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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

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Guided Cooking Trend Continues Momentum In 2018

Two years ago at the Housewares Show in Chicago, I saw the emergence of a new trend called guided cooking. At the show, companies like Cuciniale, Oliso and Hestan Cue showed off early efforts to combine sensors, software, precision heating and content in an orchestrated experience that guides home cooks through the creation of a meal.

As I said of my effort to make salmon with the Hestan Cue, using a guided cooking system for the first time was something of a revelation:

“…this combination of the pan, burner and app and the guidance system they had built that really led me to see the possibilities around this new category. I am not a great cook by any stretch of the imagination, but I cooked one of the tastiest pieces of salmon I’ve ever had in about 20 minutes. The experience was enabled through technology, but the technology didn’t take me out of the experience of cooking. Further, I can see as I gain more confidence using a system like this, I can choose to “dial down” the guidance needed from the system to the point I am largely doing most of the cooking by myself (though I don’t know if I’d ever get rid of the automated temperature control, mostly because I’m lazy and it gives me instant “chef intuition).”

Fast forward a couple of years and the guided cooking trend continues to gain momentum. A number of companies talked up new guided cooking platforms at CES in January, from big appliance makers like Whirlpool and LG to big tech platform providers like Google and Amazon.

And at the Housewares show in Chicago this week, guided cooking was everywhere. Hestan Cue, now shipping, was on display this week in the Smart Home pavilion. iCuisine, a startup that utilizes a modular sensor to connect to everyday kitchen tools to a guided cooking app, had its own take on step-by-step cooking instruction. Vorwerk’s Thermomix showed off their all-in-one multicooker with built-in guidance and talked about the company’s online recipe platform, the Cookidoo.

Over at the Gourmia booth, the prolific maker of low-cost connected cooking devices showed off a variety of connected devices, including a Thermomix-like multicooker with built-in cooking guidance. The company’s head of product told me the Gourmia multicooker will eventually act as a smart kitchen hub that enables cross-device cooking orchestration with other Gourmia appliances. As I left the booth, celebrity chef Cat Cora was performing a cooking demo in the booth and talking about the concept of smart recipes.

Gourmia’s Thermomix clone (currently only available in Europe)

Chefman, another maker of low-cost connected cooking appliances, showed off its sous vide cooking app with newly integrated guided cooking capabilities at the show, and a company spokesperson told me the company plans to add guided cooking to all of their connected cooking appliances this year.

Meanwhile at SXSW (which annoyingly was at the same time as the Housewares Show this year), Innit announced the release of Google Assistant functionality within the Innit app they first demoed at CES. With Google Assistant, a home cook can navigate the Innit app’s guided cooking features via voice. According to company COO Josh Sigel, the release marks the first third party app which is completely controllable via Google Assistant.

Of course, like any new trend, there will be hits and misses as products roll out. Early reviews of the Tasty One Top have been somewhat subpar, while my experiences with some of the early Amazon video cooking skills have been hobbled by lack of YouTube integration and the early stage of cooking capabilities in their Alexa skill API.

All that said, I think we can expect lots more in the guided cooking space as 2018 unfolds. I saw a slew of products in Chicago under embargo that are slated for later this year that offer new approaches to guided cooking, and there will no doubt more guided cooking products being developed in stealth that should see the light of day at IFA and Smart Kitchen Summit.

Bottom line: what started as a trend a couple years ago is fast becoming a central theme for appliance makers big and small, making 2018 a big big year for guided cooking.

Podcast: The Future of (Food) Media Is Conversational & AI Driven

If you’re looking for someone who can build a media company with the future in mind, you could do a lot worse that Shelby Bonnie.

Bonnie first showed his ability to build forward leaning media properties with CNET, a company he cofounded that helped set the template for tech media for much of the past couple decades. For his next act, Bonnie cofounded Whiskey Media, a company that tapped into the power of passionate communities with brands like Tested, Screened and Giant Bomb just as social media platforms like Facebook were beginning to change the media landscape.

