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Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. announced Wednesday that it’s testing an autonomous kitchen assistant called Chippy that will make tortilla chips.
Created with foodservice automation company Miso Robotics, Chippy uses artificial intelligence into help with the chip recipe, which includes corn masa flour, water and sunflower oil. The robot chef is also designed to incorporate a human touch in the tortilla chip preparation.
“Everyone loves finding a chip with a little more salt or an extra hint of lime,” said Nevielle Panthaky, Chipotle’s
CMG,
vice president of culinary, in a statement.
“To ensure we didn’t lose the humanity behind our culinary experience, we trained Chippy extensively to ensure the output mirrored our current product, delivering some subtle variations in flavor that our guests expect.”
Chippy is currently at Chipotle’s innovation hub in Irvine, Calif. and will be in a Southern California restaurant later this year.
Chipotle incorporates artificial intelligence into its chat bot Pepper, which is on the company’s app and website.
Restaurants and other consumer companies are increasingly using hi-tech tools in their brick-and-mortar locations, to deliver orders, and more.
Chipotle stock is up 4% over the past year while the S&P 500 index
SPX,
is up 9.3% for the period.
