Throw away those old ink cartridges.  It's time to load your printer with chocolate.  That would be neat wouldn't it?  Load some rice paper, spray a message in dots of chocolate, and then eat your words.

That description may still depict a future scene.  For now, there's a 3D chocolate printer that has just come out.  It prints gobs of chocolate into shapes by adding layers of chocolate on top of previous layers of chocolate.

I saw a story a couple years ago about a 3D printer that printed parts in plastic to make the parts for a new, identical, 3D printer.  It could make the parts to replicate itself.  I thought that was really neat.

But now, a 3D printer has been invented that uses chocolate as the printing medium.  If this is commercialized, you could design a chocolate model at home on your computer, upload to the machine online, and then go pick up your model a little while later. 

Having helped chocolate companies troubleshoot their tempering and enrobing of chocolates, I can imagine the engineering of a chocolate printing machine to be quite an undertaking.  It has to be able to heat the chocolate properly to get a good flow, yet be cool enough to control the layering.

Probably much trial and error in the process.  Hmm, I wonder what percentage of failed samples were remelted for another attempt and what percentage made it into the researchers mouths?

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Bryn Kirk

Course Facilitator at Chocolate University Online

Bryn worked for nearly 10 years in a research and product development for Ambrosia Chocolate Company in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Now she develops all of the CUO lessons and coaches the members of the Primal Chocolate Club.

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