And Bonnie’s latest bet? A company called Pylon, which is leveraging AI-powered voice assistants and chatbots to create media properties that power content delivery in vertical interest areas such as food and cooking.

I caught up with Shelby to talk about those early days, how he sees media evolving over the next decade and how he thinks Pylon can help shape that new future.

If you are an appliance maker, food brand or any company that touches the consumer, you’ll want to listen to this podcast to get an understanding of the future of consumer media.

You can listen to the podcast below, download it here or subscribe to the Smart Kitchen Show on Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

The Battle For The Kitchen Screen Got A Lot More Interesting At CES 2018

When I wrote about the battle for the kitchen TV last June, the launch of the Echo Show was one of the signals that told me companies were beginning to pay attention to the space. Half a year later, my own usage of the Show has helped me better understand why.

That’s because ever since Amazon’s video-enabled Alexa assistant entered our home, it’s the first thing my eyes are drawn to as I enter the kitchen. The continuous scroll of news and weather, integration with popular apps like Pandora and Allrecipes, and access to videos all have quietly made the small screen indispensable for my entire family.

And now, with a slew of standalone smart displays and kitchen-centric video screens at CES last week, I’m more convinced than ever as we enter 2018 the kitchen TV market will be a fascinating one to watch.

Here are some of the kitchen screen entrants from this year’s big consumer show:

Echo Show And The Competitors

In some ways, the Echo Show and its small screen competitors are the early favorites. Whether or not to purchase a $200 or below (today the Show is on sale for $179) countertop video-enabled voice assistant is a much easier decision to make than that of a $3 thousand fridge. And now, with Google pouring money into the space, you can expect many more choices and over time.

CES 2018 featured some new smart displays on, um, display, many of them designed to be used with Google Assistant. I suspect at some point Google will likely come out with a first-party device (like the Echo Show), but for now we have displays from the likes of Lenovo, Philips and JBL and the initial reviews are pretty positive.

Fridge TV

Hard to believe, but Samsung’s already on version three of its Family Hub fridge, a product that is fast becoming the central focus of the CE giant’s broader smart home strategy. I stopped by the Samsung CES showroom at the Aria to check out the Family Hub 3, and I have to say the new screen looks good.

And as is often the case, LG has followed Samsung’s lead with the ThinQ Instaview Fridge but took things one step further by making their smart screen translucent so you can also see what’s in your fridge. You can see a demo of the LG ThinQ Instaview Fridge here:

While the idea of fridge TVs continue to gain steam, some argue that there’s a mismatch between the life cycle of cutting-edge tech and that of installed appliances. An appliance is an investment, something most consumers expect to last up to a decade. Technology, on the other hand, can be outdated after a few years. This argument resonated after talking to someone at the Samsung booth, who told me the Family Hub gen-1 likely wouldn’t be updated to the third generation software that is coming out with the Family Hub 3, (though the Family Hub Ones in the field were recently updated to Family Hub 2 software).

Despite this, I think the centrality of the fridge in most kitchens and the early relative success of the Family Hub will fuel interest in making the fridge the star of the kitchen TV market.

The GE Kitchen Hub 

One of the more interesting concepts in kitchen TV I saw at CES was the GE Kitchen Hub, a screen/smart home controller designed to sit above your oven.  The Kitchen Hub, which was originally conceived in GE Appliances innovation hub FirstBuild, not only has voice and gesture control capability built in but works with Zigbee and Z-Wave to connect to your smart devices.

You can see Digital Trends video walkthrough with the Kitchen Hub below:

GE Kitchen Hub - Hands On at CES 2018

The concept of the Kitchen Hub sits somewhere between the Amazon and Samsung approach, a device that’s separate from a large appliance (and their long life cycles), but one that is also a built-in. The product is priced in that middle territory as well, coming in at $600.

