Japanese conveyor belt sushi restaurant chain makes sushi with the help of artificial intelligence

At least when the machines take over there’ll be good sushi to eat.

Kura Sushi, one of Japan’s most well-known conveyer belt sushi chains, offers a variety of interesting foodstuffs such as cheddar cheese tempura and rice-based soda.

And most recently Kura Sushi has experimented by temporarily adding a special item to their menu: sushi made from fish aged by artificial intelligence. 

For the uninitiated, aged fish involves a process where fish meat is wrapped in a clean cloth and left to sit in a controlled environment, like a refrigerator, where the humidity level and temperature can be monitored and adjusted carefully. Over time, the fish’s proteins will break down to produce glutamate, a component of MSG that provides umami, a savory, meaty taste.

By aging fish, you get tastier pieces of sushi, but because of how extensive the aging process is and the need for a trained professional with the right knowledge and expertise, aged fish is more commonly seen at sushi specialty shops than your typical revolving sushi chain store.

However, thanks to artificial intelligence, Kura Sushi has managed to mass produce aged fish for its nigiri sushi. So far the sushi chain has perfected the aging process done by artificial intelligence for its tuna and yellowtail nigiri sushi.

Besides employing artificial intelligence to age raw tuna, Kura Sushi also used a special app developed by Japanese advertising company Dentsu called “Tuna Scope.” Tuna Scope identifies the best parts of a tuna fish by analyzing the cross-section of the tail with artificial intelligence, ensuring that hungry patrons of the conveyer belt sushi chain chomp on the freshest and most high quality fish.

While these two sushi pieces were only rolled out for a week, here’s to hoping they’ll make a comeback given the novel technique they were made with. After all, the possibilities that come with artificial intelligence are endless as well as death-defying!

Source, images: Kura Sushi (1, 2, 3) via Entabe
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