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smart fridges

September 5, 2018

Seltzer? Sous Vide? Smart Apps? What Cool Things do you Want in a Fridge?

For those old enough to remember, there is an episode from season two of The Simpsons where Homer designs a car for the average American. The result, as you can imagine was a hodge-podge monstrosity that featured bubble domes, three horns, shag carpeting and cost $82,000.

I started thinking about that Homermobile a lot when I read about the new fridge from Sharp that has a built-in vacuum sealer for sous-vide cooking. Well, technically, this could be used to keep food fresher longer, but still, I hadn’t ever thought about combining the vacuum sealer and the fridge. Do I want that?

Maybe?

Companies are already pushing the notion of modern fridges doing much more than keeping our food cold. Equipped with smart screens, they are being turned into literal Family Hubs, have voice assistant capabilities built-in, talk with other appliances, have internal cameras to help us keep inventory, and even guide us through cooking.

We also learned last week that Mitte was in talks with appliance manufacturers to have its mineral water dispensing tech built into fridges, and Spoon founder, Mike Wolf, openly opined that he wants to have a SodaStream built into his fridge. Which honestly, doesn’t seem that far-fetched given the rise in seltzer consumption. How much bigger (or smaller on the inside) does a fridge need to get to accommodate still water, ice, mineral water, seltzer water and why not throw regular soda in there as well?

Further afield, both Amazon and Facebook (yes, Facebook) both have patents around smart technology for your fridge. Amazon’s version of the smart fridge would smell your contents for early spoilage detection, while Facebook’s (yes, Facebook) is more about accessing your fridge camera for meal recommendations and, of course, targeted advertising.

The fridge, ironically, seems like it’s heating up as a convergence zone for new kitchen tech. Which is why I think it’s good to think about what you want in your next one. I’m still a couple of years out from needing a new one (knock on wood), but as someone who writes about this stuff for a living, I’m already going through the features that I’ll want.

Mostly, I’m still going to treat my fridge like a fridge. I want it to keep food cold. I don’t need a constant connection so I can check in on the internal temperature, I just need it to be the workhorse of my kitchen, especially for the thousands of dollars that fridges cost.

Having said that, I really like the LG screen that goes transparent when you knock-knock on it. First of all, it’s neat, but it also saves me money by letting me peer into the fridge without letting all the cold air out.

Built-in screens, as a whole though, make me nervous. A screen in the kitchen is actually useful and lots of companies are vying for your eyeballs while you cook. But I don’t want to be locked into a particular ecosystem, I want to use all of my existing apps easily, and I don’t want an update to an operating system or app to suddenly brick my fridge. A better bet seems like just mounting a cheap tablet to the front of the fridge, which has the added benefit of being more portable, should I need to look at a recipe or watch the news while I cook.

Having my appliances talk to one another is kind of cool, but that requires its own lock-in (brands only talk with same brands), and I’d rather be able to pick the best oven, cooktop, induction burner, fridge or dishwasher independent of one another. Rather than focusing on a proprietary communication channel between their own appliances, I’d rather see appliance manufacturers work on integrating a wide variety of voice assistants (or, well, you know, the two main ones: Alexa and Google). That way users can just as easily control appliances using their voice, and they have more control over when each appliance goes on and to what temperature.

On the hardware side, I do think Mike is on to something with the seltzer tap built in. I like the idea of reducing waste (there are so many cans in my recycle bin), but I’d want to make sure that I could adjust the carbonation to make it as crisp as I like. Also, I’d like a decent enough-sized IoT -enabled CO2 cannister that automatically ordered a replacement and didn’t have to be replaced that often. I don’t think I’d go for any other type of drink like mineral water on tap from the fridge, and I wouldn’t want sticky flavor syrups gumming up the works in there either.

And as insane as it sounds, I am also intrigued by the Amazon smell-o-fridge. Fighting food waste is a big deal, and if my fridge is smart enough to tell me something is safe to eat, I’m all in. If built-in cameras and complex image recognition systems help with that as well, more power to ’em.

But I’m never letting Facebook into my fridge, though.

