Fully automated kitchen prepares tailor-made take-out meals
TOP was recently approached by the two young entrepreneurs from Eatch. They had an ingenious plan to lift takeaway food to a higher level. This plan was born from a daily dilemma: they don’t have time to prepare a meal every day, but they do wish to eat healthy and varied meals with fresh ingredients tailored to their needs. The takeaway and ready-made meals could not please them. The search for that one meal you really crave costs time. In addition, traditional out-of-home meals such as pizza, chips or shawarma are usually not suitable for a healthy lifestyle and a nice salad is often too expensive to eat daily.
They came to TOP with the idea of developing a fully automated kitchen. A kitchen where (almost) no person touches the food, yet every meal can be composed of a unique combination of ingredients; just like you do while visiting the store and combining ingredients in your shopping cart. They selected 50 fresh ingredients to prepare an almost unlimited number of dishes. They asked TOP whether we could help to realize their dream.
A dream with technical challenges
This request from the entrepreneurs of Eatch fits seamlessly with TOP’s mission to develop solutions for healthier, fresher and convenient food products. Enthusiastically, we started working with the men of Eatch on the technical challenges that this dream entails. Some ingredients need to be cooked and others not. Ingredients can be solid or liquid. And the quantity of the ingredients varies per recipe. Plus, the storage temperature also differs per ingredient: hot, chilled or at ambient temperature. But they all have to be cooked (more or less) at the same time, within a few minutes.
TOP has designed a small-scale prototype kitchen that is currently being tested thoroughly. The test results will subsequently be implemented in the design of the first large-scale pilot kitchen. During the design process, we paid attention to the safety and quality of the equipment and the ingredients. The goal is to treat the ingredients in the right way to achieve optimal taste and quality of the meals. The use of smart technology enables us to deliver the customization that our customer is looking for.
Restaurants 2.0
Eatch discovered that our opinion and the way we consume our food is changing faster than ever before. We are more time bound and more aware of our health than ever. We want convenient, healthy, affordable and of course tasty meals. The automated kitchen of Eatch does not only meet the needs of restaurants, but also hospitals, airports, company canteens and (online) supermarkets. Also the emergence of “dark kitchens” (restaurants that only deliver) is an interesting market that Eatch is exploring. Especially in the last few months, when restaurants had to close due to the Corona measures, the takeaway, delivery and healthcare markets were flourishing, whilst traditional restaurants had to close their doors and keep their tables empty. The broad range of use cases for the automated kitchen allows Eatch to react quickly to major shifts in the way we consume food.
TOP has a lot of experience in designing advanced technologies that meet the highest, and most recent, safety and quality standards. TOP is the perfect partner for you to realize your dreams.
More information
Are you curious about the developments of Eatch and TOP in this area, please feel free to contact and mail to or send a message to .
