By Steve
From finding recipes to hands-free timers, discover how your phone can help you cook with more joy and less stress.
A Well-Seasoned Wednesday!
There is a special kind of magic that happens in the kitchen. It’s a place of creativity, comfort, and connection. While many of us have our tried-and-true cookbooks and cherished family recipes, technology can be a wonderfully helpful “sous-chef,” quietly working in the background to handle the little logistical details and make the entire process, from planning to preparation, a bit smoother and more enjoyable.
Today, let's explore some simple, practical ways your phone or tablet can lend a hand in the kitchen. This isn't about replacing the craft of cooking, but about using simple tools to help make more delicious food!
You can share our homepage with all of our articles: thehotelinehearald.substack.com
The most obvious use for tech in the kitchen is finding recipes, but it goes far beyond a simple search.
Targeted Recipes: Instead of just googling "chicken recipe," you can get more specific with recipe apps like the New York Times Cooking app (this seems to be a crowd favorite with our readers). These dedicated apps let you filter by cuisine, ingredients, or dietary needs to find exactly what you're looking for.
The "What Can I Make?" Wizard: This is where modern AI can be truly brilliant. Have a few random ingredients in the fridge and don't know what to make? You can ask an AI tool, "What can I make with chicken thighs, a lemon, and some spinach?" It’s a wonderful way to reduce food waste and spark new ideas.
Interested in trying something like this out? Send me an email and I can help you get set up:
How many times have you had messy hands from kneading dough or handling ingredients when you suddenly needed to set a timer? This is where your phone's voice assistant (like Siri on an iPhone or Google Assistant on an Android) is a game-changer. For many people, including me, this is the only thing they use Siri for.
Just Use Your Voice: Simply say, "Hey Siri, set a timer for 15 minutes." You can even set multiple, named timers at once, which is fantastic for a busy stove. For instance: "Hey Siri, set a 'rice timer' for 20 minutes" and "Set a 'vegetable timer' for 8 minutes." It’s a simple convenience that many find indispensable.
We've talked about shared grocery lists before, but tech can help even before you share the list. Many recipe apps have a feature that lets you automatically add all the ingredients from a recipe you've chosen directly to a digital shopping list with a single tap. This helps ensure you don't forget that one crucial ingredient for your new dish.
No need to pull a heavy reference book off the shelf for a quick question. Your phone is a brilliant tool for on-the-fly kitchen queries:
Unit Conversions: Quickly ask, "How many tablespoons in a quarter cup?"
Ingredient Substitutions: Wondering, "What's a good substitute for buttermilk?" A quick search will give you several simple options.
Temperature Checks: Unsure what internal temperature your chicken should be? A quick search provides immediate, food-safe answers.
Want to master a specific skill, like how to properly dice an onion, spatchcock a chicken, or knead bread? A quick search on YouTube will bring up thousands of short, clear videos from professional chefs and home cooks alike. It's like having a free, visual cooking class right in your kitchen, whenever you need it.
Using these simple tech tricks can handle the small stresses of cooking, freeing you up to focus on the joy of creating a delicious meal for yourself or your loved ones.
Quick Tech Tip
When you're using your tablet or phone to display a recipe while cooking, it can be frustrating when the screen keeps dimming or turning off. To prevent this, look in your device's Settings menu under "Display & Brightness." You should find an "Auto-Lock" feature. You can temporarily set it to "Never" while you cook, which will keep your recipe visible the entire time. Just remember to set it back to a shorter time (like 1 or 2 minutes) when you're done to save battery life!
Tech Term Demystified: Smart Fridge
You may have seen a "Smart Fridge" in a store or advertisement. At its core, it’s a refrigerator that is connected to your home's Wi-Fi. The proposed benefits are varied: many have a large touchscreen on the door that can act as a family calendar or a place to display photos. Some have cameras inside, with the idea that you could check your phone from the grocery store to see if you’re out of milk. The most advanced versions aim to track the food you have, suggest recipes, and even help order groceries for you when you're running low.
The goal is to create a more connected and convenient kitchen hub. However, this is one piece of technology that often prompts the very fair question: what was wrong with a normal fridge? For many, including some we’ve spoken with, the idea of another internet-connected device listening or watching inside our home brings up privacy concerns. When a simple sticky note on the refrigerator door works perfectly well for a shopping list, the "smart" features can sometimes feel like a solution in search of a problem. So, while the technology is certainly clever, many are happy to stick with a "dumb" fridge that excels at its one, most important job: keeping the food cold.
Good News Byte
Smart kitchen scales are becoming increasingly helpful for health-conscious cooks. Many new models can connect via Bluetooth to an app on your phone. As you add an ingredient to the scale, the app can show you its detailed nutritional information (calories, protein, carbs, etc.) in real-time. It’s a great tool for anyone managing their diet, baking with precision, or just curious about the nutritional content of their meals.
Did You Know?
The tradition of writing down and sharing recipes has a very long history! One of the world's oldest known collections of recipes is "De Re Coquinaria" ("On the Subject of Cooking"), believed to have been compiled in the late 4th or early 5th century in Rome. It proves that for nearly two thousand years, we’ve been passionate about recording and sharing the secrets to a good meal.
Your Turn in the Kitchen!
This week, try using just one of these tech tricks while you cook. The next time you need to time something simple, like boiling an egg or steeping a cup of tea, try using your phone's voice assistant to set a hands-free timer. See how it feels to have a little digital help!
A Little Bit of Fun
I love to cook and try new recipes. I would love for you to share any favorite family recipes with me! I promise to send pictures after I make it.
Happy cooking!
Warmly,
Steve