Cooking Dinner From the Road

Roland Piquepaille writes "After 12 years of development and with the help of NASA's Embedded Web Technology software, the TMIO company is delivering its first smart ovens. You can monitor these refrigerator-ovens from any Internet connection. For example, you can adjust and control the oven settings from your cell phone and be sure that dinner is ready when you get home. But cooking from your office or your car won't come cheap: these ovens carry a price tag of $8,699. Right now, they're only available in North America, but I bet there soon will be distributors in other parts of the world. Read more for additional details about these smart ovens."

Comments

Re:Or

[adrianmonk]

I can toss a tv dinner in a toaster oven on an X10 plug, ssh into my box and turn it on with the firecracker module, and save... whatever it costs minus 15 bucks.

I think the idea behind this smart oven is that it refrigerates the stuff while you're gone at work, so you can safely leave that Stouffer's brand frozen pork chop and mashed potatoes in there for 10 or 12 hours (or a week, if you feel like it) without it going bad while you're gone.

Whether that's worth $9000 odd dollars to you is another question, but it is at least more than an oven on a timer.

Big Deal

[apenzott]

As a roadie, I have been doing this for years already.

For some great recipies, check out Manifold Destiny for some delicious and low-tech ways (aluminum foil, meat, vegetables, and possibly some fish to grill) to prepare some great meals. The best part is that your final destination does not have to be home. If planned properly, a picnic at a rest stop and no dishes to cleanup when done will have you be the envy of your fellow passengers.

Re:Thank you Roland for the Non-Story

[adrianmonk]

who would really benefit from an oven like this? Ask yourself:

When was the last time you used your oven?

Yesterday afternoon. It's winter, after all, and using the oven also heats the house. Plus the food comes out better than when you microwave it.

Are you willing to prepare a dish in the morning and put it in the oven before you leave for work?

Sometimes. Probably not usually, but with an oven like this, you could in theory prepare a few dishes on the weekend, put them in the bottom of the refrigerator for the rest of the weekend, then put Tuesday's dinner in the oven (set to refrigerate) on Monday night before you go to bed.

Also, lots of people who do serious cooking could make use of these on special occasions. For example, on Thanksgiving or Christmas, if you cook a big meal with turkey, ham, dressing, sweet potatoes, a pie or two, etc. there is a LOT of scrambling to do to get it all done. It's not uncommon for people who are hosting a Christmas gathering to get up at like 4:00am or 5:00am to start cooking so that it can be ready at lunch time. If part of that could be prepared the night before and could take itself through the rest of the process automatically, that could seriously cut down on stress in situations like that.

Would you actually trust this thing not to burn down your house?

There are millions of people who are perfectly comfortable going out or even going on vacation and leaving running appliances that work by burning explosive gases. If you don't believe me, then answer this: when you go out of town, do you turn off the natural gas supply to your water heater and furnace? Do you even think about it possibly burning your house down?

Re:under the hood

[ozmanjusri]

Did anyone else see the headline and thing the link was going to teach us how to look dinner on the engine block?

Well, I did. I used to have a job that meant I'd regularly be driving from between minesites in the north of Western Australia. I'd always use the heat from the exhaust manifold of whatever car I was driving to heat up pies and other food.

The turbo shroud on a Holden Rodeo (not sure what the US equivalent is - probably an Isuzu) was just the right size to hold a pie or foil-wrapped meal. Landcruisers were good for the heat, but had no secure area for the food - I lost a couple of meals until I worked out how to wire it them place properly.

It wasn't an original idea of mine either - Manifold Destiny has been around for years. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0375751408/qid=90 4512153/sr=1-1/002-8127825-7704826?n=283155