I like the idea of the Kitchen Hub. A separate built-in screen, one that is more affordably priced than a hybrid appliance/TV product and that can also act as a smart home control center is a potential winner. Of course, a lot will rely on execution, but overall this is an intriguing product to watch.

One thing’s that clear: the battle for the kitchen TV became a lot more interesting at CES 2018. Check back at the Spoon and subscribe to our newsletter to monitor our coverage of this market over the next 12 months.

Whirlpool Smart Kitchen Announcements Include Cooking Automation And Yummly 2.0

Whirlpool is kicking off CES with a slew of smart kitchen announcements, including an update to the Yummly personalized recipe app, voice integration with Google Assistant and scan-to-cook guided cooking technology.

Whirlpool made a huge effort at CES 2017 to move further into the smart kitchen space, showing off a suite of connected appliances. Then, in May of last year, the company acquired recipe app startup Yummly and gained an entire community of users and a host of food content.

Whirlpool spent the rest of 2017 working on taking full advantage of the Yummly acquisition and is introducing the results of its work today at CES 2018. Among the brand’s many kitchen-related announcements, Whirlpool is launching Yummly 2.0, a new version of the recipe and cooking resources app that includes image recognition, meal scheduling features and an enhanced guided cooking experience when using Whirlpool connected appliances to cook.

Ingredient Recognition 

The next-gen Yummly app will include built-in image recognition software powered by machine learning to recognize multiple foods in one picture and dole out recipe recommendations based on what foods are shown. With a large database of food images, Yummly will continue to get better at identifying the food that users have on hand, using machine learning to evolve and grow its knowledge base.

In the Whirlpool mobile app, the company is launching the new Scan-to-Cook technology, a feature that allows users to scan a UPC barcode on frozen food packages and an existing set of instructions including temperature and cooking time for that particular food will be sent to the appliance. Scan-to-Cook setting can be customized to individual preferences if a food is preferred more or less cooked than the standard settings.

Guided Cooking Gets Better

For home chefs that have Whirlpool’s connected range or microwave, Yummly is now able to identify recipes that will work with those appliances and send cooking instructions to the device while following an interactive step-by-step tutorial in the app with images and video. While the user is instructed on what to chop, wash and prepare, the participating oven can be heating up and preparing a timer so it’s ready to go when they are. 

Starting in the spring of 2018, users will also be able to control their connected appliances straight through the Yummly app – a good sign that the brand plans to continue to invest in the platform as the center of their smart kitchen strategy in 2018.

Same Day Grocery Ordering 

Many smart appliances offer grocery list integrations, but Whirlpool takes it a step further in the Yummly app. The ingredients are categorized automatically in an attempt to make shopping easier (better than my Amazon Alexa grocery list which is just one giant list of things I may or may not have already bought) but even better – a new integration with Instacart means you can get the ingredients you need, delivered in about an hour.

Scheduling, Voice, Remote Start

The Yummly app lets users schedule their meals out for the week and let them know when it’s time to start cooking based on the scheduled desired eating time. And, like almost every other company at CES, Whirlpool is announcing integration with Google Assistant to be able to control connected appliances through voice command. Details on the integration weren’t provided but with Google pushing back at Amazon’s domination in voice assistants, it’s not surprising that they’re pursuing the kitchen as a space to gain mindshare. Additional features in the app lets families remotely start their appliances from outside the house to warm up the oven and get the kitchen ready for dinner.

For more #smartkitchen news at CES, follow @TheSpoonTech, @SmartKitchenCon and @michaelwolf for updates.

The Recipe Isn’t Dead. In Fact, It’s Becoming The Center of Action In The Digital Kitchen

At last month’s Smart Kitchen Summit, celebrity chef Tyler Florence said: “the recipe is dead.”

Needless to say, it’s a bold statement. There’s no doubt that Florence is right to suggest that things are changing quickly in the age of Tasty cooking videos and that the time-worn practice of looking up recipes in cookbooks is something people are doing less every day.

