The Center for Genomic Gastronomy is an independent research institute engaged in exploring, examining and understanding the genomes and biotechnologies that make up the human food systems of planet earth.

Cat and I have spent the last week putting the finishing touches on the cookbook that we are publishing as part of our DA4GA project called “Eat Less, Live More…and Pray for Beans.” The file is in the hands of the printer (Ditto Press in London). We were excited to take advantage of Ditto Press’ 2-color risograph printer. What follows is a sneak preview of a few sections of the publication. In all of the images below, the orange is actually a neon ink and will show up very differently on the book than on these design proofs.

Our thinking and writing during this project was highly influenced by the book Meals to Come by Warren Belasco. Here is one infographic from our cookbook that draws on his analysis of 200 years of Anglo-American food futurism.

Early on in our research we spent of time looking for interesting stories from the many data sets about global and Dutch food. Here are some infographics of trends and changes that caught our eye.

(click for a larger version or download the .pdf)

On the right-hand side is a short essay from the book called “Calling All Beta-Tasters and Gastronauts: This is Your Opportunity to Dive Into the Future Mouth-First.” To develop the recipes we worked with repeat collaborates Heather K. Julius and Scott Heimendinger. Both culinary creatives responded with some amazing recipes which we reveal on June 7th.

When we spoke to Tiny van Boekel at Wageningen University we were quite amazed to hear about “MeatLess” a lupine-flour based product that can be used to make meat that is 80% meat and 20% non-meat. This conversation inspired our “Meat Map” so we could figure out where to put semi-meats on the spectrum.

((click for a larger version or download the .pdf)

And finally, in the process of writing this cook book, we came to realize that we are always on the look out for unexpected ingredients. Now we have one more to add to the list: Maisantozwammen a mushroom grown on transgenic corn.

We hope you are able to visit the exhibit at Naturalis in the latter half of 2012. If you want a copy of the cookbook you can visit the Naturalis museum in Leiden, the Netherlands, where it will be on sale in the bookstore starting June 7th. It will also be available on their online bookstore (http://www.natuurenboek.nl/) starting June 7th. (They ship internationally.) Or you can email us directly at info at genomicgastronomy dot com

We are down to three “BioHacker” posters of our original 100 prints. Time for a trip back to Bangalore to make a second print run?

Reviewing the final copy for our new cookbook (being released as part of DA4GA on June 7th) I ran across this little menu note made in our Planetary Sculpture Supper Club Bangalore menu, when we first prepared our “Seed Savers Delight” dish:

It has been said that technology is the most human thing about us. Seed saving is a one of the oldest and most resilient human technologies. Seed saving is an environmental interface between humans and the plant world we are constantly co-evoloving with.

One of the greatest databases ever created is the collection of massively diverse food genomes that have domesticated us around the world. This collection represents generation after generation of open source biohacking by hobbyists, farmers and more recently proprietary biohacking by agronomists and biologists.

This dish is a celebration of the great work by countless experimenters and aesthetes whose contribution to our sculpted planet and agri-eco-culinary system is rarely acknowledged. It should remind us that “We Have Always Been Biohackers”

I am still pretty happy with that description.

There is a review of EDIBLE in nature here: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v483/n7390/full/483404a.html

Here is a .pdf

The Center showed a version of DOOMER FOOD as part of the “Collections” show at Fictilis Gallery in Seattle, WA, USA. The show is up until March 29th.

SEAWEED WALL by The Center for Genomic Gastronomy, an exhibit at the EDIBLE exhibition at SCIENCE GALLERY, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland in 2012

Feeding Times Special: Vegan Ortolan

The Center for Genomic Gastronomy curated the current exhibition at the Science Gallery, EDIBLE. We were really excited about getting visitors to experience parts of the exhibition through taste – one of the senses that is often disregarded in exhibitions.

To bring this component to life we commissioned culinary extraordinaire Heather K. Julius (who also runs the Special Snowflake Studio) to develop recipes, challenging her to create dishes such as the Vegan Ortolan. It was an inspiring collaboration and you can find all of Heather’s recipes for edible, as well as recipes from other foodies, chefs and scientists on the Science Gallery website.

The feeding times will run twice daily for the duration of the exhibition, serving a new recipe every three days. Today was the first day for Vegan Ortolan.

