S5 Ep15: Revolutionizing Food Experience with Research and Development with José Guerrero
“The soul of everything is knowledge.” — José Guerrero
If science is the engine that drives innovation, then research and development (R&D) is the lifeblood behind it. In the past couple of years, food science has made incredible strides. However, there is still so much to understand about our favorite foods.
R&D can help create the foundation for creativity, new innovations, and change. From bringing ideas to life to providing new insights into our daily lives, R&D helps motivate, inspire and transform the food industry.
Founded by José Guerrero, Anima Project is a research and development project that aims to create an impact in Gastronomy. They focus on improving human lives by "changing the industry from the inside with ethical and sustainable products."
In this episode, Justine and José help us rethink the potential of food as something more than a plate on the table. Listen in as they discuss what "anima" means and how it relates to food experience, how to revolutionize the kitchen and eradicate the hostility in the workplace, what drives creativity, how to make knowledge accessible to everybody, and why we should always weave in joy in the food experience.
Connect with Jose:
An experienced chef, José Guerrero wanted to create a deeper impact in the food industry so he studied Gastronomy at Basque Culinary Center. José did not only get educated about food, but he was also trained in the research and development side of culinary.
When the pandemic hit, José and his girlfriend, Fanni moved to Budapest. They founded Anima Project where they are creating a revolution in the research and development of food products. Recently, they have partnered with Thimus in an effort to create a plant-based protein alternative. They are also working with experts and interested individuals in their test kitchen and pilot lab projects to create a more holistic and sustainable approach to our food experience.
Episode Highlights:
00:53 A Big Dream Came True
05:33 Creativity is Not Magic
10:08 Making Knowledge Accessible to All
16:57 What Anima Means
21:06 Revolutionizing Human Experience with Food
27:12 Research and Development Toward Improvement
Tweets:
Food is the centerpiece of human experience, and we need to know more about it. Listen in as @jreichman and Anima Project founder, José Guerrero discuss how research and development can revolutionize our food experience. #podcast #entrepreneurship #socialgood #inspiration #impactmatters #NextGenChef #EssentialIngredients #AnimaProject #humanrevolution #impactmakers #gastronomy #research&development #foodexperience #kitchenrevolution
Inspirational Quotes:
01:52 "If a man or a woman loses the capacity of dreaming, they lose their life." -José Guerrero
06:03 "We are not machines, we are humans and we should understand that we are working with humans." -José Guerrero
06:47 "Creativity comes from knowledge. Creativity is not magic." -José Guerrero
12:21 "When you organize your team, when you organize your time, when you organize your resources, then there is a lot of time to think, to stop, to re-think, and to redesign." -José Guerrero
17:06 "The soul of everything is knowledge." -José Guerrero
24:55 "It's also hard to change people's traditions. It's also hard to change people's minds. And that's why the experience is very important because all of these that are developing in laboratories always end as an experience— always." -José Guerrero
26:31 "There is a lot of education going on that's necessary— plant-based eating is part of it." -Justine Reichman
Transcriptions:
Justine Reichman: Welcome to Essential Ingredients. I'm your host, Justine Reichman. Today with me is Jose Guerrero, and he is the founder of Anima Project.
So welcome, Jose, I'm so pleased to have you here.
Jose Guerrero: Thank you very much. Thank you. It's such an honor for me to be here talking with you.
Justine Reichman: And me with you. I've heard such wonderful things. I've read such wonderful things, and I'm so eager for you to share with our community a little bit about yourself and what the animal project is. Tell us what is Anima Project.
"If a man or a woman loses the capacity of dreaming, they lose their life." -José Guerrero
Jose Guerrero: Anima Project is the design of a revolution, I want to start like that. I always been a big dreamer since I was a kid. I remember when I was in school, I was telling my mom like, I want to have a Ferrari when I am big. When I grew up, I want to have a ferrari, I want to be famous. I don't know what that is, I always was a big dreamer. I grew up in Colombia in a family that is middle class. In normal way, these kinds and families cannot afford the education that I had. So the first thing that I want to highlight is that all my education, everything that I did was with scholarships, and it was a product of a huge effort. I don't came from a rich family, and I have been in the best education, and I've been in the best opportunities, and I feel proud of that. And that makes me what I am, like a dreamer. I always been following my dreams, and I always say that if a man or a woman loses the capacity of dreaming, they lose the life. So this is like my guiding star.
