Science is nowhere near to creating a robot chef that will fix our favorite meals for us. Perhaps you’ll settle for a robot oven — a range that will keep raw food cold throughout the day, but have it ready to eat as you step through the front door.
Whirlpool Corp. is already selling such a stove. Its Polara is the first computer-controlled refrigerator-oven. But Polara is just the beginning. Whirlpool is experimenting with an upgrade that would let Polara owners control their ranges via cellphone or Internet.
Whirlpool introduced the Polara about 18 months ago. Despite its intimidating $1,500 price, ”We’re selling in the hundreds a month,” said a senior product development manager, Joanne Belanger.
Whirlpool designed Polara for the needs of people Belanger calls ”active balancers”–basically working people with children and lots of outside-the-house activities, like soccer games and Cub Scout meetings.
The Polara combines a fast-working electric convection oven with a small refrigeration unit built into the bottom compartment of the range. The refrigerator pumps cold air into the oven cavity, so that raw ingredients can be placed in the oven all day without spoiling. In case consumers don’t quite get the point, Whirlpool employs an unusual sales tactic. ”We encourage the retail sales people to actually put bottled water in the range cavity,” said Belanger, ”to show that it really is a refrigerator.”
Buttons mounted above the oven control the Polara. The user whips up a dish that needs baking — lasagna, for instance — and puts it inside the unit. The unit can be programmed to chill the food throughout the day, and begin cooking it at, say, 5 p.m.
But what if a Polara owner gets stuck in traffic, or the Little League game goes into extra innings?
Wouldn’t it be nice if Polara could be reset to chill the food a little longer, and start the cooking a little later?
That’s the idea Whirlpool is testing. It’s one of several companies in the Internet Home Alliance, an industry partnership that’s studying ways to use Internet technologies to enhance the performance of household appliances.
Whirlpool designed the Polara to accept a standard data networking card, such as those found in personal computers. Add some extra software, and the upgraded Polara can be programmed to accept commands that are relayed through a Web browser or a cellphone.
The Internet Home Alliance is testing the concept in 20 Boston-area households. Early returns suggest that consumers may embrace the idea of remote-controlled cooking.
”So far, so good,” Belanger said.
From Boston.com