The bigger point is that we are entering an age where your fridge could get overloaded with features that could quickly become frivolous. You should spend your money smartly, and that may not mean buying a smart fridge. If you’re Homer Simpson, for instance, it’s probably smarter to skip the connected fridge and focus one that holds 64 slices of American cheese.

January 10, 2018

CES: Will the Newest Smart Fridges Be a Smart Buy?

At CES 2018, Samsung and LG continued their tradition of debuting new connected refrigerators that are less about keeping your food cold and more about becoming the center of not only your kitchen, but your life.

Samsung unveiled its new set of Family Hub fridges, which feature a built-in touchscreen and a host of connected features that offer smart-home integration and meal planning as well as information and entertainment services.

The company has expanded support for the SmartThings connected home platform (which Samsung owns). Standing at your Family Hub fridge, you will be able control your smart thermostat and lights, or check video feeds from your connected cameras.

The new Meal Planner feature provides users with recipes based on food preferences, dietary restrictions, and, using the fridge’s internal cameras, the food you already have. A new Deals app helps you find bargains and save them to a shopping list. And the View Inside app lets you remotely check what’s in your fridge, so no more forgetting if you already have broccoli at home while you’re at the store.

Samsung’s voice assistant, Bixby, is built into the fridge and can now recognize more than one voice. So it can tell apart different family members when they speak and bring up personalized information such as calendars, news, weather and updates, depending on who’s talking.

The Family Hub screen can also mirror Samsung TVs, stream content from phones, and access audio and video content like music streaming services as well as HomeAdvisor, Pinterest and Buzzfeed’s Tasty.

Over at LG, the company unveiled its InstaView ThinQ Refrigerator, which sports a 29-inch touchscreen and has the ability to “talk” with other LG ThinQ devices.

LG’s touchscreen adds a bit of magic by turning transparent if you knock on it twice, so you can see what’s inside your fridge without opening the door.

The ThinQ fridge also recommends recipes based on the food you have inside it. And once you’ve picked a recipe, the Alexa-powered fridge will guide you through it on-screen. Then the ThinQ fridge will automatically talk with the ThinQ oven to preheat to the proper temperature, and to the ThinQ dishwasher to select a fitting wash cycle for all those dirty dishes you create making the dish.

The ThinQ also allows you to “Smart Tag” foods in your fridge with information like expiration dates, so your fridge will know when something is about to go bad. Finally, it lets you remotely access the internal camera when out shopping.

Pricing information wasn’t provided, but a quick look at Home Depot shows that existing Family Hub fridges start at $3,000, and the previous generation of LG smart fridges start at $3,600.

That ain’t cheap. But the bigger issue with purchasing a major smart appliance is that technology moves quickly and companies want you to buy into a bigger ecosystem beyond just one appliance.

Most people don’t buy a new fridge every year, let alone five or even ten years. So smart fridges like these beg the question, what happens when the smarts of your fridge get outdated and can no longer run the latest version of of your favorite streaming service? And heaven forbid that your fridge gets bricked.

Then there’s the question of diving into an ecosystem. With the Samsung, you have to use Bixby, not Alexa, so you lose access to that (ubiquitous) Amazon integration. And while the LG makes use of Alexa, if you want it to talk to your oven or your dishwasher, you’ll have to pony up for those LG-branded devices as well.

We love smart kitchen devices here at The Spoon, it’s just that when it comes to major appliances, we like to be extra smart about what we buy.

January 16, 2017

Podcast: The CES Smart Kitchen Wrapup Show

It’s the CES 2017 smart kitchen wrapup! Mike and Ashley talk about what they saw at this year’s big consumer tech confab in Vegas.

Some of the topics they cover:

  • Smart fridges
  • Smart appliances
  • Whirlpool assisted cooking
  • Bosch’s kitchen robot Mykie
  • Panasonic’s smart kitchen
  • Anova’s new lineup of sous vide circulators
  • AppKettle
  • Alexa

Plus a couple non-CES news items such as Daimler’s investment in Starship and the
AB Inbev and Keurig Partnership.

This episode can be downloaded by clicking here.

Enjoy!

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