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The next great kitchen tool


dcarch

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On the subject of the next great kitchen tool - I would love to see some of the high-end kitchen equipment come to wider availability for home use. A few items on my short list include a Pacojet and ultrasonic homogenizer. Obviously these aren't new tech, but they're so cost prohibitive few people have access to these tools.

I don't really see 3D printing becoming relevant to cooking any time in the near future - it has to provide an advantage over current techniques to be adopted. Current 3D printing instrumentation generally require relatively expensive motion control, specific curable/extrudable "ink." Is it convenient to order/formulate a printable food ink, load it into your machine, program your machine, and print your food? I'm sure the technology will improve rapidly, but the current printers are very slow. It takes half a day to print a small component with a reasonable spatial resolution. The idea of someday in the far future being able to print out a whole raw (or cooked) duck breast to order sounds awesome, but that's not coming anytime soon.

Sous vide was accepted because it was low-cost, easy to use, and provided tangible advantages to cooking.

Edited by Baselerd (log)
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I teach innovation at U of A and we deal a lot with 3D printing, and have one in our office, so I am pretty comfortable with it...Currently, there is successful experimentation of printing of functioning organs, skin/tissue, guns, etc. Certainly kitchen tools can be printed easily (they can print whole houses). As for taste/texture, that is very advanced...but not impossible. There has been some experimentation with printing chocolate.

As for SV: I was over it before it started. Who has the time??

"Printing functioning organs, skin/tissue"

You can create living cells with a printer? I think not.

References please.

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I have a pacojet at home. It is next to worthless.

Could you elaborate on this? I've never used one, but I always have had the impression it allows you to make ice-cream/sorbet/etc to order from the frozen canister so that you don't have to re-churn and/or temper each time you want to get a nice texture.

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I have a pacojet at home. It is next to worthless.

Could you elaborate on this? I've never used one, but I always have had the impression it allows you to make ice-cream/sorbet/etc to order from the frozen canister so that you don't have to re-churn and/or temper each time you want to get a nice texture.

Yes, that is exactly what it does, but how much ice cream and sorbet can you eat at home before becoming Sergeant Fatbody? Great results, though. Also great for farce mousseline.

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I teach innovation at U of A and we deal a lot with 3D printing, and have one in our office, so I am pretty comfortable with it...Currently, there is successful experimentation of printing of functioning organs, skin/tissue, guns, etc. Certainly kitchen tools can be printed easily (they can print whole houses). As for taste/texture, that is very advanced...but not impossible. There has been some experimentation with printing chocolate.

As for SV: I was over it before it started. Who has the time??

"Printing functioning organs, skin/tissue"

You can create living cells with a printer? I think not.

References please.

They aren't creating cells from smaller components, but rather formulating a gel slurry containing a suspension of cells. They can print a mesh with this material, and the cells will proliferate throughout the structure. All of this technology is still in the basic research phase, but I can imagine not too far from now where we could print out human ears, noses, etc.

Check out this article if you can get access to it:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21358040

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.. Scientific American ran an article in its lastest issue about 3d printing with metal. specfically a printed titanium prosthetic hand .

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=brighter-future-manufacturing-3d-printed-one-layer-at-time

Simply amazing. The reason why I post this is because I saw in another article, which I can't seem to locate, that some systems are less than $2,000. which makes than affordable to many people.

dcarch

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Personally I find a lot of the latest kitchen appliances a bit "Emperor's new clothes" for me.

I would say that the next great kitchen "tool" is the idiot who falls for this stuff. (In the UK - tool is slang for a fool - in case it is not the same worldwide).

I haven't got on the SV bandwagon. I have not been impressed with efforts of friends, especially as one seems to like their food very bloody. My local favourite restaurant refuses to use SV but relies on talent and quality ingredients to produce good food. The chef once produced an amazing chicken dish from simply wrapping the meat in paper and cooking in the oven.

I am of the efficiency and economy camp with kitchen appliances. It has to either save me time or money. Coincidently my breadmaker has done both. If I can't create a great dish buy using good quality ingredients or a good combination of flavours, then I have failed as an amateur cook.

http://www.thecriticalcouple.co.uk

Latest blog post - Oh my - someone needs a spell checker

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1. I saw a program sometime ago. A reporter was reporting a fancy Jewish event. The reporter was shocked to see shrimp cocktail served. Then he found out those were intimation shrimps. There are people because for one reason or another, have to have some food flexibility.

