baking

I love baking. I love technology. I just never thought to put the two together. Israel-based artist and designer Debbi Nitsan, however, is already on the case.

Nitsan created an entire collection of electronics with their original casings removed and replaced with new, 100 percent more delicious, bread casings. The items include clocks, radios, and flashlights.… Read more

If there's one thing we know for sure, it's that humanity is only a few years away from the robot armageddon. The robots are improving too quickly and building each other too rapidly to stop. At least we can console ourselves by laughing at the robots of today. Like this bakebot. "A robot baking? How hilarious," you say. Well, get your chuckles in while you can, human. (It's actually pretty funny though.)

Personal favorite part of the video below? When Bakebot tosses the empty bowl on the floor. Just like a real chef! (We all do that, right?) Bakebot is well-known at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL), where it was built by MIT graduate student Mario Bollini.

Bollini cooked up the bakebot using the PR2 research and development platform, developed by Willow Garage, to bake chocolate chip cookies from scratch.

"My task is to have the PR2 bake cookies all the way from locating the ingredients in front of it on the table to putting the cookie in the oven," Bollini said.

The bakebot (which is not the first robot chef we've seen) begins by examining the table using a laser scanner and camera to locate the cookie sheet and butter. It identifies all the other ingredients and supplies by color and size. The robot then follows a coded version of the recipe that takes it through mixing the ingredients, scraping the cookie dough onto the baking sheet, and patting it into a large cookie. … Read more

Blooming buttercups have been a symbol of good fortune, as well as happiness, since Victorian days. You can share the good fortune with your friends and family by way of the Buttercup Cakelet Pan, which allows you to bake six cakes in the shape of blooming buttercups at a time. Each flower will have details like petals baked in, but you can easily make them even more festive flowers with a bit of icing or other decorations. If buttercups aren't exactly right for the situation, though, the miniature cakes you can bake with this pan are also ideal bases … Read more

Believe it or not, my stomach is looking forward to the arrival of my iPad (hurry up, UPS!) just as much as my brain. That's because I can envision the tablet on my kitchen counter (sitting upright in a dirt-cheap stand, of course), serving up page after page of delicious recipes, each with tantalizing photos and large, easy-to-read text.

In the meantime, I'm making due with my iPhone (or my wife's iPod Touch--whatever's closer). The print may be a little small, but the cooking/recipe apps are first-rate. Here's a list of my five favorites:… Read more

Cupcakes taste great and, somehow, miniature cupcakes taste even better. The Mini Cupcake Maker lets you turn out a batch of smaller cupcakes in less than five minutes, without needing to preheat the oven. You simply mix up some batter--a half batch of many recipes is plenty for the seven cupcakes that the Mini Cupcake Maker has space for, but it's fast enough that you can bake several rounds if you want more--and pour into the nonstick baking tray. Less than five minutes later, your cupcakes are done. They'll release quickly from the tray and clean up will … Read more

Scottish shortbread can be incredibly decadent: considering the amount of sugar and butter the recipe calls for, that's no surprise. But just making up a batch of shortbread can leave you a plain cookie. The Shortbread Pan offers the opportunity to make your shortbread stand out. It imprints a traditional design of Scottish thistles, as well as dividing lines that make your finished shortbread easy to break up. The mold is made from fired, nonporous ceramic that can bake shortbread without any worry of the cookie sticking to the pan. While many shortbread recipes call for oiling a pan … Read more

It's easy enough to put together a batch of rolls, but I've always wanted to make my own kaiser rolls. The pattern on top of kaiser rolls had me stumped, though: how exactly did bakers make it? It turns out that the swirl is easy to duplicate, as long as you have a Kaiser Roll Stamp. You just make your roll dough as you would normally and, before you leave the rolls to rise, stamp each bun with the Kaiser Roll Stamp. Your rolls will rise with a swirled pattern across the top with next to no extra … Read more

Going all out on baking for the holidays is a family tradition: we make cookies, cakes, and anything else we can think of, handing out treats to friends and family. Since I give them to a wide variety of people, I'm always looking for a way to make mine look their best. The Baking Shapes that King Arthur Flour is offering for the holiday season easily add a little something special to a plate full of holiday sweets. The set of four includes a pair of bells, a star, a snowman, and a tree. You can fill one with … Read more

Rather than hunting up your Halloween cookie cutters and rolling out a batch of cookie dough, this year you can bake Halloween cookies in Wilton's new Halloween cookie pan. Getting cookies shaped like ghosts, mummies, and spider webs is just a matter of rolling cookie dough into balls and placing it in each of the 12 cavities of of the cookie pan. As the cookies bake, they'll take on the shape of the Halloween designs. When you take the pan out of the oven, it's easy to remove the cookies: not only is the pan nonstick, but … Read more