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Would you eat a dish if, just like you, it was living and breathing? We've seen Anthony Bourdain eat cobra hearts that are still beating. We admit, it takes guts to do that. But we're referring to a different type of food, ingredients that have been specifically designed to mimic a living creature.
Food that appears to be alive is a captivating new trend developed by artist Minsu Kim, who has dubbed the project Living Food. Kim used synthetic biology to create dishes made of artifical ingredients which pulsate on the plate. Here's how the artist describes the project:
''I designed future dining experience where food behaves like a living creature entertaining us through an empathetic connection - what if food became alive like a fictional character? What if food was able to play with our cutlery and create hyper-sensations in our mouth? In this respect I propose a future dining experience where food takes a life-form.''
Kim's living food could certaintly revolutionize gastronomy, especially in a world where chefs are intent on enhacing the diner's experience by tapping into other senses (check out The Roca Brothers'culinary opera). To borrow a phrase from Ferran Adrià, the godfather of molecular gastronomy, this 'techno-emotional' cuisine and could very well be the future of fine dining.
Interestingly, our tongue's taste receptors interact differently with living foods (see also the Nordic Food Lab's tongue podcast). In theory, taking a bite out of a regular dish would feel different than if we ingested food that was still 'living.' The following graphic sheds some light on this phenomenon:
Here's a video where you can see living food in all its glory:
Via Minsu Kim
