Alberta brewery taps ChatGPT for new beer design and recipe

Grande Prairie’s Grain Bin Brewing Company has taken a hands-off approach to creating its latest beer, called the Amber Waves of Grain.

As reported by CBC News, the northern Alberta brewery asked OpenAI’s ChatGPT to decide the name, the price, the packaging and the recipe for a new beer. “We decided to just be as hands-off as possible, to see what the limitations were and what the actual final product would be if we relied solely on artificial intelligence,” said Dalen Landis, a co-owner of the brewery in Grande Prairie, Alberta.

According to Landis, the hope is that the beer will become a conversation piece, with the use of AI raising moral and ethical questions about using content generated from sources across the internet for profit. “It’s using bits and pieces of other people’s content and it’s producing something for us that, you know, we’re using for profit.”

The brewery’s goal was for the beer to be completely AI-generated, though the brewery staff had to intervene at times to direct the technology. “For example, when the AI-generated recipe called for a malt normally used in home brewing, staff asked for a substitute better suited to commercial production,” wrote CBC News.

Further, according to University of Alberta food microbiology professor Michael Gänzle believes that human oversight is essential in using chatbots in food production, particularly in light of concerns around food safety and liability. He added that with the proper human oversight, the technology is worthy of a taste test. “I wouldn’t have a problem with AI-generated beer,” he added. “I have a problem with bad beer.”

It remains to be seen whether Amber Waves of Grain will become a commercial success, but it’s clear that AI is increasingly being used in the food and beverage industry to create unique products and enhance the customer experience.

Image credit: CBC News

Source: CBC News