The AI Cook

I love MasterChef. Some of my vivid memories is of Gordon Ramsey reminding the contestants to always “taste” the food they’re preparing.

I don’t know if (or rather when) an AI contestant will enter the MasterChef kitchen. It certainly can “taste” the food.

This isn’t really easy because the human perception of taste relies on the saliva produced during chewing and digestive enzymes to decide whether food is enjoyable or not.

Cambridge university researchers trained robots with the first dish every culinary expert was trained on- scrambled eggs.

It tasted nine variations of scrambled egg and tomatoes. A salinity sensor attached to the robot’s arm provided readings as the robot prepared dishes. To imitate the chewing progress, the team blended the egg mixture and had the robot test the dish again.

So it goes beyond saying if the dish is salty or not can suggest if more mixing is needed, other ingredients should be added etc.

Now, who’d like a hand in the kitchen? 😉

Image Credits: WEForum

https://www.weforum.org/videos/robot-chef-trained-to-taste-food-as-it-cooks