Robot chef trained to ‘taste’ food as it cooks so meals are always seasoned properly
A robot chef is being trained to ‘taste’ food as it cooks it like a human does to see if it is sufficiently seasoned.
The mechanical maestro can even change the taste of food depending on individual tastes.
Researchers at Cambridge University say this could one day lead to automated robots in food preparation that know exactly what tastes good to most humans.
Aiming to nail down the science of the art of cookery has already led to the robot chef able to make an omelette designed on a human taster’s feedback.
The team found by creating a ‘taste as you go’ approach improved the robot’s ability to quickly and accurately assess the saltiness of the dish.
To imitate the human process of chewing and tasting in their robot chef, the researchers attached a conductance probe, which acts as a salinity sensor, to a robot arm.
They prepared scrambled eggs and tomatoes, varying the number of tomatoes and the amount of salt in each dish.
Using the probe, the robot ‘tasted’ the dishes in a grid-like fashion, returning a reading in just a few seconds.
To imitate the change in texture caused by chewing, the team then put the egg mixture in a blender and had the robot test the dish again.
The different readings at different points of ‘chewing’ produced taste maps of each dish.
The researchers are now hoping to improve the robot chef so it can taste different types of food and improve sensing capabilities so it can taste sweet or oily food.
Grzegorz Sochacki, a PhD student at the University of Cambridge’s Department of Engineering, said: ‘Most home cooks will be familiar with the concept of tasting as you go – checking a dish throughout the cooking process to check whether the balance of flavours is right.
‘If robots are to be used for certain aspects of food preparation, it’s important that they are able to ‘taste’ what they’re cooking.’
Dr Arsen Abdulali, also from the Department of Engineering, said: ‘When we taste, the process of chewing also provides continuous feedback to our brains.
‘Current methods of electronic testing only take a single snapshot from a homogenised sample, so we wanted to replicate a more realistic process of chewing and tasting in a robotic system, which should result in a tastier end product.’
‘When a robot is learning how to cook, like any other cook, it needs indications of how well it did.
‘We want the robots to understand the concept of taste, which will make them better cooks.
‘In our experiment, the robot can ‘see’ the difference in the food as it’s chewed, which improves its ability to taste.’
Dr Muhammad Chughtai, senior scientist at Beko, said: ‘We believe that the development of robotic chefs will play a major role in busy households and assisted living homes in the future.
‘This result is a leap forward in robotic cooking, and by using machine and deep learning algorithms, mastication will help robot chefs adjust taste for different dishes and users.’
The results are reported in the journal Frontiers in Robotics & AI.
MORE : The International Space Station just started up its new robotic arm
MORE : Gigantic robot electrician carries out repair work on railway lines