Mother always said not to use your food to make art. However, one company didn't listen.
Meet the PancakeBot. It's a 3-D printer that uses pancake batter to make your food into whatever shape you desire. Do you want to eat a pancake that looks like your favorite car? Done. Want a pancake shaped like Obama's head? Not a problem. The printer can take any image you submit and create a pancake that looks like it.
PancakeBot designer Miguel Valenzula was inspired when his 3-year-old daughter misheard him, then told her sister that she was going to make a pancake-printing machine out of Legos, according to FastCo.Exist. After hearing about her interest in such a device, Valenzula committed to making a real device.
"It took a while to develop the final prototype, but the girls were supportive throughout the project.....When they saw the final result of being able to make Mickey Mouse pancakes with Lego PancakeBot, the first version, they were ecstatic," Valenzula told FastCo.Exist.
The device is pretty simple. A series of robotic arms translate the imported image into a series of motions, which are then used to place pancake batter directly onto a griddle.
Valenzula believes that the PancakeBot is the first step towards developing 3-D food printers. Other companies have attempted similar devices in the past, but most of them were extremely expensive and cost more than $1000. The PancakeBot is a reasonable alternative that only costs $179 on Kickstarter.
The final version of the PancakeBot is currently available for backing on Kickstarter. Valenzula plans to ship the PancakeBot out by July 2015.