Justine Reichman: Dreaming gets me up.
Jose Guerrero: Anima is the materialization of that dream. How it started? So it started almost around five years ago, like the baby in my head growing here like a region. It wasn't because I always been working with the R&D department restaurants, I've always working with creativity, creation of knowledge, creation of experiences, new new things of the restaurants. I always try to push the restaurant to be more than a plate on a table, and that led me to work always in R&D departments, but always in kitchens. Five years ago, I decided to come out of the Michelin stars world, and I wanted to be an impact maker because another dream I always had was like, I don't want to leave this world without a mark. I always want to leave my mark here and the people, I want to improve people's life. I have this obsession that when I speak with somebody or I experience for somebody, I want to improve their life or help them to improve at least small step of their life. So five years ago, I came to research. That was my way of helping the gastronomy to improve.
Then I traveled to Spain, I started working in our restaurant because it is mainly in research and development that I moved to Barcelona. I was working with for (inaudible), that is the brother of (inaudible), a very beautiful group of restaurants that he has. Very, very creative. And then I joined at the Master of Science in gastronomy, and that was like the bomb, like the detonation of everything because I joined the Basque Center in Basque country in north part of Spain. And my mind just blew up because I was coming from my kitchen, my language was kitchen, my creativity was kitchen experience and ingredients. And then you come to this master where there are people from economics, from medicine, from artists, from design, and you start talking, is that talking, is that watching that your war goes more than the point of your nose. And you start getting a lot of, I started getting a lot of inspiration, a lot of different ways to work on gastronomy, and it was understanding that the gastronomy can talk so many languages that people never imagine that. Usually you say to a person, I do like gastronomy. Oh, you eat very good. You travel a lot. You work in a restaurant. No, there is a lot of things you can do. And then we did a lot of research projects. We work with blind people. We work with several projects, nutritional products that help people, and they're started the idea of Anima growing. I'm not under that name, but my idea was to create something to make an impact. I just wanted a platform to make an impact in people's life and in gastronomy. I wanted to improve.
Justine Reichman: When you launched this company, you had come from the restaurant business as a chef in the kitchen, and you decided to leave the kitchen, so to speak, to go do certain development, and you decided you wanted to do impact driven work. You wanted to make an impact, and you wanted to start a revolution. You wanted to start, what was the specific impact you wanted to make?
"We are not machines, we are humans and we should understand that we are working with humans." -José Guerrero
Jose Guerrero: So I came from kitchens. Kitchens are a very, very hard environment. Because initially, the people worked a lot of hours, they were always angry, over caffeinated. And not only way the relationships are not the most kind. The chef's, all school chef are always screaming with their people. There is a way of working that usually, we tend to think that we are machines. So my first driving for making our solution was this, I say that we are not machines, we are humans. We should understand that we are working with humans. So I wanted to create a movement or I wanted to create something that the people can see that there is somebody thinking differently, that there is somebody that wants to make a step to the left and say, I don't want to continue this line of hostile kitchen. So I wanted to change that in the mind of the chef. I wanted to start--
Justine Reichman: Environment in the kitchen.
Jose Guerrero: I wanted to change the environment, and also to show people in the kitchen that you can take your career more than the kitchen. With knowledge, with research, you can learn. And then creativity comes from knowledge. Creativity is not magic. It does appear that when you wake up in the morning, creativity appears because you have knowledge, because you have cultivated, you have created some knowledge. And I wanted to show this to people. Since I entered science, I started understanding a lot of scientific methods and a lot of ways of thinking that were applicable to the kitchen process.
"Creativity comes from knowledge. Creativity is not magic." -José Guerrero
Justine Reichman: The thinking that you integrate it.
