Cultured, fermented and 3D-printed foods

Meat the future

Cultured, fermented and 3D printed foods are almost on the table, but will dinner still taste good?

by John Lehndorff

As the brilliant comedian and social commentator George Carlin once wisely said: “The future will soon be a thing of the past.” In the world of food, dining, farming and grocery shopping, the future isn’t waiting its turn. Companies are fabricating entrees that are cell-cultured or fermented, 3D printed and constructed from pea protein, banana peels or seaweed. Facial recognition software is invading the supermarket aisles. Electric chopsticks promise to make food delivered by drones taste better. Here is a glimpse into the futuristic meals and technology that will change how we cook, dine, eat and shop in the next decade.

Take a bite of the meativerse

Israeli company Future Meat plans on having its cellcultured meat on U.S. shelves this year. … Juice chain Pressed is offering animal-free egg white protein made by EVERY Company using fermentation to replicate animal protein. … Colorado-based Meati Foods is introducing an alternative steak product made almost entirely of mycelium, or mushroom “roots” … London’s Symplicity Foods is turning mushrooms and miso into plant-based meats using a fermentation process. … Austria’s Arkeon Biotechnologies is using fermentation to transform captured carbon dioxide into proteins. … Umaro Foods is making plant-based bacon from seaweed. … Israeli startup Plantish is using 3D printing technology to create plant Meats is using 3D printing for plant-based meats that creates whole cuts of vegan meat. … General Mills’ new alternative dairy cream cheese is made from pea and dairy proteins using microbial fermentation technology.

First law of robotics: make coffee

A Cambridge University research robot is capable of tasting salt and other ingredients in a recipe and adding more as needed. … Japanese researchers have created a set of electrical chopsticks that create a salty taste in the user’s mouth. ... Under development: a TV screen you lick and taste a range uses an electric current to stimulate the taste buds and make food taste better. … Panera Bread is testing the CookRight intelligence to monitor coffee volume and temperature using predictive analytics. … Betty-Bot robots are bringing orders to restaurant tables at the Marriott Fort Lauderdale Airport, while a robot at the AC Hotel Miami Dadeland delivers food from several restaurants to rooms. … Robot servers at Robotazia in deal with glitches like the robots’ tendency to malfunction when using concentrated ingredients to mix more than 100 cocktail varieties at home.

Here comes the ice cream drone

Residents of Canberra, Australia, can order more than 250 of Coles supermarket’s most popular grocery items by on-demand drone delivery service. The drone hovers and lowers the package to the ground. … DroneUp is providing drone delivery from 34 Walmart locations in six states including Arizona. The top-selling drone-delivered item at one of these stores is Hamburger Helper. Seriously.

Scary food tech on aisle 9

technology that checks the faces of customers buying alcohol. A recent survey from Piplsay shows 69% of customers believe grocers should inform shoppers when facial recognition is in use. … Philadelphia cream cheese installed a device to diffuse the smell of freshly baked cheesecake into the dairy aisle. … Instacart has announced it will cover tips that customers pull back after their orders are delivered, an offense known as “tip baiting.” … Minnesota-based company Recombinetics is set to sell beef from cows whose genes have been altered through CRISPR technology to tolerate hot weather.

Growing veggies on the ocean floor

The startup Nemo’s Garden was founded in 2021 to prove that herbs, fruit and Pepsi has created a limited run of cola-infused pepperoni to be served at pizzerias

Using bitcoin in metaverse restaurants

Recycling waste in a tasteful way

John Lehndorff hosts Radio Nibbles Thursdays on KGNU. Listen to podcasts at news.kgnu.org. Email questions or comments to nibbles@boulderweekly.com

ALEXIS ROSENFELD

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Soak in a mash bill while you sip it at The Beer Spa

by Matt Maenpaa

For once I went to Denver and came home smelling like a brewery on purpose. That sentence sprang fully-formed in my mind when I got an email inviting me to check out The Beer Spa in Denver’s Five Points neighborhood. A spa soak in a tub full of beer was all I could imagine.

Like many seasoned drinkers, I’ve had my fair share of spills in crowded bars. As a bartender, I’ve had tap lines spray me and kegs foam over. One fateful mash day at the distillery, I was coated in an oatmeal-like rye mash so sticky I had to get in the shower with my clothes on to avoid accidentally waxing my entire body. Though I look back at these memories with a sort of wry amusement,

