Take electronics giant Sony. Add François Chartier, gastronomy and a hint of artificial intelligence (AI). You get a “crazy thing”, according to the Quebec sommelier and creator of aromatic harmonies. Since 2018, he has been concocting an artificial intelligence that chefs can use to improve and create new culinary combinations.
Posted at 8:00 a.m.
Mr. Chartier, who has lived in Barcelona for six years and will be returning to Quebec this month for the first time in three years, will present the “Sony AI Gastronomy” at E-AI’s inaugural event next Tuesday at noon.
This astonishing project, to which more than 400 people at Sony are contributing and for which François Chartier has been appointed special adviser, is being prepared without much publicity. It was only in its infancy, and recently entered a second phase, where a user-friendly application can be presented. “It’s Sony: when they’re ready, they push the media machine,” explains Mr. Chartier. I think the chefs will get on board. »
Aromas, seasons and colors
Basically, there was a chance meeting in 2017 between officials from Sony, who wanted to invest in artificial intelligence projects, and the Quebec sommelier based in Barcelona. “My specialty is not AI, it’s aromas,” he explains. We know little about it, but Sony already had a foothold in gastronomy: they were the agents for 25 years of chef Joël Robuchon. »
PHOTO PROVIDED BY FRANÇOIS CHARTIER
François Chartier, sommelier, author and special advisor to the Sony AI Gastronomy project
What they say is that basically, they are there to help artists, in music, in cinema, in video games. And the chefs, the gastronomy people, they are artists.
Francois Chartier
One thing leading to another, we decided to integrate into a gigantic database all the aromatic science of molecular harmonies developed in the books of François Chartier. The project is presented at the very first international Science & Cooking congress, held in 2019 in Barcelona, ”this city which has become the capital of gastronomy” thanks to the creativity of its chefs. He will also conduct a series of videoconference interviews with the most important of them and will involve them in trials of this new possibility.
Beyond the molecular harmonies, the database has been enriched with millions of other pieces of information, specifies Mr. Chartier. “It’s even bigger: we include geolocation, season, colors, texture, new techniques, styles, from Bocuse to your grandmother, via the local bistro. »
After the pandemic
This AI, he sums up, is “like a sub-chief, but of a high level, capable of ‘challenging’ the creator”. A few examples: she is asked to create a dish from soy sauce, she suggests chocolate. “The chef changes his mind and wants to work with chocolate, he wants crunch. There is a dialogue. »
Who, apart from François Chartier and his AI, knew that nori seaweed and raspberry share the same aromatic molecules? “However, there is no recipe that combines the two. If we put them together, 1 + 1 = 3! »
The AI will not replace the cook, he specifies, but will above all serve to inspire him, to suggest new avenues that he can follow or avoid at his convenience. He believes that it comes at the right time when two years of pandemic have weakened this field, which he was able to observe during twenty interviews on Zoom with top chefs – and two wine and sake producers, by the way.
“We wanted to capture this moment of fragility in which they were at that time, to see how new technologies could help them to be more creative and to come out of the doldrums. »