I got news for you, at "Fancy Jewish Events" we often eat REAL shrimp, once the rabbi has exited the premises.

Jason Perlow, Co-Founder eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters

Foodies who Review South Florida (Facebook) | offthebroiler.com - Food Blog (archived) | View my food photos on Instagram

Twittter: @jperlow | Mastodon @jperlow@journa.host

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.

I would say that the next great kitchen "tool" is the idiot who falls for this stuff. (In the UK - tool is slang for a fool - in case it is not the same worldwide).

.

In the US, "tool" is slang for a fellow who is a...uh... schmuck perhaps even a putz.

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I know what I would like.

I wish someone would INVENT a gadget (sturdy, so it won't break) that will STIR foods being microwaved...

I hate it when I take something out of the microwave and the outside edges are 150 degrees and the center is 70 degrees (or less).

The rotating tray swings the stuff around in a circle - unless carefully centered - which is SUPPOSED to guarantee "even heating" but that is only a fairy tale.

I have had microwaves since the late '60s when I got my first Radarrange and I'm still taking stuff out, stirring and putting it back in.

I want a container/gadget with a stirring implement that will rotate counter to the direction the microwave tray is rotating - mine goes both directions, reversing when stopped and re-started, and I am willing to PAY well for it.

A friend who works in an industrial laboratory has bent his mind to the task - they do have "stirrers" for certain laboratory tasks - but has not yet come up with a viable idea.

I don't think I am alone in this desire and I can see such a gadget making a fortune for the inventor or marketing genius that brings it to the public.

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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I know what I would like.

I wish someone would INVENT a gadget (sturdy, so it won't break) that will STIR foods being microwaved...

How about if the turntable itself does the stirring in relation to a fixed paddle?

http://tinyurl.com/bmbv7wt

Or a microwave with two beams (magnetron) located in a different aiming area.

dcarch

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Speaking of appliances, would anyone be interested in an automatic adjustable bread slicer? The idea is that you'd drop an unsliced loaf of bread vertically into a box. Then, you'd adjust a thickness dial and press say '2' for the number of slices and 2 slices of the selected thickness would pop out the front. Meanwhile, the remaining bread stays sealed in a box unsliced until needed.

Anyway, here's a similar thread we had about such things... http://forums.egullet.org/topic/136372-the-dawn-of-post-modernist-cuisine/?hl=3d#entry1779168

And more recently there's news about noodle making robots being employed in China. They're already cheap enough ($1,600) for the well off to afford as a novelty for entertaining.

That Would a wonderful and very useful device!

I've learned that artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.

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I know what I would like.

I wish someone would INVENT a gadget (sturdy, so it won't break) that will STIR foods being microwaved...

How about if the turntable itself does the stirring in relation to a fixed paddle?

http://tinyurl.com/bmbv7wt

I'm ordering one immediately.

"There are, it has been said, two types of people in the world. There are those who say: this glass is half full. And then there are those who say: this glass is half empty. The world belongs, however, to those who can look at the glass and say: What's up with this glass? Excuse me? Excuse me? This is my glass? I don't think so. My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!" Terry Pratchett

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

Something about SV seems to uniquely provoke certain folks. I read comments that say in essence "I will NEVER do SV" as though it is a lesser form of cooking or immoral in some way, which I don't get. One doesn't hear similar disavowals of smoking meat or induction cooking.

It may be that SV is the target of anti-Modernist feelings and takes heat because it is so often discussed on eG.

Might be a market for a book...Atavistic Cuisine, a guide to primitive cooking techniques. Smoking, grilling, salting, & burying in the ground till it ferments will all be covered.

I have used SV, it makes a great egg poacher.

“I saw that my life was a vast glowing empty page and I could do anything I wanted" JK

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Damn dcarch beat me too it with the new articles. I'd have to say 3D printing food is going to be the latest greatest thing especially for astronauts.

And this is for Jason Perlow.

Yes, that is me using a 3D printer...

Sleep, bike, cook, feed, repeat...

Chef Facebook HQ Menlo Park, CA

My eGullet Foodblog

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