Jose Guerrero: No. For example, the ways how science make hypotheses, that normally way, there is always a research process behind. Normally, we're in the kitchen, most of the processes that our chefs does is for trial and error, and most of the processes are not standardized, most of the processes are not measure. So all of this is creation of knowledge. When you start understanding what happens behind the ingredients that you use, when you start on standardizing that methods and understanding, for example, a simple thing like fermentation, it's super easy to talk about that. But let's say five years ago, it was like a hydrogen war fermentation because the people didn't understand the metabolic groups of bacteria, they didn't understand the processes, the Food Safety. Now, they understand, and then the creativity appears. So I wanted to start implementing these methods on creative processes in the kitchen, and I wanted to standardize this to the kitchen like a bridge between science on gastronomy and restaurants.
Justine Reichman: Wondering, how was it before when you were there? So this is not ordinary, this is not part of the process in the kitchen you're saying.
Jose Guerrero: Normally, there is different kinds of kitchen. There are the kitchens that you see always in the world's 50 Best, or in Michelin Guide, or the dream kitchens where they have tons of technology, they have 40 people teams. These kitchens normally where the processes are very advanced, and they do research, they have resources to have chefs traveling around the world. But these restaurants, let's say, are only 50 because that's why there is a 50 Best guide. But in the world, there is so many restaurants that normally way the restoration becomes business. You're thinking operational, operacional. How the line of production goes? How the results creation is. How is the research creation, the play that is more selling? So that's the best. And how are these types up here? Because trial and error won't happen if I put, let's say, I don't know. What happened if I put a lobster stock? What happened if I put them on, most of the processes are not understandable. For example fermentations in a lot of kitchens, but there is no food safety on that fermentations. I think that it's a key factor to start understanding this in teachers that are not capable to work on the scale at best 50 restaurants
Justine Reichman: Before you go on, I'm curious. So once you instituted this, or now that you're instituting this in some restaurants, what kind of impact have you seen? And is it well received?
Jose Guerrero: I already told you about the two revolutions in Anima. The revolution of knowledge and the human revolution. But there is a third revolution, or the idea is accessibility. I've been fighting all my life with accessibility. You want to be well educated, you have to pay a lot, you want to be in the best restaurant, you have to work, speak with these people, you have to win a prize. One of the main things I want to do in anyone is to pull the knowledge accessible to everybody. And this is the main impact that people have feel it on them. Because the first restaurant I was doing this, they never imagined that it was so easy to start adopting these processes and to start working on these methods. They was thinking that these, you need a $10 million R&D department to the base. And it was amazing.
"When you organize your team, when you organize your time, when you organize your resources, then there is a lot of time to think, to stop, to re-think, and to redesign." -José Guerrero
It was amazing. Because at the beginning, you speak, and it's like a funeral. There is so much information, and there is no feedback. You just see the face of the people like their mind is just collapsing, then the second meeting is the same. And then the third meeting, there is one guy in the bottom that is encouraged to make a question. And that's amazing. Because when they start making questions, they start connecting things in the head. They start asking questions, and this is the best. So it's beautiful, important because then the people becomes more productive, and the people start enjoying the profession. Because of course, there is the long hours and the long, the hard work behind the kitchen. There is this beauty part where when we make meetings between the chef, within the sommelier, within the head of the service and they already have the (inaudible) metal on the head already installed.
So it's beautiful how the people just started growing and growing, and they start creating a curiosity. And instead of curiosity, and they start looking for more answers, and questions, questions and answer, questions and answers. And this is beautiful. This is beautiful because before, they just was thinking in producing, producing, producing, which is the best. Okay, this is the top seller, let's do this during 10 years. And don't change because we're gonna lose money. Or maybe we don't have time to think. But then, when you organize your team, when you organize your time, when you organize your resources, then there is a lot of time to think, to stop, to re-think, to redesign. And amazing, beautiful input when you see. One of the main restaurants you can see that is here in Budapest, one of the most traditional restaurants in three years became one of the most risky and innovative restaurants because of these kinds of practices. Because they were working 10 years under the same umbrella, under the safety sun. And then one day, I arrived and I start asking questions, and then they start asking questions as well. And they start looking for answers for the questions, and then that takes the restaurant to another level.