But if today’s news about another Amazon integration with a popular online recipe site is any indication, I’d suggest the recipe is far from dead. In fact, it looks more and more like the recipe is becoming the center of action in the digital-powered kitchen.

And it’s not just Amazon that likes the idea of shoppable recipes. Companies like Northfork have integrated with the some of Europe’s biggest grocers to enable recipe-driven shopping, while big players like Google are building guided cooking recipe capabilities into their virtual assistant platforms.

Then there are AI-centric startups looking to take the recipe and add extra intelligence to it to make things more personalized and interactive. Companies like Wellio, Chefling and Pylon.AI are doing interesting work here.

Then there’s the recipe itself becoming fused with connected cooking hardware. Everyone from one of the world’s largest cookware companies in Hestan to the world’s biggest appliance maker in Whirlpool to cookbook disruptor Tasty are creating recipe-guided hardware.

And finally, if technology-driven integrations and one columnist’s opinion aren’t enough to convince you, there’s always old-school chefs like Christopher Kimball (check out our podcast!) who think the recipe has a long life ahead of it.

So no, the recipe is not so much dead as evolving. Instead, as our recipes become digitized and more connected, they’re becoming the center of action in the connected kitchen.

As Jon Jenkins suggested at last month’s Smart Kitchen Summit, software isn’t only eating the world, but we are eating software. That software includes whatever the recipe is becoming which, in short, is probably just better, more evolved version of the recipe.

Google Assistant Is Becoming A Guided Cooking Platform. We Talk To The Person Leading The Charge

Back in April, Google’s Emma Persky wrote a post telling the world that Google has been working on a recipe guidance capability for Google Assistant.

At last month’s Smart Kitchen Summit, she gave a little more detail on what exactly the company has been up to.

Persky, who runs point for Google Assistant’s cooking guidance team, told the Spoon’s Allen Weiner how much of the focus has been on building in contextual understanding of recipes.

“We can talk you through step by step how to cook a recipe and answer contextual questions about how to do that,” said Persky. “To do this, we have to build a deep model of what a recipe actually looks like. Have to take the text of a recipe and understand that text so we know what pasta is, we know what type of pasta you’re talking about, we know what the units are, we know the cooking temperature.”

“On the other side, we know what the user is saying. We have a whole bunch of machinery at Google that is able to understand what a user is saying and turn that into a machine question. We have a whole bunch of data about how different people ask these questions, which we use to build a model and understand these types of questions.”

When asked about how Google is utilizing company competencies like search and YouTube, Persky said that while there’s been significant work done here, there’s an opportunity to get better.

“We do a pretty good job now when you ask on your phone or desktop ‘how do I sauté an onion?’ we show you a nice video of how to sauté an onion.”

But, she said, “there’s a lot of opportunity for guided cooking feature to more deeply integrate with this, so when your recipe says sauté the onion, and you don’t know how to sauté the onion, we are able to return these types of video answers on on Google Home platform to help you become a better chef over time.”

Persky also discussed how she thought web content schemas could evolve to create a foundation for richer content through platforms like Google Assistant.

“When it comes to companies that have this kind (recipe) data available to them, there are a lot of opportunity for finding ways to increase the fidelity of the data that we have access to. At the moment we have schema.org markup, which is a good first pass. We don’t have a lot of detail and use machine learning to extract a lot of the context from that. And I think where there’s an opportunity to where a lot of people working on this stuff is to find ways to access more high fidelity data that we could offer to the users as an improved experience.”

When asked by Weiner how schema.org and other web markup languages could improve, she had this to say: “There’s a lot of work we can do to improve the quality of that markup. For example, right now the markup just has one block of text for all the instructions in the recipe, but actually if we could break that down and have a step by step, it would be easier for us to parse that out. Right now we have to apply machine learning across that to do that.”

It’s a really good conversation to understand what Google has been up to as they look to combine recipe content with their voice AI platform. You can watch the full conversation between Allen Weiner and Emma Persky below:

Ed note: Answers in this interview have been edited slightly for brevity/clarity