The Counter Intelligence department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the US invents new gadgets for the kitchen.

Which basicaly does NOT interest me. Salvatore, owner of a my favourite gastronomia, cooks delicious, cheap aubergines and fish, so my main activity in a kitchen is to open the door of the microwave to heat those fabulous melanzane alla parmigiana!

However, the lab developed a series of prototypes which could come handy if ever Salvatore wanted to close the shop and go back to Sicily.

Connie Cheng and Leonardo Bonanni equipped a spoon with sensors that measure temperature, acidity, salinity, and viscosity, of any food the spoon is in contact with. The sensors transmit the data to a computer which in turn sends back suggestions to improve the food (put more salt in the brine, etc.).

Minerva, by Shyam Krishnamoorthy, is a kind of video assistant system that looks at the ingredients placed on a counter, recognizes them, and retrieves appropriate video cooking show.

Jon Dakss and Michael Bove developed software tools for “hyperlinked video” programs in which video objects are automatically tracked and associated with additional content, such as text or a video clip.

An Interactive Dinner At Julia’s explores the potential of hyperlinking educational television content, enabling viewers to navigate a “web” of video clips featuring Julia Child.

Viewers can “click” with a remote control device on entrees and decorative items at the dinner table at Julia’s house and be shown video clips in which Julia creates them. Selecting ingredients and cooking utensils generates text boxes with relevant details.

The software tools used to create and play back this program were first demonstrated in HyperSoap, a soap opera program in which a viewer could select clothing, props and scenery and see purchasing information, such as the item’s brand and price. The authoring software creates statistical models of objects’ color, texture, motion and spatial position and uses these models to both track objects automatically and perform searches among identified objects.

Via BBC Technology.