Justine Reichman: So that's why Budapest? Why is Budapest the place to have?
Jose Guerrero: I think was--
Justine Reichman: Food is evolving in so many different cities. I think there could be a revolution and a lot of different places, but I know you're passionate and you believe Budapest is the place. So I'd love to hear why.
Jose Guerrero: So basically, I arrived at that place because of COVID. In my case, I have the beautiful pleasure that COVID for me was an opportunity. I was in Spain working with a laboratory in the digital gastronomy lab. This is a place where you combine technology with science and food. And then it came COVID and the Spanish government said, okay, we will close the country tomorrow. And I was there with my girlfriend. She's Hungarian. We panic because we are there alone. We are just stalling and working. And then I said, okay, my family is in Colombia. 11 hours, 1200 euros. Her family was two hours of plane and 90 euros of plane. So the decision was easy. Let's go to your family. We don't want to be alone. So we came to Budapest. Of course, the first one was quarantine. I got crazy in the first three weeks doing nothing. So my girlfriend's father, his restaurant there. He has two restaurants and I say, listen, I want to work. I want to wash the dishes, whatever, but I want to do something. So he knew my background and he said, okay, here are the keys of my restaurant. Here is my team, do whatever you want. Basically, that was the trust. Do whatever you want. And without huge responsibilities or creating a plan like, okay, let's do our first training. This COVID is nothing. It is going to finish in one month, and we are working in Spain. So I decided that one month of training.
So they want one training, and became three years now. So then, when I started that training, of course, the current thing was softer and we could go out. We was able to go out. So I started traveling across the country, and I started discovering what is in here, and I started scoring beautiful things. I was in love with the country. And then there was one day that I say, this is the perfect country for revolution. Because it's a country that it's been doing the things during the past 10, 15 years in the same way, and there is so much people and so much talent that they want to do different, but they just don't know how. They just know what is there to push them to do the things differently. I started discovering this potential that there is a lot of talent here, a lot of beautiful people with beautiful knowledge and I say that this is the perfect place for revolution. All the things set. There is the people that is the desire of the revolution, and there is the meanings as well. And the government is very supportive with these kind of things. And also now, the politics of the Hungarian government, they force art on putting the Hungarian on the map. This is like the main politics now. So I think the scene is set, all this set. It just needs, I don't know, somebody who say, okay, look, your country is amazing. Let's do something for it. That's how I just stay here. I took the decision of staying here. I started working in the restaurant. And then the second year, I said, okay, let's build the platform here. The platform that I've been dreaming during the past four years, let's do it here. So it appears as an extension development project.
Justine Reichman: Is there technology included with this platform, or is this the training when you talk about it?
"The soul of everything is knowledge." -José Guerrero
Jose Guerrero: So what happened is that I decided to form the project, then I found the name Anima. Because Anima means soul in Latin. For me, the soul of everything is knowledge. Anima is a project of research and development. We create, we try to create knowledge and are multidisciplinary. So we create knowledge for chefs, for gastronomy and for the food industry. So that's the Anima for everything. This is the soul for starting anything. So then also appears the opportunity of building out this kitchen, a laboratory like a hybrid between a professional kitchen, biochemistry laboratory, and physic laboratory. We can also say that. So that is machines from the chemistry environment, that is machines from the kitchen that I build with my own hands. With these things just to create an environment, to create knowledge, to create a perfect environment so people can come here. With multidisciplinary talking, we can create knowledge, and we can share it. So the project takes more shape.
Justine Reichman: And as you grow, what can we expect to see in the next few years?
