Recently I’ve had several conversations about robots: how people keep making robots that can do new things, how robots are getting better and better, how someday maybe they’ll take over.  Yes, it is a bit daunting, but I believe there are some things that robots will never be able to do quite as well as we humans can do them.

One of these is cooking.  I can imagine robots making fast-food meals that are exactly the same for every customer in every restaurant.  (And I’m kind of surprised that McDonald’s hasn’t yet replaced its cashiers with ATM-like machines where you key in your order and the foodlike items drop out of slots–that technology has been available for a while, but thank you McDonald’s for continuing to hire humans who need jobs!)  The kind of cooking that requires tasting the food and making judgments about what it needs, though, seems like something that can be done well only by someone who eats food.

I’ve written before about robot cooking blogs, but today I received a trackback from one that really impresses me with its ability to look like a pleasant, informative cooking site while actually publishing a lot of gibberish.  It’s cookdaymeal.com and is “Designed by DECENT WEB EXPERTS.” (You can tell they’re really decent by the capital letters.) I clicked through to their site, and it looks like the decent experts might be humans, just humans who don’t speak English. But cookdaymeal.com has recipes that I don’t think were written coherently in any language.  For example, here are the ingredients of No Bake Banana Pudding:

Components: three or even four ripe plums, broke 1/3 cup dissolved butter (or decreased fat for any healthier version) the single cup sugars or darling (this could become reduced in order to cup) 1 egg cell beaten one teaspoon vanilla one teaspoon baking soda pop Pinch of sodium 1 glasses associated with all-purpose flour or even whole wheat grains flour Optionally available: Walnuts, pecans or some kind of other enthusiast of the particular option.

That’s a lot of plums for a banana pudding–and no bananas.  Yet somehow we will later “mix the particular butter using the bananas inside a large mixing dish.”  Here are some other excerpts from assorted recipes:

Clown is an outstanding food. It all really is healthy and delicious.

Whilst preparing a blood banana smoothie you have to bear in mind to preheat the particular oven at three hundred and fifty?? N or even 184?? Chemical and also you start planning.

The hammock till right now continues to become in whatever method to recline plus calm down together with or along with no particular family members to be capable to bask inside the warmth through the sun collectively with coziness concerning family. Therefore extended because youre cautious in order to adhere to the specific instructions banana bread quality recipes are usually generally written with this type of the particular means that watts ill even children may help allow it to be. apples

Stir within the dry components till thoroughly mixed mainly because well as permit to are a symbol of 5 minutes. A clown can offer a person utilizing a substantial embrace power. It’s okay if this moves over the edges.

Pour the cup of drinking water right into a saucepan and include three tablespoons associated with vegetable oil in to it, plus warm the combination gently. Whenever warmed, eliminate from warmth. Include half a mug of chopped dark olives along with a whole room-temperature egg cell towards the money mix.

Whilst continuing to defeat the combination, slowly mix within an extra one?? mug flour, gradually and progressively, till the particular dough starts in order to take away from your sides from the particular dish.

Rub it manually simply for one minute read more regarding a gently floured surface area, divide it all by 50 percent and shape every half right into a loaf (roll Program. Pulling. Bitmap money right into a rectangle utilizing the floured rolling pin number then, beginning at among the particular narrow finishes, roll upward just like the jelly roll mainly because tightly as you possibly can and tuck every finish under). Spot the loaves inside the prepared cookware (tucked finishes down) and clean melted butter on top of each. Allow in order to increase for thirty forty-five minutes more inside a draft-free location (but usually do not protect them). Cook at 350 levels for half a good hour. Eliminate from your oven when carried out.

This many basic bread recipe will go well topped along with eggs or succulent meat and might be served silently with dissolved butter.

This particular recipe unlike some other fried breads utilizes hardly any essential oil, which can make it just the little healthier likened to average smolder breads.

Regardless of whether this bread might be to showcase non-existent culinary abilities, a white colored meal for bad university students or simply a pleasing method to start on the chilly morning, this particular white and straightforward recipe makes sure that however, most severe cook could create something to turn out to be happy along with.

Whenever making use associated with bare collection presently there is certainly simply one spot in this interference could arrive inside as nicely as that’s between terminate within the particular cable along with the terminal; nevertheless when making utilization of banana plugs a person double this while interference is heading to be inside the position in order to enter between end within the wire with the by the finish from the connect combined with the terminal.

Anyone who would make a fruit smoothie that way has got to be thinking electronically, it seems to me.  On the other hand, recipes that call for “two teaspoons cooking soft drinks” and “four ovum” might be human recipes that were just translated by a robot whose inadequate algorithms come up with “cooking soft drinks” instead of “baking soda” and “ovum” where normal humans would say “eggs”–mistakes that any non-English-speaking human using an other-language-to-English dictionary might make.  Hmmm, maybe the site is trying to avoid copyright violations by having robots translate real recipes from English to another language and then back into English, perhaps with a thesaurus involved?

I’d love to hear from any readers who are brave enough to try one of these robots’ recipes and see how it turns out!