The demand for various foods with specific functionality and nutrition is increasing nowadays. The food industry is investigating several techniques to meet the individual needs of taste, nutrition, and health.
This introduces artistic capabilities into domestic cooking and extends customisation to the food processing sector. Three-dimensional food printing is a potential solution to overcome drawbacks of food customisation techniques, such as low production efficiency and high manufacturing costs.
Its application in domestic cooking and food processing not only provide an engineering solution for customised food design and personalised nutrition but also has the potential to reconfigure a customised food supply chain.
Three-dimensional (3D) printing refers to a process to create an object using computer-aided design (CAD) software and instructs a digital fabricating machine to shape 3D objects by successive addition of material layers. It is also known as ‘additive manufacturing’ or ‘food layered manufacture’. It offers a wide range of new processing possibilities to the food industry and allows a layer by layer printing of predefined slices of designed and desired objects. Thus, this technology can increase production efficiency and reduce manufacturing costs for customised food products fabrication. The most common materials suitable for 3D food printing are carbohydrate, fat, protein, fibre and functional components.
The 3D food printing technique is useful in manufacturing food products with customisation in shape, colour, flavour, texture, and nutrition. There is an increasing market need for customised food products, most of which are currently designed and made by specially trained people.
The food printer platform consists of an XYZ axis, dispensing units and user interface. Food composition can be deposited essentially point by point and layer by layer according to a computerised design modelling and path planning.
Generally, the available printing materials can be classified into two categories based on their printability viz., natively printable and powder materials. Natively printable materials include a hydrogel, cake frosting, cheese, hummus, and chocolate. The mixture of sugars, starch, and mashed potato was used as powder materials.
In the area of food product design and production, 3D printing represents a technology with immense potential and provides low cost, simple and rapid prototyping advantages over traditional methods for the fabrication of food materials. However, a fact that must be faced is that some food materials do not lend themselves as suitable for 3D printing since their structural stability is weak or difficult to integrate the different components into each other or the printed food itself proves difficult to cook in the kitchen. The other difficulties associated with the fabrication of traditional food by 3D printing are the intrinsic characteristics, such as mouthfeel and flavour, may not live up to consumer expectations.
To achieve a better understanding of 3D food printing processing, a mathematic model that can realistically describe the process with inputs, outputs and process type will be essentially useful. Customised food fabrication processes and food printer design are the major driving force for developing such a model.
Key process parameters such as temperature, moisture and food properties such as density, thermal and electrical conductivity, viscosity, permeability are often important. It is necessary to digitalise comprehensive cooking processes before mathematical manipulation, which greatly differs from traditional food processing models.
Importance of 3D Food Printing
Food printers introduce artistic capabilities to fine dining and extend mass customisation capabilities to the culinary and food processing sector. This benefits a high-value, low volume customisation food fabrication process that would be impossible to achieve currently. The food design process should be structured to promote the user's creativity, the fabrication process should be quantified to achieve consistent fabrication results, and a simulation model should be developed to link design and fabrication with nutrient control. With the development of an interactive open web-based user interface, food printers may become part of an ecology system, where networked machines can order new ingredients, prepare favourite foods on demand and even collaborate with doctors to develop healthier diets. 3D printing holds the promise to make food with designed complex geometries, controlled composition, and customised nutritional contents.
In terms of food manufacturing, the potential that 3D food printing techniques can revolutionise certain aspects of food manufacturing, providing the convenience of low-cost customised fabrication and even tailored nutrition control. Food printing can enable precise control of people’s diet, and ensure fresh and healthy dishes that exactly meet the needs and preferences of individuals; it would significantly improve population well-being. The most successful material was the pasta dough, judged by viscosity, consistency and solidifying properties. Food products made by natively printable materials can be fully controlled on taste, nutritional value, and texture.
Other composite formulations such as batters and protein pastes may require a post-deposition cooking process. Combining 3DP and digital gastronomy techniques can digitally visualise food manipulation, therefore creating a new space for novel food fabrication at an affordable price. The 3D printing model such as 'fused deposition modelling' (FDM), which is suitable for printing of materials such as viscous slurries, pastes and doughs.
In food printing, hot-melt extrusion is applied to create personalised 3D chocolate products. The food printer design based on hot-melt extrusion has a compact size, and low maintenance cost. 3D edible food products such as cookies, cakes, pastries and so on are created in a layer structure, which involves pre-patterning food items at multiple layers of processing.
Applying multiple-material is quite common in customised food design and fabrication. Some of these materials are from traditional food recipes, additives and others are non-traditional edible materials.
Philips Food Creation Printer introduced food cartridges to create custom-designed food products in a layer-by-layer manner. An interactive graphical user interface was proposed to select ingredients, quantities, shapes, textures and other food properties. This idea may be applicable for any type of customised 3D food printing. Some researchers tried multiple-print head using Fab@Home 3D printer, and tested chocolate, processed cheese, muffin mix, hydrocolloid mixtures, caramel, and cookie dough and started investigating fundamental-level issues in food printing, such as converting ingredients into tasty products for healthy and environmental reasons.
As an emerging food processing technique, there is a huge space existing for 3D food printing. It offers a wide range of new possibilities within the food industry. From the realisation of complex food designs to the automated preparation of personalised meals, 3D food printing provides many innovations in the food manufacturing, catering, retail sectors, and food supply chain.
The applications of 3D food printing have demonstrated its capability of making personalised chocolates or producing simple homogenous snacks. However, it is necessary to develop a systematic way to investigate printing materials, platform design, printing technologies and their influences on food fabrication.
(Srinu is Ph D scholar, College of Food and Dairy Technology [TANUVAS], Chennai, and Baskaran is professor, Dept of Livestock Products Technology, Madras Veterinary College [TANUVAS], Chennai)