What does a virtual and real Roca creation taste like?

It was to be expected that the brothers from El Celler de Can Roca (Girona), always open to new ideas that satisfy their creative appetite and dialogue with other disciplines, and interested in the field of neuroscience for years, would accept the challenge that He asked them: contribute to the creation of one of the stations dedicated to the senses in which MWC visitors will be able to participate.

Thomas Osborne
Thomas Osborne
26 February 2023 Sunday 22:29
24 Reads
What does a virtual and real Roca creation taste like?

It was to be expected that the brothers from El Celler de Can Roca (Girona), always open to new ideas that satisfy their creative appetite and dialogue with other disciplines, and interested in the field of neuroscience for years, would accept the challenge that He asked them: contribute to the creation of one of the stations dedicated to the senses in which MWC visitors will be able to participate. And, logically, it could not be other than taste.

From the Mobile World Capital Barcelona, ​​Eduard Martín explains that in previous editions they had worked with 3D food printers or with robots that served a drink. "But this time we wanted to go one step further in the process of bringing virtual reality closer through a simple gastronomic experience, as part of that circuit through all the senses that as a whole builds a story."

The taste turn will be after having passed through the station dedicated to smell, since both senses are totally associated. This is how the visitor will have created his or her avatar's own aromatic map based on the interests shown when taking an olfactory tour of various places in Barcelona. The profile of aromatic preferences will be essential to enjoy the digital journey that aims to provide the flavor experience led by the Roca brothers, who will produce a total of 2,000 chocolates for the congress.

The visitor, equipped with immersive reality glasses, will receive the instructions for tasting in a couple of minutes, so that depending on the aromas for which they have been inclined in the previous area, they will be offered a chocolate or another based on the tastes sweet (based on a caramel ganache), sour (a lime and passion fruit ganache) or spicy (with red pepper and chili). Although the participant in the experience halfway between the virtual and real world is not aware of it, they will have previously set the guidelines so that they give them the chocolate that best suits their tastes.

Jordi Roca and Damian Allsop, who have worked with the MWCapital team and collaborated with Puig, the firm that has led the station dedicated to smell, have considered the challenge very positive: "We love the opportunity that this collaboration gives us to show what we do with chocolate at Casa Cacao in a different, enveloping and introspective way. Converting a tasting experience into an interactive virtual reality is wonderful, and a new space has opened up for us in which to play experimenting”, they explain.

Initially, the idea was raised that a robot would serve the chocolate, but Eduard Martín explains that in the end they preferred to opt for the human presence, which is closer. And it is that one of the challenges of this experience of approaching a virtual world is to maintain the emotional factor, so linked to gastronomic enjoyment.

The main objectives of the initiative, they explain from MWCapital, consist of exploring ways for new experiences in restaurants -why not have a sommelier in the metaverse?-, as well as reinforcing the immersive way of informing or training and also opening routes for tourism, an area in which tests have been carried out in previous editions of the congress.

Martín adds that they would have liked to be able to offer a more complex gastronomic experience, but that they have had to adapt to the requirements of the space itself. “It was also important for us to highlight the excellence and culinary talent that Catalonia brings together, and that are represented through its most awarded restaurant, El Celler de Can Roca”, he concludes.