ABOUT VEGAN ORTOLAN

The traditional preparation of the ortolan bird in France demands that they are captured alive, force-fed, drowned in Armagnac and eaten whole. Although it is illegal to prepare and eat, the dish retains a forbidden attraction for some adventurous eaters. What better way to challenge the skills of a chef than to create a vegan recipe which simulates the experience of crunching through the skin, guts and bones of a small bird, without using any animal products? This dish is intended to be consumed in the traditional way — with a large napkin covering the head and the face — to keep the flavours in, and to hide one’s shame from God.

Tasting notes for traditionally prepared ortolan emphasize the rich foie gras like taste of the flesh, the crunch of the many tiny bones and the bitterness of the guts.

The feeding time specials change every three days for the duration of the exhibition. Here is Conor updating the times for today.

The nests are ready and the Eaters are taking their seats.

Enguerran, head chef for the exhibition is plating the vegan ortolan.

The dish is traditionally eaten with a cloth over your head – to keep the aromas in and to hide your shame from God.

The Fig symbolises the head and beak, while the body is represented by a tofu pocket.

As we begin our research for our DA4GA project, Edible Time Machine, we are putting the finishing touches on the EDIBLE exhibition at the Science Gallery in Dublin, Ireland. Three of the projects we are exhibiting in the show should give some indication of the direction we will be heading in over the next few months:

SMOG TASTING

DOOMER FOOD: BEANS, BULLETS & BULLION

DISASTER PHARMING

The Edible Time Machine project will seek out interesting ingredients and develop 5 recipes, providing five different ways to think through the future of food systems. Our research process runs concurrent with NCHA‘s Growing Older Together study, and will draw on the food preferences, memories and narratives of research participants as one source of inspiration.

One of the things we hope to contribute through this process to our collaborators and colleauges in the Life Sciences and Healthy Ageing research is a much more diverse, critical and nuanced way of imaging the future of food, and healthy ageing. Especially when employing the lens of Biotechnology and Genomics.

Most of the timelines and narratives we have run into that imagine the future of food and health through the lens of emerging technologies seem to return to the same top-down and techo-deterministic themes of:

• nutraceuticals
• genetic modification (transgenesis & cisgenesis)
• in-vitro meat
• vertical farms
• gene therapy
• personalized medicine
• entomophagy (eating insects) because it is “efficient”…etc.

Here are just two timelines of the future of technology (including food) that we have run into in the last this week:

Envisioning Emergent Technology popped up in our blog feed today and includes these predictions for the near future:

• In-vitro meat
• vertical farming
• Smart Drugs
• Personalized Medicine
• Anti Ageing Drugs

Here is the timeline of Biotechnology from Naturalis:

It includes the following predictions for the future:

• “The last farm is closing down. Our food is increasingly being produced from algae grown in huge tanks.” (((That didn’t work out so well in Windup Girl. However, we ARE intrigued by the idea of a currency based on calories, instead of gold or fiat.)))

• “We have solved all of the mysteries of DNA, but have still not managed to eradicate diseases and death.”

• “Cloning humans is by now medically safe, and the ethical objections are diminishing.”

• “Barren areas, such as deserts, are now used for agriculture. Genetically engineered crops have made these areas fertile.”

• “People live even longer; hence the age of retirement rises to eighty years.” (((Is Greece getting a jump start on this one?)))

There are many well written critiques of technologically-deterministic-futurism including the recently penned The Future Isn’t What it Used To Be from a futurist insider, and the more academic Meals to Come (“accuracy is only one of many reasons why people make predictions.”), so we won’t rehash those arguments in this short space.

The Naturalis Biotechnology timeline exhibit is only one floor down from where our piece will be installed. We are hoping that our artwork serves as a counterpoint by explicitly including ethical, social, cultural and flavor aspects that don’t seem to be factored into much forecasting that uses Science & Technology as its lens.

Here is just a rough list of possible topics that we hope to pursue in the coming months:

• Culinary Eugenics / Biodiversity of the Kitchen / Resistance to Fungible Ingredients
• 2012 Paranoia / End of Empire / Doomer Food / Stockpiling / Hoarding
• Junk Science/ Fad diets / Fast Food Forecasting driving consumer & eater behavior
• Individuals doing things with food technology that were not intended
• The Culinary Innovations of Peak Oil / Economic Contraction / Energy Shortages / Climate Change