There’s something unique cooking at the recently opened Dominique Ansel bakery inside Caesars Palace Las Vegas.
Ansel is best known for inventing the cronut, now he’s diving into cutting edge tech to serve up his signature Cookie Shot.
“If you look at just the sheer sales numbers, they have gone up through the roof,” said Aravind Durai founder of RoboChef, the company that created the robot.
The robot retrieves a cookie shot from a shelf, fills it with chilled vanilla milk and delivers it through a rotating door.
You order the cookie by scanning a QR code on your phone, so the entire process is automated.
“When you add this layer of intelligence onto a workhorse like a robot, you’re able to get these robots to do a lot more things,” explained Durai.
I went through the process on my phone, then watched as the robot went from grabbing a shell, to filling it and then delivering it. The movements are swift but careful.
When the shot is ready, a green light lets you know it’s safe to take out of the rotating delivery door.
The shot is sweet and decadent. The cookie absorbs a bit of the milk so initial bites are crisp, but they get more saturated as you get to the bottom of the chocolate chip cookie shot shell.
The robot has been at work for just a few weeks but it’s already attracting crowds, mostly through word of mouth.
While we were there, Las Vegas visitors were curious to watch the robot in action and order a shot of their own. The robot is playful in between servings, dancing and gesturing to the crowd.
“Time now has come to take advantage of the software and the software is really where the intelligence lies,” concluded Aravind.
FYI, Ansel is best known for inventing the cronut, but the bakery also offers a treat called the DKA, which I tried and it’s fantastic. I highly recommend getting it if you ever have the opportunity.
