Restaurant robot serves lunch. ()
Innovation City’s Gurunavi Food Hall WYE next to Haneda Airport has appealing options for hungry travelers like me.
At first glance, the food hall’s décor made me feel like I was entering old Japan. The entrance had a small sori-bashi (moon bridge) and a karesansui (rock garden) with torii gates and a yagura (tower). I’ve never been to Kyoto, but it did feel like I was there when I entered the area.
Looking beyond the architecture and decorations of the space, the food hall had an interesting feature that was not a fixture in old Japan: robotic food servers. The robots themselves were shaped like half cylinders with multiple compartments to hold food trays on-top of what looked like a Roomba guiding them. When a robot delivered our food, it did a 180 and we retrieved the trays. There was a neat button on top that reported to the robot that the food had been delivered and returned to the kitchen. The robots use sensors to avoid bumping into people or tables, as well as to know which table to deliver to.
To place an order, diners scan a QR code at their table, which leads to the menu and ordering system. The menu came in English as well, making ordering very simple on the line app.
The extensive menu offered many options, including Thai food, burgers, fries, and Japanese food like oyakodon (chicken and egg rice bowl) and beef tongue. The food hall also serves alcohol, and for those who partake, there are deals on drinks after 3 p.m.
For my order, I went with the gapao rice, a spicy Thai dish consisting of ground chicken and rice topped with a fried egg, for 1,200 yen. My friend ordered the fried karaage chicken set.
We waited eagerly for our robot waiter to bring us our meals. After 10 minutes, one of the electronic minions arrived with our trays carrying, to our dismay, small portions of food.
Although the serving was not big enough for my liking, my gapao rice was very tasty. My friend was happy with the flavor of his karaage, but we both agreed that we would have liked more food.
The seamless, no-contact order and receiving process carried over to paying out bill. Diners can pay on their phone from their table. But if you have yen or want to pay in person, you can head to the front register where the staff will take care of you.
We did not interact with the staff much, making the experience feel quite different from other restaurants, but in a good way. Often when traveling abroad, you have language barriers to contend with, especially at restaurants. The food hall seems to reduce the stress a newcomer might have ordering a meal in a foreign language.
Despite the small portions served at Gurunavi Food Hall WAE, it is a great place to see robots in action and bypass having to order in Japanese. I will come back to this place next time I’m at Haneda Airport.
Address: 1-1-4 Haneda Innovation City [2F], Hanedakuko, Ota-ku, Tokyo
Hours: 11 a.m. – 9 p.m.,
Takeout hours, 11 a.m. – 8 p.m.
Price estimate: 480 yen to 1,680 Yen on meals with non-alcoholic drinks being around 480 Yen.
Tel: 03-5579-7704
