These New Food Tech Inventions Will Upgrade Your Life
Technology has come an incredibly long way in just the past decade, with the Internet of Things (IOT) taking over lots of home-use appliances, like the Amazon Echo and Wi-Fi headphones. Food has been a huge part of this technological takeover, with tons of inventions being created for both industry and home uses. Some of these inventions are incredibly fun and cool to upgrade your personal love of food at home. For home gardening, shopping, or cooking, these are some of the coolest inventions aiming to make your food experiences convenient, high-tech, and personal.
Salad Sultan – Wearable Micro Greens You Can Grow
Now you can wear your accessories and eat them too! This cool microgreens growing kit, revealed at the 2016 Food Hackathon & Forum in San Francisco, was developed by microgreen growing kit revolutionaries Hamama . Using a patented "seed quilt" technology, they were able to design growing kits that allow microgreens to take the shapes of headbands, armbands, necklaces, and other accessories that people wear within a couple of weeks of easy growing. Just dip in water then spray once a day until grown!
Additionally, Hamama also is planning a future release of patterned Seed Quilts next year for more creative ways to wear your microgreens.
This makes microgreens fun to wear — and makes for a tasty on-the-go snack that you can show off and have fun with!
The Salad Sultan isn't available yet, but the microgreen growing kits will be available in the next few weeks – first to California, then eventually to the rest of the nation.
Farmbot – Automated Home Gardening
Make home gardening extremely simple with this incredible technology! Farmbot is designed to do everything you need for gardening, whether it be planting seeds, watering, or even killing invasive weeds. Because the blueprints are open-source, it's easy for anyone to download and make their own (although Farmbot also has DIY kits available). You can control the machine through an app that lets you pick what vegetables you want to grow and monitors the growth progress. Home gardening couldn't be simpler!
The blueprints/technology are free to download, but pre-made kits are also available online for preorder.
Juicero – Cold-Pressed Juice Vending Machine
Don't rely on sugary store-bought juices again, and use this simple machine instead for healthy, nutritious pressed juices! When you purchase a Juicero vending machine, you sign up to get specific packs of juice on a regular basis as well. These are shipped the same day they are made for optimal quality, and all you have to do is insert the packages of pressed fruits and veggies into the machine to get your own quality, cold-pressed juice!
The packs also have QR codes that allow you to not only monitor the quality of the produce inside, but also see exactly where it came from – giving a whole new meaning to product transparency!
These next-level vending machines are currently available in California, Arizona, and Nevada, and plan to go nationwide in the future.
Nomiku – Wi-Fi Enabled Sous Vide Device
Sous vide is a gentle cooking method typically seen in high-end restaurants that usually needs vacuum sealed bags and an immersion circulator — equipment that's expensive to get at home. Nomiku makes it incredibly easy to make your own sous vide at home — and no vacuum sealing is required! All you need to get started with this device is a pot, a heatproof bag, ingredients for your recipe, and the Nomiku appliance to get started!
The Nomiku does come with its own primer of recipes, but you can get more from the internet as well (or add your own once you get pro with your device). After downloading recipes from the Tender app and sending them to your Wi-Fi-enabled device, Nomiku is programmed to perfectly cook the recipe while sealing in a ton of the nutrition and giving your food amazing flavor and texture.
You can remotely control the device from your phone, making it super easy to cook and keep track of delicious, Michelin Star-quality food!
Habit – Meal Delivery Based on Your DNA
DNA testing can be used to identify everything from your gut microbiome to your ancestry. Now, Habit uses it to create your own personalized meal plans.
When you purchase a test kit from Habit, you're able to get your DNA analyzed to see how your body works to process nutritional biomarkers like carbohydrate processing ability. You then get a personalized nutrition profile that identifies the foods and nutrients best suited for your needs, as well as personal nutrition coaching. These then get turned into personalized meals that are delivered straight to your doorstep, providing you with the perfect foods you need for your personal, optimal health!
Habit is taking preorders for test kits for a limited Bay Area release at the beginning of next year, but hopefully they can expand their service nationwide — or even globally!
Nima – Know If Your Food Contains Gluten
This powerful little device can test for gluten in less than 3 minutes with any food. All you have to do is place the food in a single use capsule, put it in your Nima device, and let the test run. It then tells you if the food has gluten or not, and these results can even be shared through the Nima app if desired, creating a network of knowledge on whether certain foods from certain places contain gluten!
These devices are currently sold out, but plan to be shipped out within the next month.
Shopwell – Personalize Your Shopping For Your Health
Shopwell is one of the most powerful apps you can download for your personal health. The app takes your requested nutrition preferences (low fat, gluten-free, athletic training diet, etc.) and turns it into customized shopping recommendations based on where you shop. It does this by developing a custom health scoring system based on your nutritional desires, and ranks products in the stores you shop in on a 0-100 scale. It then makes recommendations for you to switch to higher-scored products while shopping (by scanning in products on the app) or after shopping, helping you improve your diet and shopping habits around what you need!
The app is free for anyone to download on Android or IOS, so go ahead and give it a shot!
All of the above inventions give a personal twist to what the future of food can be. With these inventions (and more to come in the future, no doubt), it's easy to see a future of food that is high-tech, nutritious, and truly made personal.
This article was originally published by FoodBeast on November 30, 2016.