Future of Food: Will AI Replace Chefs? Experts Weigh In

The future of food is being shaped by rapid changes in how restaurants, foodservice operations, and culinary businesses operate. Artificial intelligence, automation, labor shortages, and evolving consumer habits are already transforming the industry, and these forces are likely to accelerate over the next decade. As technology takes on more of the operational load, human creativity, judgment, and hospitality will become the industry’s clearest differentiator.

Recently launched by Culinary Arts Academy Switzerland, the Circle of Excellence brings together influential chefs, restaurateurs, educators, and business leaders to exchange ideas, support emerging talent, and help shape the future of the culinary industry. At its inaugural roundtable, among many topics discussed, members turned their attention to a question affecting every corner of the sector: What will the future of food look like?

The discussion moved quickly beyond fine dining. Multiple factors are already impacting the industry, transforming how food is created, sold, and served, such as:

• artificial intelligence, 
• automation, 
• changing consumer habits, 
• new business models, 
• labor shortages, and the 
• growing importance of hands-on kitchen experience 

Yet the clearest message from the table was that technology will not diminish chefs' importance. It will make human creativity, judgment, and connection even more valuable.

AI in the Kitchen: A Tool, Not a Replacement

Much of the public conversation around AI begins with fear: Will machines replace people? Will automated kitchens eliminate jobs? Will AI replace chefs? For Chef Poul Gorell, Regional Culinary Manager for Europe at Nestlé Professional, the technology itself is neither the problem nor the solution.

AI is a gift, and it is super powerful. But you need to know how to use it wisely.

This view is increasingly reflected across the industry. A 2025 Deloitte survey found that 82% of restaurant executives planned to increase their investment in AI, with improved customer experience and more efficient operations among their leading objectives.

From forecasting demand and managing inventory to scheduling teams, documenting recipes, personalizing offers, and reducing food waste, AI can take on tasks that once demanded hours of administrative work. Gorell described how he can now dictate and refine a recipe in approximately six minutes, rather than spending an hour calculating quantities and entering the information manually.

Chef Deepanker Khosla, Michelin- and Green Star-awarded chef and founder of Haoma Bangkok, went further, arguing that automation is not a distant development waiting to enter the kitchen. It is already there.

The Pacojet is a robot. The Thermomix is a robot. The RATIONAL oven is a robot. They are doing the tasks that we want. AI is already here.

The next generation of tools will be more connected, intuitive, and responsive, but their fundamental purpose remains the same: to help people work more efficiently and consistently. 

The International Labour Organization’s research into generative AI and employment similarly suggests that complete job automation remains limited. In many occupations, AI is more likely to transform individual tasks than replace the people performing them. 

How AI Enhances Culinary Creativity

AI can also accelerate the research and development behind a dish. Khosla shared how he used Claude while creating a menu tracing five thousand years of Indian cooking. After building a nomenclature and feeding it into the platform, he asked what type of vessel the Harappan civilization might have used to serve a barley stew. The response led him to commission beaten-metal bowls inspired by the period.

The technology shortened a research process that could otherwise have taken months. It did not, however, conceive the menu, understand its emotional purpose, or decide how the historical reference should become part of the guest experience. Those decisions still belonged to the chef.

AI can identify patterns, propose combinations, calculate quantities, and retrieve information. It cannot taste a sauce, read the mood of a dining room, understand the significance of a childhood recipe, or recognize when a technically correct dish lacks soul.

As Khosla put it:

It will all come down to how we make people feel. The human element will never be taken away from our industry.

That distinction will become increasingly important. The more accessible technology becomes, the easier it will be to create a menu, brand identity, website, virtual restaurant, or cloud-kitchen concept. The competitive advantage will no longer be access to the tools themselves. It will be the ability to turn what those tools produce into something relevant, memorable, and commercially viable.

