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Could a smart cooktop do the job of a rice cooker?

 
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sammyk



Joined: 26 May 2015
Posts: 1

PostPosted: Tue May 26, 2015 9:37 pm    Post subject: Could a smart cooktop do the job of a rice cooker? Reply with quote

Hey all,

I enjoy cooking, but I usually don't have enough time in my schedule to dedicate my full attention to it.
I started working on a "smart" cooker that would let me be productive while my food is cooking. The idea is basically to choose a recipe on the app to set the cook-cycle over wifi, and have it send a notification when manual intervention is needed (like adding ingredients, stirring etc).

It has a temperature sensor embedded in the electric heating element, and sits on little feet that let it function as a kitchen scale.

Here's a rendering of how the final product might look:


The app is a recipe app with trigger points for certain conditions. For example, an instruction like "let cook for 6 minutes" would have a little button next to it that would trigger a notification 6 minutes later.

Have any of you tried something like this before? I was thinking that with some calibration for the cookware it could fulfill the job of a rice cooker or slow cooker. Does anyone know what features separate a high-end rice cooker from a low or mid-range one?
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PostPosted: Mon Jan 18, 2016 7:56 pm    Post subject: Could a smart cooktop do the job of a rice cooker? Reply with quote

This most definitely can be done, and has been done in a variety of solutions. While the following is not exhaustive, some examples include:

1) "Speed" and "Combi" Ovens that have preprogrammed menus, and beep to instruct the user when to add items, flip items, etc. I've not used these, but read of them and seen videos. I have used microwave ovens that can be programmed for different radiation levels for different times in multiple segments, and expect newer models may have some recipes pre-loaded in memory. Given available marketing material, I suspect some of these features are becoming available for more classic thermal and convection ovens (including toaster ovens), especially those with inbuilt probes that sense interior cooking temperatures of large pieces.

2) Gas range with temperature sensors to adjust flame/auto off (we used to have one that had a special "rice" feature, which expected a pot with rice and water, would run at initial heat (nearly full) until the water boiled, then turn down, keeping the water boiling, and finally turn off when the pot temperature started to rise again (indicating the water had boiled away), beeping to notify us when the rice was done. This sort of feature is often marketed as "anti-boilover" or "non-burning", and may be incorporated into any range or cooktop that is able to measure the temperature of the cooking vessel.

3) Various tabletop accessories (bread makers, rice cookers, multicookers, slow cookers, pressure cookers, halogen ovens, heating blenders, etc.) will have both preprogrammed recipes and/or allow users to define custom recipes that involve multiple steps. Of these, I've only used a "rice cooker" of this class, but it had a wide range of preprogrammed recipes, and would beep to ask the user to add things or stir between various cooking phases to prepare meals.

I have not heard of this feature being combined with a kitchen scale previously, so that it could accurately estimate how much of each ingredient the user had added. Note that successful implementations should include an inbuilt barometer, as the local atmospheric pressure will affect the evaporation temperatures of liquids, avoiding burning the food after the liquid is removed while relentlessly trying to achieve some temperature goal.
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Jim Cooley



Joined: 09 Oct 2008
Posts: 377
Location: Seattle

PostPosted: Sat Jan 23, 2016 6:08 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If you can't cook a pan of rice you have no business being here.
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