Eating

Dear Krispy, I'm breaking up with you. Thanks to the new Automatic Mini Donut Factory, there is no longer any reason to venture out into the world.

The $179.99 doughnut maker from Nostalgia Electrics sits on your kitchen counter and magically transforms raw doughnut batter into little halos of sin. All the flipping and frying is handled automatically, with your treats popping out at the far end of the machine.

Safety windows let you observe the action without accidentally frying your fingers. It even has a component called the "donut slide."… Read more

I have attempted to make sushi at home using a bamboo mat, seaweed, vegetables, sushi rice, and fumbling fingers. The resulting rolls bore a vague resemblance to the real thing, but they would have gotten me laughed off the set of any respectable cooking show.

The Rice Cube sushi maker promises relief for enthusiastic, but ultimately incompetent, home sushi chefs. This kitchen gadget looks like it was pulled from a game of Tetris and given 3D life in bright red plastic.

The small device squishes rice, fish, and other ingredients into perfect little squares that will make your potluck buddies envious. It works through a series of pushing and sliding motions. Check out the video below if you're having trouble visualizing that.

There's no reason to stop at sushi, though. Adventurous chefs can come up with all sorts of things to press into cubes. It's only a matter of time before someone slips some bacon in there.… Read more

Food on the go is an essential part of modern life. It's a wonder it took as long as it did for the food truck thing to catch on, but the important thing is, it did. Good food no longer has to be subject to long periods of idleness. If you're wondering what might be the next big thing concerning mobility, you are not alone. Electrolux, with its 2011 Design Lab exhibition, has just released the 25 semi-finalists for the competition. The theme is "Intelligent Mobility." Here are a few examples of the concepts that perhaps … Read more

Hot dogs and burgers cooked over an open flame may be associated with summer, but they are not the only foods that go well with warm weather and outdoor activities. A much sweeter option exists, and will be found in the hands--dripping down the fingers--of people everywhere. S'mores seemingly exist mainly to fuel packs of sugar-hungry kids as they tear around on campgrounds, beaches, and parks, but those ravenous (and sticky) youngsters no longer have to wait to get to the great outdoors to enjoy the goopy treat. Now, this high-octane snack can be made easily indoors.

The Nostalgia Electrics SMM-100 Old Fashioned S'Mores Maker … Read more

Would you let a man who created a piece of furniture called the "scum chair" anywhere near your food? I would, as long as the man is design engineering student Hannes Harms from the Royal College of Art in London.

Harms has hatched a concept called NutriSmart that melds the tracking power of radio frequency identification (RFID) tags with the yumminess of Twinkies, Cheez Wiz, or just about any other food product you can imagine. The edible tags could hold information about where the food was grown or shipped from, what the ingredients are, how far it has traveled, and what the nutritional content is.

The NutriSmart prototype includes a smart plate that reads the RFID tags in the food. It can tell you how many calories it is costing you (150 for that Twinkie) and how it stacks up nutritionally in your diet.

Harms imagines a kitchen with a smart refrigerator that tells you when your milk is going sour or that it's time to replace that aging bottle of ketchup you haven't touched in a year. It could also be used to alert allergy sufferers when a potentially dangerous ingredient is present. … Read more

My bookshelves hold tons of cookbooks, but I've always used Google to search for recipes. It's been helpful to compare multiple recipes and see how they line up with the ingredients I already have in my pantry. I could take a bit of one recipe and add it to another and create a meal.

But now Google has introduced Recipe View, which allows you to filter out the non-recipe content from your results. In the past I've always just typed in "recipe" in the search box, and it filtered out most of the unwanted content. … Read more

'Tis the season for a big steaming hot pot of food. Even in the warmest of weather a slow cooker full of goodies can be enticing. Certainly the ease in which it can be used is enjoyable for everybody. Just pop in some ingredients, set the timer, and in a matter of hours a thoroughly satisfying meal can be had--one that warms straight down to the bones.

The not-so-secret allure of slow cookers such as the Calphalon Digital Slow Cooker is the ability to time cooking completion to whenever one wants. The new model ups the ante with an automatic … Read more

Setting down to dinner accompanied by some tasteful tunes has always been an appetizing way to start a meal. As the silverware clinks together, the sounds mingle with voices and music and create a soundtrack that seemingly enhances the food. Surroundings are taken into account, and the high-gloss enamel of the table is observed; the music seems to be emanating from within the dinner table itself. As it's an odd place for music to be, one steps back and examines the table in full: it is a piano, with an iPod placed where the sheet music would go.

This … Read more

Doughnuts aren't typically the type of things one thinks too often about creating at home. Most every community has a doughnut shop nearby, and if it doesn't, then the next one over certainly will have one. Aside from the ubiquity of doughnut purveyors, the simple fact is one (or a dozen...) will usually suffice. But don't let all that stop you from whipping up a batch of five at home.

The Sunbeam FPSBDML920 Donut Maker is a bright-yellow countertop appliance that screams for attention. If the color doesn't grab you, the doughnut-shaped design will. The clamshell-type … Read more