Food tech encompasses everything from middleman restaurant delivery to lab created plant-based meat. While the bulk of food tech funding has gone to food delivery startups—which raised nearly $5.5 billion last year and include two of the most well-funded food startups, China’s Ele.me and Germany’s Delivery Hero—other startups are also tackling unique food tech categories like subscription services for international snacks and neighborhood meal-sharing of home cooked dining.
Today we’re running the food tech gamut with two ends of its spectrum. Joining us on one end is Eitan Bencuya, the Head of Communication of DoorDash, the middleman delivery service for restaurants. On the other end of the food tech spectrum we have Emilie Baltz, a food technologist and creator of the Cotton Candy Theremin—yup, that’s right. Here’s the quotes:
“A food technologist uses technology to better our experience with food.”
“Things that bring us pleasure is what I’m focused on.”
“I like to be in more of the Willy Wonka world. So much is based on utility.”
“I always knew I wanted to work in food. My mother continued her French cooking into our home.”
“There’s nothing that so quickly puts a smile on someone’s face like food.”
“As industrial design grows so does technology.”
“The food design studio is at Pratt. The class introduces them to food as a product of design.”
“When we’re eating something we’re not just tasting. We have a multisensory experience.”
“Chefs have a great understanding of multisensory experiences.”
“We eat first with our eyes.”
“Kids lean over and smell something. That gives us a sign if this is safe to eat.”
“If you take a whole bunch of potato chips they each have a different sound and crunch to them.”
“If you deconstruct the sounds of what you’re eating you can have a more enjoyable experience.”
“I take great care to make a beautiful meal when I can, but otherwise I’m a regular person.”
“Cotton Candy Theremin is a project I co-developed for the New Museum.”
“How do we eat? Sitting, standing, what are the other ways we move when we eat.”
“When you’re playing the Theremin you move around the same way you make cotton candy.”
“Lickestra is a licking ice cream orchestra. It’s conductive ice cream cones, so as you lick it you create sounds.”
“Food is a collaborative medium.”
“As children we discover the world through our mouths.”
“Circuit of the Senses is a 4-stage dinner. Every room is a different course and a different sense.”
“I push people to feel the world in a new way. We come up against our own boundaries.”
“The LOVE Foodbook came about when I was the creative director at the Museum of Sex.”
“Food is such a clear, emotional portal into ourselves. Love we still grapple with.”
“I asked chefs and mixologists what love means to them through food.”
“There’s an interesting trend with frozen foods. The shape shifting of materials.”
“It’s important to connect to your motivations. Think what’s important to you then build out from there.”
“If you could deliver your memories to your door—WHOA!
“DoorDash is 3 years old. We bring your favorite food from your favorite restaurants to your door.”
“We started by helping small businesses. Our CEO’s mother is a small business owner.”
“People would call in to a store and want delivery. By and large store owners would say no. Tony saw store owners leaving money on the table.”
“Running a logistics network is hard. The idea for DoorDash was providing that delivery app for them.”
“People are always asking me for restaurant recommendations. It’s hard to keep up with everyone.”
“DoorDash texts you and gives you updates of where your food is.”
“One of the things we’re most excited about is our great selection of restaurants. We have chain brands all the way down to local favorites.”
“Sometimes restaurants approach us where they recognize us as a way to grow their business.”
“Sometimes we approach restaurants so they can think of a new way of doing business.”
“I’m a geek at heart and love technology.”
“While I was at Google I worked on Chrome. Simple tech is incredibly complicated under the hood.”
“DoorDash is a super simple front end, but to make all that happen is incredibly complicated.”
“We see orders for wings going up around the Superbowl. On Mother’s Day we see pancakes and coffee delivered.”
“We’ve seen ice cream ordered to the park. We’ve seen cakes delivered to weddings. The possibilities are endless.”
“How you experience food is paramount. We invested a lot into photography.”
“For those restaurants that you’ve never ordered at before, photography is important.”
“We invest in the customer experience through reviews and scoring to encapsulate the delivery experience.
“Food may not travel as well as eating it in a restaurant.”
“Forgetting that extra side of ranch can make or break your meal.”
“If you’re able to integrate the delivery experience from the get-go, we provide a tablet for the back of house for the orders.”
“Thinking about delivery from the beginning makes it so much easier to work with a third party.”
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