The future may very well be here right now in the form of an automated kitchen that sports a robotic chef. The Automated Kitchen has been shown off to the public at the Hanover Messe in Germany. The trade show features the leading industrial products. The Automated Kitchen has been created by Moley Robotics, based in UK, which claims that the robotic chef is capable of cooking like an expert chef.
The prototype system that was unveiled in Hanover has been developed in over two years as a collaboration between Sebastian Conran – designer of cooking utensils, Mauro Izzo Dysegno and the Yachtline Company that is responsible for the creation of the kitchen furniture.
The robot itself has been designed by the Shadow Robot Company that creates products for NASA and nuclear industry. The robot features a set of completely articulated hands which is the center piece of the kitchen and represents 2 decades of Research and Development. Shadow Robot claims that the robot is capable of reproducing the human’s movements by making use of 20 motors, 129 sensors and 24 joints!
Moley Robotics further added that the system will not cook like a machine but rather like a human chef since the system mimics the movements of a human. Tim Anderson who is the winner of the BBC Master Chef competition was brought in and he created a crab bisque dish to check the potential of the system. He cooked in a studio where he was recorded in 3D as he cooked the dish. Each detail and action was then broken down and translated into digital movement via bespoke algorithms that were created by Shadow and Moley teams. Stanford University and SSSUP Pisa also contributed towards these algorithms.
Anderson said, “To be honest, I didn’t think this was possible. I chose crab bisque as a dish because it’s a real challenge for human chef to make well, never mind a machine. Having seen – and tasted – the results for myself, I am stunned. This is the beginning of something really significant: a whole new opportunity for producing good food and for people to explore the world’s cuisines. It’s very exciting.”
Before you get all excited though, the consumer version is still about 2 years away. As of now, Moley Robotics is aiming on scaling down the product so that the commercial version is smaller and sports more functions and features. It is also reaching out to a number of designers, kitchen installers, home builders and food suppliers for collaboration purposes and to eventually bring it to the market.
It will be launched in 2017 and shall sport a dish library of 2,000 dishes. Moley Robotics also said that this system isn’t taking away the fun and relaxation that many people find in cooking but rather allowing for a chance to explore new cuisines and improve your cooking.
