Pop!Tech 2006: Dangerous Ideas

Chef Homaro Cantu, 29, is blazing a trail into the new era of postmodern cuisine. Homaro wants to change the way people perceive and eat food. Homaro’s restaurant, Moto, is his laboratory where he tests new technologies daily, using elements like liquid nitrogen and helium and devices such as a centrifuge and a handheld ion particle gun make regular appearances in the Moto kitchen.

From the Pop!Tech Wiki..

Now You're Cooking with Gas(es)

Before Homaro Cantu took center stage this afternoon, I have to admit, I had my doubts that the 29-year-old mad scientist of gastronomy and owner/executive chef of Moto Restaurant in Chicago, could teach me anything about food that I didn't already know. But of course, he proved me wrong. I mean, come on, my grandma didn't have a super-insulated polymer oven or an inkjet printer with edible inks in her culinary repertoire.

A few minutes listening to Homaro and you'll think he was an engineer who accidentally became a chef. He and lab partner Ben Roach, the 20-something pastry chef at Moto director of R&D at Cantu Designs are creating and using technology to reinvent the future of how people eat.

They inkjet print flavor, amount of calories and a lot of other characteristics into the food they invent. They talk like "the transmographication of food" and "caramelaserization" are all in a day's work and make dinner menus with "fizzilators" and "large baths of liquid nitrogen". Homaro says he looks at dishes as whole product lines and that means whenever they create new dishes, they create new hardware and new technology to go along with it.

For those of us who haven't had the pleasure of Moto, yet, were lucky enough to get a sneak peek at a few menu items on the five-, ten- and 20-course menus. And I have to say, after seeing the preparation of these on the big screen today, these food creations are not for the weak of stomach.

• King crab and popcorn
• Red kuri and lychee
• Kiwi, mango, mint and maize
• Nitro sushi roll
• Synthetic champagne
• Goat cheese snow and balsamic
• Hamachi and orange
• Beef with kielbasa
• Mac and cheese
• Jalapeno with avocado and cilantro cream

"Sometimes people think we're really messing with them when we serve them a half an orange for $160," said Homaro. I should say. Moto's smallest meal, the five-course, goes for $65, so it may have surprised some to hear that Homaro came from much humbler beginnings. For a time, he and his mother and sister were homeless.

"Understanding the price of oil is great, but what about what you're going to eat for dinner?" asked Homaro. Just one reason he's also dedicated to finding innovative ways of feeding the world's hungry.