THE KITCHEN OF THE FUTURE IS SMART BUT WEIRD

Magnetic burners? Smokeless grilling? The Pancakebot?

BECAUSE I’M A CHEF, every so often someone asks me about the future of food: “What ingredients will we have in our pantries?” they ask. “What will our stoves and refrigerators do?” I don’t know the answers to these questions, so I usually handle them like a politician: I change the subject. But recently, I took five of 2016’s most futuristic kitchen toys for a test drive and I got a glimpse of where we’re going in the process. Here’s what’s next.

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Philips Smoke-less Infrared Grill ( williams-sonoma.com)

Every time I make a steak or burger for dinner, I have to disable my apartment smoke alarm. Philips’ new indoor grill is designed to save me from this insanity. On outdoor grills, most of the smoke is caused by fats dripping on the coals. Oils from fatty or heavily marinated meats can flare and even cause small

L WIL S PAN T T, BU HO BE E. N’T B WO S STOVE

Polyscience/breville Control Freak TemperatureControlled Induction

Cooking System

(williams-sonoma.com)

This year is a big one for induction burners, which are finally moving from commercial kitchens into homes. These use a magnetic field to create heat in a cast-iron or steel pan without actually heating a stovetop. And this one is more precise than I’ve ever seen: the power ranges from 100 to 1 800 watts and you can dictate the temperature of both the pot and the liquids inside to within a single degree. If you can’t imagine the possibilities here, consider these: you can poach a piece of salmon at precisely 23˚ Celsius. You can hard-boil eggs without ever getting a rubbery white or a chalky yolk. You can make curd and caramels and candies and not screw any of it up. VERDICT: It’s a big investment, but if you’re looking to buy an induction burner, you won’t find a more versatile unit. It also comes with an ingeniously designed mount for a temperature probe. I wish I had ten of them.

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Nomiku Wi-fi Immersion Circulator

(nomiku.com)

If the folks at Nomiku have their way, home cooks will soon start making dinner like many chefs do: in sealed bags in a temperature-controlled water bath (a technique

Pancakebot

(bedbathandbeyond.com)

Billed as “the world’s first pancake printer”, the Pancakebot is designed to print any design you can imagine. Of all the gadgets I tested for this article, no other came close in terms of sheer excitement and anticipation. My kids planned a whole sleepover around the promise of Disney princess pancakes.

Though the physical set-up was simple, the tech part was not as user-friendly: the machine doesn’t come preloaded with images, so you either need to create your own (a tedious process in a drawing program on the website), or convert other users’ creations into a Gcode format that the machine can read. By the time I realised I needed an SD card to make all of this happen, my kids had given up and asked for French toast. VERDICT: I love the idea of this machine. The world is a better place when someone puts this much heart into a pancake. The recipe was great and the pour mechanism was amazing to watch. Just beware: it’s still in the early adopter stage. Cuisinart Fruit Scoop Frozen Dessert Maker (amazon.com)

I used a Cuisinart icecream maker in my first chef job 18 years ago and I’ve been a huge fan ever since. The company’s latest version comes with two paddles: a classic ice-cream paddle and a paddle with multiple blades that can turn any fruit into a frozen treat. I followed one of the recipes it came with and transformed half a dozen sliced bananas and a little honey into an excellent creamy dessert in about 15 minutes. VERDICT: The protrusions on AllClad’s new d3 Armor series pans are created during the bonding process and contain little air bubbles that get less hot than the metal around them. The upshot: food skates around on top of the bumps and releases more easily.