AI heads futuristic Dubai restaurant

By Alimat Aliyeva

At Gastronaut Hospitality's Woohoo restaurant in Dubai, UAE, dishes are crafted by AI Chef Ayman, an artificial intelligence system trained on thousands of recipes and flavor combinations. Opened in September 2025, Woohoo positions itself as a glimpse into the “future of gastronomy”, Azernews reports.

The concept began when the restaurant’s owner, Akhmet Oytun Cakir, faced a creative block in the kitchen and decided to experiment with ChatGPT to develop a new dish. He asked the AI to suggest a recipe, and it recommended spiced mutton. “It was incredible—just incredible. We immediately photographed it and added it to the menu. It became an instant bestseller,” Cakir recalls.

AI Chef Ayman is an avatar built on the Umai model developed by Vivid Studios in the UAE. He resembles a middle-aged man with glasses and a futuristic aesthetic, and he “runs” the kitchen using insights from a massive database of recipes, ingredients, and flavor pairings. The AI can invent dishes by combining ingredients in unconventional ways, creating unique flavor profiles that might never occur to human chefs.

Woohoo is more than a restaurant; it’s an experimental lab for AI-driven gastronomy. Chef Ayman can adapt recipes in real time based on diners’ preferences, dietary restrictions, or seasonal ingredients. The restaurant has even started hosting interactive tasting sessions, where guests can watch the AI design a dish on the spot and then taste it minutes later.

This approach hints at a future where AI not only supports chefs but may also reshape culinary creativity, offering endless possibilities for experimentation, flavor exploration, and innovation in the restaurant industry.

Some regulars jokingly call Ayman the “robotic Michelin star chef,” and social media clips of him “creating” new dishes have gone viral, sparking curiosity and excitement about the possibilities of AI in cooking.