As was predicted by Back to the Future Part II, instant home pizza is now a reality. Only we’re not rehydrating pizzas, we’re printing them. The future is here!
3D printing is one of the greatest new technologies to come out in the past decade, allowing people to print anything from car parts to prosthetic limbs and even organs! It’s truly a milestone of human achievement, and now there are developments within the 3D printing world that have made this invention even more monumental, at least for us pizza lovers.
How it Works
Photo Credit: Image courtesy of geek.com
The way 3D printers work is by first, loading up the printer with soft malleable material (plastic, metal alloy, etc.) and then sending the design of the object you’d like to print to the printer. The computer in the printer then prints the object by layering thin layers of the material on top of each other until you have a completed object. So, in order to 3D print pizza, you just need to load the printer with the food mixture that you would like to eat!
While we’re pretty excited about 3D printed pizza, that’s certainly not the only cheesy food you can print. Along with pizza, you could also print pasta, ravioli, and cheeseburgers.
You can watch the pizza being printed here with the Foodini printer here:
This particular machine will only print out the dough and an even layer of sauce, so you still have to add the cheese and put it in the oven yourself. However there are others out there who have begun printing with cheese! Some even print cheese-only creations. Scientists at Cornell University are loading their printers with cheese “ink” to make these adorable spaceships made out of cheese, which they then deep fry (of course).
Photo Credit: Image courtesy of Student Science.
Photo Credit: Image courtesy of Student Science.
With this new technology the possibilities are endless. Personally, we like to imagine a future where we can impress friends by printing anything from the perfectly round pizza to fried mozzarella in the shape of your own face!
Photo Credit: Featured image courtesy of 3DPrinting.com
Jamie Ditaranto
Jamie Ditaranto is a senior at Emerson College and an online editorial intern for culture, who enjoys writing, photography, and travel. She finds a way to sneak cheese into just about every meal and is a sucker for free samples.
