Automation and the Benefits of Food Quality and Consistency

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There are many drivers for consumers when choosing a brand to purchase their food from. Unsurprisingly consistency in the taste of the food is one of the most important factors. Owners, chefs and operations teams spend months sourcing the highest quality ingredients, perfecting recipes and documenting the optimum way to cook their food so that dishes can be served to customers perfectly every time.

Many consumers choose which restaurant to go to or which takeaway they order from based on a previous visit or online review and have high expectations. After all, they don’t want to be disappointed having spent their hard-earned cash on a meal. Each foodservice operator - from Quick Service Restaurants (QSRs) and fast casual restaurants to cafes and local pubs - relies on repeat business and delivering high-quality meals with every order, every day, is imperative.

They do this by ensuring all the ingredients they purchase are of high quality, and to their exact specifications. In fact, many food service providers run regular tasting sessions to ensure the quality has not drifted. They also have to consider the cooking equipment, the holding equipment, the team procedures, and the recipe builds, as any one of these aspects can dramatically improve the taste, appearance and quality of a restaurant’s food.

However, automating some or all of the cooking procedures in a commercial kitchen can have huge benefits, standardising quality control and eliminating the possibility of human error. 

When it gets busy in a kitchen, standards slip. 


When team members are 100% focussed on getting meals prepared and to the customer in a timely manner, quality standards are significantly reduced. For example, if those chips are taken out of the fryer 30 seconds too early, they will be less crispy or if that pizza that was supposed to have 10 perfect lines of drizzle on the top, has eight messy ones instead, the customer will notice. Or when there is too much going on and communication is unclear so too many side orders are produced, and end up being thrown away. These slip ups might seem small but the knock-on effect on taste, consistency and wastage can be significant.

Automation - enabled by intelligent kitchen robotics - can help solve this problem.  By automating just one cooking procedure (like frying), kitchen staff can spend more time on other areas in the kitchen, improving the attention to detail on the food, or improving the customer experience.



  • Automation Enhances Traceability


    Traceability is a significant benefit of automating a cooking procedure. The machine will be able to tell you details including portion sizes, cook times, wastage amounts, and temperatures. Every single food product will be traceable. This enables restaurants to  keep track of food in the supply chain, which supports the accurate withdrawal or recall of unsafe food, if required. The more information establishments keep, the quicker and easier it is for them to identify the affected food, mitigate risks to customers and save time and money.




  • Automation Reduces Waste


    In addition to cooking food to order, intelligent kitchen systems can connect directly to the customer order systems, ensuring that only food items ordered by customers are cooked. Plus, AI-powered solutions can predict how much food really needs to be prepared when it gets busy - very clever stuff!




  • Automation Increases Safety


    Kitchen automation also improves workplace safety. Intelligent robotics systems can reduce the risk of accidents, as well as help avoid and prevent work injuries, resulting in a safer workplace for everyone. It’s scary that 54% of burns victims got them whilst using a fryer. By making the workplace safer, uptime and productivity will also increase.


Karakuri is revolutionising Quick Service (QSR) and Fast Casual restaurants with our intelligent, robotic kitchen automation. We bring together food, people, and robotics to deliver unprecedented levels of quality, consistency, and efficiency to restaurant kitchens. 


Click here to learn more about what Karakuri can do for you.