I never thought about voluntarily soaking myself in the stuff that beer is made from. I love a nice hot soak, or a hot tub with some cocktails or a few beers (editor’s note: mind your alcohol consumption in hot tubs, folks). While I was admittedly skeptical about soaking in beer, it was too interesting and different to pass over. I thought I knew what to expect walking through the doors that day, but I walked back out genuinely impressed. Let’s take a step back to look at how a beer-focused day spa landed in Five Points. Founded by entrepreneurial couple Jessica French and Damien Zouaoui, The Beer Spa is a culmination of more than a year of global travel as the married couple explored Europe and Asia. The goal, French says, was to look at unique business concepts that hadn’t made their way to the U.S. yet. “We’re both very entrepreneurial, so we had this drive to work for ourselves,” French says. “It became pretty apparent (to us) that we wanted to do something different, not just open a restaurant or coffee shop.” While traveling, it also became apparent that they were still very interested in businesses involving hospitality and wellness, Zouaoui says. The true moment of inspiration came from a rainy afternoon in a Polish mountain town, where a beer spa offered shelter from precipitous weather. Sipping pints while soaking in a warm tub, the smell of beer all around them, led the pair to a conversation about bathing traditions and bringing them back to the U.S. Zouaoui and French found a renewed focus for their travels—studying spa, wellness concepts and bathing culture to bring the best ideas back home with them. They wanted to combine the joy they found in the Polish beer spa with wellness practices found in other cultures, like saunas and Japanese onsen. “The wellness industry in the U.S. is very different than in other countries,” Zouaoui says. “I think with the pandemic, people realized that need for balance between work and life, and how important it is to take care of yourself.” concept. With beer in mind, French and Zouaoui chose Denver and made it home. Construction began on a building in Denver at 30th Avenue and Downing Street When I spoke with French and Zuoaoui ahead of my appointment, they assured me I wouldn’t actually be soaking in beer. The only actual beer at The Beer Spa is for consumption. Instead, French compares it to herbal baths, hydrotherapy and aromatherapy, citing essentially a giant tea bag added to the soaking tub, making it more like wort—the pre-fermentation proto-beer. On the day, I brought one of my good friends with me for company and the two of us enthusiastically committed to our beer-centered wellness routine. The staff were from the self-serve tap wall. The Beer Spa partners with a new Colorado brewery each month, featuring their beers in the tasting room and utilizing their varieties of hops and barley in the spa itself. Beers in hand (in insulated tumblers to prevent broken glass in the tub), we were shown to our soaking room and given a brief tutorial. Each room has a sliding door for privacy and guests can enjoy the relaxation either naked or in a bathing suit at their own comfort level. As close as we are, my buddy and I opted for swim trunks. Each room has a two-person infrared sauna—all the heat with none of the steam—and a rain shower to sweat out any toxins before getting in your beer soak. The soaking tub holds two, but it is certainly an intimate experience. Neither my friend or I are particularly small humans but were both plenty comfortable for the hour we were there. It was a genuinely lovely experience, dear readers. The temperature in the tub was just warmer than the human body, so it lacked the sensation of being slowly cooked alive that I associate with hot tubs and hot springs. I confess I didn’t actually smell like wort, but the aroma was very pleasant. The featured brewery was Cerveceria Colorado, so I enjoyed a pint of their Mexican lager while I relaxed. More than just for visitors or special occasions, I can see myself heading back to The Beer Spa. The tension drained from me and my muscles felt eased, at least until I had to get back on I-25 North.

MATT MAENPAA

DETAILS:

The Beer Spa, 3004 N. Downing St., Denver. Reservations required via thebeerspa.com

Send questions or comments to mattmaenpaa@gmail.com

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by John Lehndorff

Taste of the Week: A totally cool taco

From the beginning, Fresh Thymes Eatery was designed to feed everyone, no matter their dietary persuasion—carnivore, vegan, vegetarian, paleo or keto—a gluten-free, sustainably sourced meal. However, that has never meant boring fare at the Boulder restaurant. Take Fresh Thymes’ memorable The regular menu includes chicken, steak, ancho chile pork, veggie entrees, coconut caramel and toasted coconut.

TACO TIME: Fresh Thymes Eatery

Next door to the eatery, Fresh Thymes Bodega recently opened offering coffee drinks and takeout-prepared foods including a readyto-eat burrito dished with a kimchi-like housefermented salsa verde. The star of the gluten-free

BODEGA: Fresh Thymes Bodega chewy chocolate chip cookie

Boulder Recipe Flashback: Just add rattlesnake

Another Roadfood Attraction: Pasteis pleasure

Ichicken and cream cheese.

The cafe menu includes feijoada, the black bean

Culinary Calendar: June tastes like

M

We are assembling a comprehensive guide to Boulder County’s roadside stands. Dickens 300 Prime steakhouse will open soon at 1125 Pearl St. That was the longtime home of West Flanders Brewing Co., but as a cook, and the restaurant shared this recipe after a Boulder chili be substituted.

Pearl’s Rattlesnake Chili

1 large yellow onion, peeled and chopped 3 large cloves garlic, peeled, minced 4 tablespoons olive oil 1 pound boneless rattlesnake meat (or pork loin) 20 ounces stewed tomatoes 1 green bell pepper, seeded, chopped 1 pound antelope sausage (or other game sausage) 1/2 teaspoon celery salt 1/2 teaspoon cayenne 1 tablespoon ground cumin 1 bay leaf 1 1/2 teaspoons salt 6 cups water 2 cups cooked pinto beans

boil, stirring frequently. Lower heat and simmer for about two hours. with warm corn tortillas.