A Dubai restaurant has opened that features what it calls the world's "first AI chef", introducing new technology in a city focused on the future.
The Emirati city is widely recognized for its growing culinary scene, with thousands of restaurants on offer from luxurious Michelin-starred eateries to street food from across the Middle East and Asia.
At Woohoo, the creator of the menu is an AI program -- known as chef Aiman -- trained on thousands of recipes and decades of culinary research and molecular gastronomy.
Chef Aiman can also optimize menus and balance flavors, according to the establishment.
The real work of preparing and serving the food remains in human hands, for now.
"AI is going to create better dishes than humans maybe in the future," said the restaurant's Turkish co-founder Ahmet Oytun Cakir, AFP reported.
While Woohoo's menu is largely international fusion dishes, some AI creations stand out.
This includes a "dinosaur tartare" created using DNA mapping.
Priced at roughly 50 euros ($58), the dish tastes like a combination of raw meats and is served on a pulsating plate to appear as if it were breathing.
"It was a total surprise. It was so delicious," said customer Efe Urgunlu.
Along with AI-generated holograms and sci-fi animation, the venue features a giant cylindrical computer presented as the digital mainframe powering the restaurant's effects.
Woohoo's Turkish chef Serhat Karanfil oversees the cooking and final presentation and adjusts the flavors when needed. "If I taste it, for example, and it is too spicy, I talk to chef Aiman again. After we discuss, we find the right balance," he said.
Cakir has high hopes that chef Aiman will one day become "the next Gordon Ramsay -- but AI".
For Michelin-starred chef Mohamad Orfali, "there is no such thing as an AI chef". His Orfali Bros restaurant earned a Michelin star last year, after Dubai became the first Middle Eastern city to join the prestigious guide in 2022.
Cooking requires "nafas", or soul, Orfali explained, using the Arabic term that describes a cook's personal flair for food and their ability to create exceptional meals.
"Artificial intelligence lacks feelings and memories; in short, it has no nafas... It can't imbue it into food."
Orfali said he limited the use of AI in his own establishment to administrative tasks such as setting the kitchen schedule and providing additional research. "We use it as a kitchen assistant, but ultimately, it won't cook," he said.
"Everyone is supporting these ideas here in Dubai," said Cakir.
The restaurant has also created a social media buzz, with an Instagram account dedicated to the AI Chef that features chef Aiman's avatar in videos sharing tips and recipes.
Dio, a customer who didn't give her last name, said she visited the restaurant after seeing the excitement around it.
"It is such a creative concept, so I thought I must experience it myself," she said.
"The dishes were extraordinary."
