out-there concept. Kucsma’s not worried, though.

自然機器公司將Foodini稱爲一臺3D食品打印機。這種頗具未來主義色彩的品牌定位或許會嚇跑一批消費者，不過庫斯瑪並不擔心。

“When people first heard about microwaves they didn’t understand the technology, but now 90% of households have microwaves,” she says. “We see the same thing happening with 3D food printing, but on a much faster scale because we adopt technology faster and the technology advances faster.”

“當人們第一次聽說微波爐時，他們也不理解微波爐的技術原理，但現在90%的家庭都有微波爐，”她說。“我們認爲3D食品打印也會經歷這樣的發展歷程，但人們接受3D食品打印的速度要快得多，因爲現在我們採用科技的速度，以及科技進步的速度，都比以往更快了。”

In reality, the Foodini isn’t a 3D printer, per se. 3D printers generally run at one speed and handle a single ingredient: plastic. The Foodini is programmed similarly, but offers multiple speeds and works with numerous ingredients at the same time. The box-shaped contraption is approximately 17 inches wide, 18 inches high and clocks in at 33 pounds.

實際上，Foodini並不是一臺嚴格意義上的3D打印機。3D打印機基本上是按照同一個速度運行的，處理的原材料也只有一種——塑料。Foodini的運行程序和3D打印機類似，但它提供了幾種不同的運轉速度，並且可以同時處理幾種原材料。它的箱型機身大約有17英寸寬，18英寸高，重約33磅。

Natural Machines’s first iteration of the Foodini works best for time-consuming projects like pasta, elaborately shaped breads and cookies. Users first select a recipe from the touch screen or send their own to the Internet-connected machine. They then make the individual components of the dish from scratch and put the components into Foodini’s stainless steel ingredient capsules. From there, Foodini whips up dinner.

作爲自然機器公司的第一代Foodini，它最擅長的就是做那些比較耗時的菜，比如意大利麪和需要造型的麪包及餅乾等。用戶首先要從觸摸屏上選擇一份菜譜，或者也可以把自己喜歡的菜譜發送到這臺聯網的機器上。用戶只需要備好原料，並且將原料放進Foodini的不鏽鋼原料容器就行了，Foodini會完成製作過程。

If the user is making a recipe for ravioli, for instance, the Foodini prints the bottom layer of dough, the filling and the top dough layer in subsequent steps. It reduces a lengthy recipe to two minutes construction time and ensures that no one has to clean a countertop caked with leftover dough and flour.

打個比方，如果用戶做的是意大利餃子，Foodini會相繼“打印”出下層餃子皮、餡料和上層餃子皮。漫長的包餃子過程會縮短至2分鐘，用戶也不必在事後收拾粘乎乎的麪粉案板了。

Version 1.0 can’t cook or heat food, but Kucsma expects to add those features in future Foodini models. She also anticipates food companies making ready-to-print items, so users can skip the ingredient prep stage entirely.

Foodini的1.0版目前還不能烹飪或加熱食物，但庫斯瑪打算在以後的機型上添加這些功能。庫斯瑪還預計，食品公司以後或將推出各種“打印耗材”，這樣一來用戶就可以完全跳過準備食材的環節。

Foodini will go on sale in the mid-2015. “The demand is so high that we’re thinking about rolling out 1,000 machines for our first run,” says Kucsma. The device costs $1,300 and will be available online. Kucsma is initially targeting chefs, but says she’s also been in talks with both corporate retailers and food manufacturers (non-disclosure agreements prevent her from providing company names and details). Kucsma says the food industry is embracing the technology. “They are asking us how this will impact their market and are getting involved quite early to figure out how to get engaged with it.”

Foodini將於2015年年中正式上市。庫斯瑪表示：“市場需求非常高，我們打算首輪推出1000臺機器。”每臺Foodini的售價爲1300美元，消費者可以從網上訂購。庫斯瑪最初瞄準的目標客戶是廚師，但她也表示，她目前也在與企業零售商和食品製造商進行接洽（由於保密協議的緣故，她無法提供合作企業的名稱和細節）。庫斯瑪表示，食品行業非常歡迎這項新技術。“他們問我們，這項技術將對市場產生什麼樣的影響，而且他們都在積極參與這項技術，以便搞清楚能夠如何利用它。”

She adds that culinary professionals see it as a tool to unlock creativity, not as their replacement. “We’re trying to reinvent food experiences, so what [Kucsma] is doing with using technology to change foods fits right into our wheelhouse,” says New York City caterer Peter Callahan, who has thrown events for President Obama and corporate clients Ralph Lauren, Tory Burch and Kate Spade. Callahan plans to purchase a Foodini—and he feels the device’s appeal extends beyond the restaurant kitchen. “[Kucsma] is pricing her machine so it can be purchased by a home cook,” he says. “I could see it being in a lot of houses.”

