To address the labor shortage in the food service industry, Japan is dependent on new technological advances in robots.

Japanese restaurants are in serious shortage of manpower. As a result, not only did the labor cost increase, but the management and opening of the store became ineffective.

The preparation of food is especially important, requiring skilled people and many years of experience, while this person is "rarely difficult to find". To help overcome the scarcity of human resources in the restaurant sector, technology that allows automatic food preparation is being developed. Progress can help bring Japanese food culture around the world.

Huis Ten Bosch's robot is fried pancakes.

In the future, it is possible to create restaurants where food is completely prepared by robots. Currently, Henn-na restaurant is located in his travel agent Huis Ten Bosch Park This is a self-service restaurant (buffet), where robots prepare food inside the Robot Kingdom complex. In addition to the five types of food, robots also make drinks and ice cream.

The most interesting thing is that robots know how to make okonomiyaki , a Japanese pancake. The robot can mix flour, cooking oil and flip the cake, before finishing with mayonnaise and dried seaweed without dropping one.

These robots use Yaskawa Electric's control technology which is used in searching and carrying parts in a factory. In addition to pancakes, robots also know how to roast rice, make round cakes and make cocktails.

Robot Kingdom is the base where visitors visit and interact with more than 200 robots. In addition to Henn-na restaurant, it also has Henn-na hotel, where the customer care robot comes to stay and Robot House, where visitors come to observe and try to operate the robot.

Due to the shortage of labor is a difficult knot to remove, many companies are looking for new technological advances. Sushi, the most famous dish in Japanese cuisine culture, is increasingly popular all over the world but the number of sushi chefs is not enough. Suzumo Machinery developed a robot capable of preparing sushi rice that looks exactly like the chef's shape.

The first model was released in 1981, when the robot could produce 1,200 pieces of sushi per hour, but the latest model in 2014 could prepare up to 4,300 pieces. Suzumo Machinery accounts for 70% of the domestic market share for this type of robot and contributes a lot of effort to expand global sushi counters.

Tempura carousel

Tenya automatic frying machine tempura fried in just over 100 seconds.

Sushi conveyor belt appeared in 1958. According to the Japanese Catering Association, the sushi restaurant market is going down after peaking in 1992 but rebounded in 2015, reaching 1.41 trillion yen, the level highest since 2000.

One of the first to adopt automatic food preparation was Ten Corp, a subsidiary of Royal Holdings, who managed Tenya tempura restaurant chain. Making Tempura requires long-term skills and experience. To automate the preparation of tempura, the company has constantly upgraded its machines since its establishment in 1989.

When the ingredients are dropped on a conveyor belt, the food is immediately fried in 180 degrees Celsius hot oil for about 80 seconds and then transferred along the conveyor belt for about 20-30 seconds to be slowly cooked by residual heat. After just 1 month of training, almost anyone can do tempura with this technology."We are able to serve a large number of orders even when the busiest , " said Yasuhiro Mochimatsu, the company's president.