Steam ovens will be the microwaves of the future and I also predict a pressure cooker revival, because this tool represents such savings not just of fuel but of time, without compromising on flavor. I do think, however, that there will be innovations in the way we shop for food and the kinds of pans and stoves we use.
I can’t see wooden spoons becoming obsolete any time soon. And my wager is that the cooking of the future will look much more like the cooking of the past than anyone usually predicts. Since writing a book about the history of kitchen technology, I get asked about the future of cooking a lot. Yield, flavor, nutrition, locality, will all factor into the equation.ĭan Barber is the executive chef and co-owner of Blue Hill and Blue Hill at Stone Barns, and the author of The Third Plate. Farmers and eaters will collaborate with modern plant breeders to create new varieties of grains and vegetables to thrive in their regions, marrying classic seed selection with modern technology such as genome mapping. We tend to think of seeds as a black and white issue-heirlooms on the one hand, genetically modified “frankenfood” on the other-but there’s a huge spectrum that exists between those two, and, 15 years from now, we’ll all know that the answer is somewhere in the middle. Seeds will become an even more vital part of the conversation. In other words, Americans will feed themselves the way most cultures always have.
Instead, grains, legumes, and vegetables will take center stage, alongside under-coveted cuts of meat, such as neck or shank. The protein-centric dinner plate, which America created and now exports to the rest of the world, is a culinary anomaly. Stewart Brand is the author of Whole Earth Discipline: Why Dense Cities, Nuclear Power, Transgenic Crops, RestoredWildlands, and Geoengineering Are Necessary. Really fresh vegetables-pick ’em yourself. The short distance to market and savings of energy and water would make them economically viable. They would fill the old industrial buildings floor to ceiling. There’s a good chance for some industrial districts of cities turning into semi-agricultural districts with year-round vegetables and fruits grown in dense indoor farms using LED lights and surprisingly little water.
(Many, of course, will reject that whole package.) And it would help establish biotech as a benign source of improved food. It would be a big win for animal welfare. It would reduce the water demand of agriculture.
It could free up enormous quantities of grazing land worldwide to return to nature. The arrival of “cruelty-free” meat grown in vats (or whatever) and not in living animals will have wide consequences, if it comes.