The Paradoxical Future Of Baking

With the advent of technological development, different aspects of our lives have been slowly progressing towards the end goal of full automation. This advancement has been unprecedented, and this can be evident from large dining establishments which have already integrated machinery which can cook an entire wok of fried rice without breaking into a sweat as an example. 

Without a doubt, the baking procedure is not spared either, and innovative companies such as Unifiller have already embarked on a research and development journey to facilitate the painstaking trial and error process. However, there comes the questions of whether the art of baking and the “love” that bakers put into their work be lost? Perhaps bakers might even become obsolete and redundant in the near future, and the entire baking process will become a high engineered sequence which can be done through the simple push of a button. With such a rigid engineered process in place, it will not be strange if creativity is stifled and baked products might ultimately end up as carbon copy duplicates of each other. 

Of course, automation in the baking process will have its own benefits and advantages as well. Gone will be the days whereby baking ingredients are being wasted due to human errors, and consumers can rest assured that they are getting perfectly symmetrical desserts which are picture/Instagram worthy. The curtailing of food wastage is definitely commendable, especially when this is a consistent problem which plagues many developed nations. With a reduction in the margin of errors, the likelihood of a customer complaining about an unsatisfactory product will naturally be greatly reduced as well since both factors are mutually correlated. We can somehow envision that in the future, consumers will place even more emphasis on the quality of food, and this includes nutrition, taste or even minute key details such as the texture of filling used. These are real challenges which us bakers will have to tackle head-on.

Technological advancement is indeed a double-edged sword, and a cost-benefit analysis will have to be carried out to determine if full automation is the right direction to head into. Perhaps a possible solution will be to find a sweet spot by having an optimal mix of both automation and manual labour during the baking process. The future of baking is indeed full of possibilities and yet, the livelihood of bakers might be compromised in the process. Keeping up with the times is crucial for us bakers to remain relevant in today's world.

What are your views on the future of baking? We appreciate it if you can write a comment below and share your thoughts on this matter as well :).