Jose Guerrero: So basically, we have just one month or maximum two months to open this place. So with the opening of this place is gonna be a huge growth because then there is something tangible. And sometimes, the people need to see something that they can touch to really, this place is going to have several capabilities. For example, there is a dining room for 12 people, and in front is the kitchen. So basically, I want to start creating experiences where all the research that I will, that we do becomes an experience. So there are three ways of working. The first way is co creation, that is when my partnership with companies and we create the food of the future. And there is the second way that this research projects like the one that we have on plant based proteins that just look, is an effort to make an impact on gastronomy and in humans' lives. And that's why we know science, we work with sensory perception, with microbiology. There are several research lines, and then there is the experimental part where all of this research becomes funny, and becomes accessible for everybody. Because if I go to a farmer's house with all of this bunch of research, you're gonna say, okay, thank you very much. I don't want to give donations. I always believe that an experience is an impacting way and an accessible way, so all of this research becomes experience. So all the things that we discover, that we co create goes to an experience, and I want to do pop ups of different things like plant based pop ups, or cultural popups as well. I want to bring people to my kitchen. I want to visit their kitchens and just make a cultural exchange and knowledge, multidisciplinary approach.
Justine Reichman: When are we gonna see you here in San Francisco, or New York? What are you going to do--
Jose Guerrero: I'm really looking forward to going to America. America is always a beautiful market for these kinds of things. Actually, I'm planning a trip to Los Angeles in February next year. So I'm gonna be very close to San Francisco, and I really want to start knocking some doors there in Los Angeles, in San Francisco in that area because that is my favorite part of America.
Justine Reichman: Let me just circle back to something. With the Future Food Tech, it would be quite a nice collaboration to have a little pop up at the Future Food Tech whether it's in London in the coming months, or whether it's in San Francisco. I'm just throwing it out there as ideas. When's the next time you talk to Isabella or somebody, or future Food Tech, notify them.
Jose Guerrero: Our main target with Mario is doing that creation of experiences. He understands the human across neuroscience, and I understand the joy of being human. So when we combine all of that, we take the research and we make experiences just for these people for understanding where we were, what is behind the research, and which is the future of the food. We are always trying to discover, okay, which is the future. We try to live one year ahead, two years ahead.
Justine Reichman: I know you did go to a Future Food Tech recently. I'm just curious, was there anything in the Future Food Tech alternative protein summit this year that stood out to you?
Jose Guerrero: There were a lot of things, it was a couple of emotions in this. For me it was quite special, because it was the first time being on a stage, a congress like this. It was a beautiful experience. Also, across all the networking and all the people, you can meet these beautiful people and he's like, I love these kinds of things. Because when you are working on projects like mine, you think you are the best in the world. I am the most advanced, I am doing everything. Look, I'm super technological, I have a lot of friends. Then you come to a conference like this and they slap you in your face and say, you're nothing. There are more interesting people than you. And this is beautiful. This is beautiful because you see, it's nice to see what's happening in the world. It's nice to see how the world is evolving and how many beautiful people out there want to change what we've been doing until now. There are a lot of people who want to improve human life. So we met a lot of beautiful projects, they are the future of food tech, a lot of beautiful minds.
I remember so much, and a person from India, he came to us in a very funny way because he was presenting a new sugar base, and then we ended up talking about bioreactors. And the guy was developing accessible ways to laboratories that can have a bioreactor that is super expensive, and this guy was making more accessible. And these really marked me because this guy was brilliant. Just speaking to him, so much knowledge behind him. He was a chemistry engineer. And then there were a lot of young people doing beautiful projects, hamburgers and startups. I remember some years doing pizza that was amazing. Talk with them. They were super interesting and had experiences together as well. Because one of the things that I took from that congress is that startups are really looking forward to collaborating with chefs. They want to see how many languages their product can talk. Because normally, they create a (inaudible), and the immediate thinking is, okay, let's put over a pizza. But then we take it and we say, okay, it's not only the pizza. We can put it here, we can do this. We can play with this wine, we can also take it here. So when you connect there are certainly a lot of beautiful experiences with this startup that is creating beautiful products.
Justine Reichman: Experience too, for these products.
