1. Internet of Things (IoT) as an Innovative Restaurant Technology
One of the greatest uses of innovative restaurant technology we see is Restaurant IoT.
For years, front registers have been sending orders to a screen in the kitchen. Employees in the kitchen fulfill orders based on what they see on the screen. Their ability to assemble meals is contingent on having all the components to the meals at their fingertips. Most of the components are waiting in holding cabinets. Somewhere in the back of the kitchen, cooks are working to keep those cabinets full. There’s not much more information given to the cooks; we just expect them to keep up.
IoT is an innovative restaurant technology to watch because it means that the register receiving customer orders can speak directly to all the cooking equipment. Imagine a restaurant in which order entry goes to a central computer server. The server can send “orders” to all the restaurant equipment. This central server knows how long every operation in the kitchen takes down to a second. It knows which machines are already in the middle of an operation, and how long until they can load a new batch. It even knows how big the backlog is on one piece of equipment, and which pieces are doing nothing at all.
Traditional kitchen operations use historical demand to predict order volumes. This works reasonably well, but what happens when a new public event in the area causes a surge and disrupts historical data? With restaurant IoT, data flows through the kitchen in real time, helping to increase throughput when needed, and decrease waste when the demand is simply not there.
Armed with this innovative restaurant technology an operation can be streamlined to reduce wait time and hold times. It could increase the pace which products move through the kitchen and reduce waste .
2. Purpose Driven Mechanical Automation as an Innovative Restaurant Technology
IoT is helpful, but it is only as good as the equipment under its control. Increased use of mechanical automation also known as robotics is the key to making IoT in the kitchen work. When discussing innovative restaurant technology, we like to use the term mechanical automation rather than robotics. This is because when we hear “robot” we often think of the Jetson’s with human looking robots and arms. There will be some of this in the kitchen, but in most cases, tasks are easier to mechanize in ways that do not look human at all.
For example, you could use a sophisticated robotic arm to pick up a saltshaker and salt fries in the holding station. Next, it could pick up the fry scoop and toss them. Yes, you could do this. Or you could build a fry holding station that can agitate the fries on its own and install a salt broadcaster over the top. In general, we find these solutions to work faster and while they may cost more to develop since robot arms can be bought off the shelf, they will be less expensive to install in any sort of volume.
The development of purpose driven mechanical automation is an innovative restaurant technology that will make any restaurant IoT system hum.
3. Smarter Holding as an Innovative Restaurant Technology
The primary objective of IoT and mechanical automation in a restaurant it to cut down on inventory holding requirements. However, the idea of 100% on-time delivery or lean manufacturing is known as perfection. It is the goal that innovative restaurant technology strives for, but there will always be room for improvement. With real success, the number of holding cabinets will go down. But let us discuss the holding cabinets that will remain in your kitchen.
Most food holding cabinets, hot or cold, are set to a temperature and left on all day. Challenges include tracking which foods are in which cabinets and how long they have been in there for. Most systems cannot set different temperatures in each bay to accommodate different foods. Innovative restaurant technology applied to holding could eliminate these issues.
Imagine a cabinet that could sense what food had been placed in it. It would change its temperature holding profile automatically for that specific food. It could display the food item’s name over the cabinet and automatically start a holding countdown timer. This use of innovative restaurant technology can help employees waste less time thinking about holding times. It will do a better job of keeping products at a higher quality which will result in greater customer satisfaction.
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Innovative restaurant technology benefits everyone from the employees to the customers. Keep an eye out for new technology in restaurants near you.