The Future of Food Beyond Fine Dining

The future of food will not be defined solely by Michelin-starred restaurants and five-star hotels. Gorell estimated that these businesses represent only around 20% of the industry. The remaining 80% encompasses an enormous and evolving market: casual restaurants, cafés, bakeries, workplace dining, institutional catering, grab-and-go concepts, food delivery, retail foodservice, virtual brands, and models that may not yet exist.

Our industry is not only five-star hotels and Michelin-starred restaurants. The knowledge, attention to quality, and care for the customer experience can and will be be applied across the wider out-of-home food industry.

This is where some of the greatest opportunities for innovation and entrepreneurship are likely to emerge. Consumer expectations are moving in several directions at once. People want speed and convenience, but they also want quality. They value digital access, but still seek personal connection. They may order dinner through an app one evening and spend several hours in a destination restaurant the next.

The National Restaurant Association’s research into off-premises dining shows that takeout, delivery, and drive-through services have become embedded in consumers’ everyday lives rather than remaining secondary restaurant channels. At the same time, the association identifies experience-driven dining, socialization, and welcoming environments as important reasons people continue to eat in restaurants. 

The future is therefore unlikely to belong to one dominant format. It will belong to businesses that understand which experience they are creating, whom they are creating it for, and how technology can help them deliver it profitably.

Food is Becoming an Experience Business

As access to prepared food becomes faster and easier, restaurants must offer a compelling reason to leave home, invest time, and spend more.

“Restaurants are now a business of experience rather than just food,” Khosla said. “ Why would someone spend five hours of their precious life and 250 francs to dine in our restaurant? For the experience.

That experience begins with the food, but it extends to storytelling, atmosphere, service, identity, provenance, and emotional connection. It explains why automation may become highly effective behind the scenes while people remain indispensable wherever trust, hospitality, and human interaction matter.

Rania Moualla added culture to that equation. She described how encouraging people to explore their own heritage can unlock a deeper sense of purpose and creative ownership.

The culture aspect creates a sense of ownership,” she said. “ It connects people to their childhood and their roots.

Those connections are intensely personal. Technology can retrieve historical information, identify regional ingredients, and suggest new combinations, but it cannot inherit a family memory or understand why a particular flavor evokes a place, a person, or a defining moment. These human associations give food much of its emotional power.

As digital tools become more widely available, cultural identity may become an even more important point of distinction. When operators can access the same technologies, originality must come from somewhere deeper: the chef’s perspective, cultural roots, values, and understanding of the people being served.

Khosla summarized this future through three words: people, purpose, and provenance. Together, they offer a useful compass for an industry facing rapid change. People create the connection. Purpose gives a concept meaning. Provenance provides the story, identity, and sense of place that technology cannot manufacture on its own.

Preparing Chefs for the Future of Food

The next decade will reward chefs and entrepreneurs who can combine culinary ability with technological confidence, commercial understanding, and a clear sense of purpose. Culinary Arts Academy Switzerland prepares students to become more than highly skilled chefs. 

By combining culinary training with business education, industry experience, and entrepreneurial thinking, it equips graduates to pursue opportunities across the wider foodservice sector, including both Michelin-starred restaurants and innovative businesses that will define the future of food.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Where is AI making the biggest difference in professional kitchens?

In repetitive, data-driven work: inventory tracking, demand forecasting, automated purchasing, and freshness monitoring. It also speeds up front-of-house admin such as answering calls and handling reservations.

What should a restaurant have ready before bringing in AI?

A clear goal, clean data, and a small pilot. AI performs best when it can draw on real POS, sales, and inventory data, and results should be tracked against set KPIs. Managers also need training on what the tools can and can't do.

Which tasks should not be handed to AI?

Tasting, creative direction, team leadership, and guest connection. AI can suggest and analyze, but people should make the final calls on the menu, quality, pricing, and how guests are treated.

Is a culinary career still a good choice?

Yes, for people who build real skills. Demand for capable chefs remains strong, and those with strengths in menu development, cost control, team leadership, and consistency at volume are in short supply.