"It's also hard to change people's traditions. It's also hard to change people's minds. And that's why the experience is very important because all of these that are developing in laboratories always end as an experience— always." -José Guerrero
Jose Guerrero: Yeah, it's very important. It's very important to create an experience. And it's very important because this plant based product, I think, is revolutionary. It's a way of people saying to the world, we want to be different. We want a better world. We want to stop climate change. We want to protect our animals. We want to protect our health. We want to improve as human beings. And it's also hard to change people's traditions. It's also hard to change people's minds. And that's why the experience is very important because all of these that are developing in laboratories always end as an experience in the supermarket or at your place, always. And if that experience is not good the first time, you're gonna go back to the meat. You're gonna say, why do I want to change? If I'm happy for you, I'm enjoying this. So it's very important to understand the things that you are creating, it's also important that the people have to enjoy it, it's not just creating a plant based approach. Because it's healthy, people will not take it, because the people love meat. Even me, I love meat. And that's why we present the relational pro, transitional pro because we say, okay, the world is not binary. Now you go to the supermarket, you see your plant based or fully meat products. But where are the products that heard me to make a transition that doesn't sacrifice the taste of the meal, but also in producing a percentage of my consumption. So yeah, it's really important. And I think the experience creation, the old experience thinking, experience design on here--
Justine Reichman: I would agree. I think it's super important to consider this. There's an event happening next week, I think we can have a Mindful Eating Film Festival that is going on. And it's all about treating animals in a compassionate way. So there's a lot of education that's going on that's necessary. And I think plant based eating is part of it. But I also think it's about the way we treat animals. I had one of the co-founders on from, he got into Just from an experience he had learning about how chickens, which chickens were treated. So all these different things, and how we can amplify people's stories and share them with the community so people can learn how animals are being treated. And so people can make a choice. I'm not trying to tell them what to do, but just to share these stories so that people can hear them and make a choice for themselves on what they're going to do next. Whether it's about--
"There is a lot of education going on that's necessary— plant based eating is part of it." -Justine Reichman
Jose Guerrero: I had a very impactful experience that I want to share. That's one of my biggest driving passions is like, last year, Christmas, I was in Norway. I have a project with the fisherman's king crab in the North Pole. So I was really in the north ribs pointing there. I was in the vessel fishing with these people. And then we came back. I took this label of Allah. He changed the day, and there was the next morning. And around 10:00 o'clock in the morning, I went out to take a walk. I see a table, okay. And it was the middle of the winter, the table was full of snow. And there was a water drop and snow was melting. In the North Pole, the snow was melting. I checked the temperature and it was +2 degrees. And I said okay, we are in the North Pole, the snow is melting, and we are +2 degrees, this is not good at all. This is not good at all. I am not freezing. And when you see these kinds of things, for me it is shocking. Normally, when you live in the cities like Budapest or New York, you think that you have everything easy. You go to the supermarket, you get the apple, you go anywhere, you get anything. When you live in the North Pole, you see these and then you see other people cannot get food for feeding. It's quite shocking.
And then you start thinking, okay, I want to make an impact on this war. I want to improve where it's been until now. And also New Yorker, another thing that was shocking for us was we weren't there to face the industries and to face the way how they are thinking marketing strategies. I cannot say names, and I cannot say the people who saw our presentation. I think they are aware of what we did. We were doing a big criticism in our presentation about how the industries are thinking about design and food development. So it was shocking. It was a shocking experience in New York. It was a lot of learning, a lot of networking, a lot of beautiful projects and collaborations. And now, we are seeing.
Justine Reichman: I'm so glad that you were able to share all those stories with me. I'm so glad that you were able to join the podcast and share the story of the community. Thanks for joining. It was great to have you on the podcast, so thanks.
Jose Guerrero: Thank you. It's a pleasure.
Justine Reichman: Thank you so much. So to be in touch with you or learn more about Anima, how would they do that?
Jose Guerrero: So there is a website of course, the website is www.dreaminganima.com, like dreaming soul with Anima. There is an Instagram platform, that is Anima Project. You can find like that on Instagram. I post all the updates about what we are doing. And also, across the team was a network. They have a YouTube channel where we are filming documentary series about our work, about what we do. So we are making it very visual and we are sharing a lot of videos on several channels.
Justine Reichman: Wonderful. Well, we will make sure to share that in the show notes for those that are watching the video. And thank you so much.