她補充道，很多專業廚師都把它當作一種釋放創意的工具，而並不認爲它會搶走自己的飯碗。紐約宴會美食家彼得o卡拉漢曾經爲奧巴馬以及拉夫o勞倫、托裏o伯奇和凱特o斯派德等企業客戶提供過宴席。他說：“我們正在致力於徹底改造食物的體驗，所以庫斯瑪利用科技改造食物的做法，和我們的方向是一樣的。”卡拉漢自己也打算購買一臺Foodini，他認爲這臺設備的吸引力並不侷限在餐廳的廚房裏。“它的定價是普通家庭也能承擔得起的，所以我認爲它會進入很多普通家庭。”

Inventor Alex Lightman has been advising Natural Machines and sees tremendous potential for the hardware to be in any space-crunched cooking space—including airplanes. “People would want to fly on the first airline that uses it because they won’t have to have airline food,” says Lightman. “And ten years from now, if you talk about airline food as a bad thing, people will look at you strange and say that airline food is fabulous.”

自然機器公司的顧問，發明家艾利克斯o萊特曼認爲，Foodini在一些烹飪空間狹小的場合下擁有廣闊的應用前景——比如在飛機上。“人們可能會想要乘坐第一家使用Foodini的航空公司的航班，因爲這樣他們就不必吃飛機上的食物了。10年後，如果你再說飛機上的食物難吃，人們可能會用奇怪的眼神看着你，對你說飛機上的食物其實很好吃啊。”

Other large-scale institutions like sports stadiums, transportation hubs and school cafeterias could use it to turn their plastic-tasting offerings into something more gourmet, says Lightman. “Think about someone going to Harvard. If you’re paying that much for tuition, you don’t want to eat crap food.” (Lightman would know; he attended Harvard.

萊特曼還表示，其他大型場所和機構也可以用它製作美食，來取代以往味同嚼蠟的產品，比如體育場館、交通樞紐和學校食堂等等。“比如有人上了哈佛大學，既然你已經交了那麼多學費，你肯定不想吃難吃的飯。”（這一點萊特曼一定深有體會，因爲他上過哈佛。）

Interestingly, Natural Machines is based in Spain. After a career working at several startups and as Microsoft’s public relations manager for Europe, Africa and the Middle East, Kucsma followed her husband to Barcelona when he took a new job in 2009. She formed Natural Machines—and the company now has 20 employees scattered across the globe.

有意思的是，自然機器公司實際上是一家西班牙公司。庫斯瑪在創辦該公司之前，曾經在好幾家創業公司工作過，並曾擔任過微軟公司歐洲、非洲及中東地區公共關係經理。2009年，由於她的丈夫在巴賽羅那找到了新工作，她便隨丈夫一同搬到巴賽羅那，隨後創立了自然機器公司——目前該公司在全球各地已經擁有了20名員工。

Some are working for little or no pay. “To date, we’ve been bootstrapping the company,” says Kucsma. The initial $800,000 in capital has come from the founders (Kucsma started the company with its CEO Emilio Sepulveda and entrepreneurs Alex Moreu and Rosa Avellaneda) and from loans. Natural Machines has secured another $1 million in financing and is looking for an additional $5 million from investors. Later this year, Kucsma plans to relocate to Los Angeles to establish a five-person U.S. base for the operation while keeping company offices in Barcelona and China.

有些員工領的薪水很低，有些甚至是免費工作。庫斯瑪表示：“到目前爲止，我們的發展完全是自力更生。”該公司80萬美元啓動資金主要來自創始人的投資（庫斯瑪與CEO埃米利奧o賽普爾韋達和企業家艾利克斯o墨利歐、羅薩o阿韋亞內達等人共同創辦了這家公司）和貸款。現在，自然機器公司已經獲得了100萬美元投資，並且正在試圖從投資者手中再拉來500萬美元。今年晚些時候，庫斯瑪打算在洛杉磯開設一間5人的美國總部，同時繼續在巴塞羅那和中國設置辦事處。

As Kucsma envisions it, one day everyone will be able to tap a button on their smartphones when they head home to tell their Foodini to get to work. By the time the user arrives home, there will be hot, fresh ravioli—or whatever else strikes a user’s fancy—waiting. “We are a food manufacturer, shrunk down for everyone’s personal taste,” she says.

在庫斯瑪的設想中，總有一天，當我們臨近下班時，只要在智能手機上輕輕一點，就可以讓Foodini替你在廚房裏忙活。等到用戶回到家裏，Foodini已經爲你做好了熱騰騰的餃子——或是任何能夠挑逗用戶味蕾的美食。庫斯瑪說：“我們是一家食品製造商，只不過是專門針對每個人的獨特口味。”