When AI Takes Over From Restaurant Chefs

Where will Artificial Intelligence stop? Everywhere and in everything, it’s increasingly governing our lives, to the point where we now find it in places and for purposes we wouldn’t have imagined not so long ago. Case in point: these restaurants that will employ AI to replace their more or less Michelin-starred chefs, as we’re seeing in Dubai.

First in Dubai

As one might expect, this sort of thing could only emerge in Dubai. It’s indeed in this Emirati city that a restaurant run entirely by an “AI chef” will open next September.

Called WOOHOO, this restaurant of the future will be located in the city centre, a stone’s throw from the world’s tallest skyscraper, the Burj Khalifa, and may well be franchised to other locations around the globe if the experiment proves successful.

In practical terms, whilst there will still be humans preparing the dishes, everything else will be managed by Artificial Intelligence; from personalised menu choices to the ambience of the moment, including service that will naturally be digital and interactive. All this under the watchful and entirely virtual eye of chef “Aiman”, whose name references “AI” for artificial intelligence and “man” for, well, man.

That said, this AI won’t be able to (yet?) test everything since, even though it originates the choices, its dishes will be cooked by humans and also tasted by them before being added to the menus. The aim is for these humans to provide their opinions and feedback so the AI can integrate them and, where appropriate, improve the results. A sort of sharing and complementarity of skills to enhance creativity and pleasantly surprise customers. After all, why not ?