Robot 'Chef' Masters Recipe Creation Through Food Video Learning

Researchers at Cambridge University have successfully trained a robot to learn and replicate cooking recipes by watching instructional videos. The robot, programmed by the researchers, was provided with a cookbook containing eight simple salad recipes. After observing a human demonstrator preparing one of the dishes in a video, the robot accurately identified the recipe and successfully recreated it. Impressively, after mastering the initial eight recipes, the robot even devised its own unique recipe. Grzegorz Sochacki, one of the researchers involved in the project, expressed the goal of training the robot to learn incrementally, akin to human learning. The university released a video on YouTube showcasing the culinary skills of the robot "chef." Have a Look

During the training process, the robot analyzed 16 videos featuring humans cooking various recipes. It utilized computer vision techniques to examine each frame, enabling it to identify objects such as knives and ingredients. Additionally, the robot recognized the human demonstrator's arms, hands, and face.

The university explained that the robot's learning process involved converting the recipes and videos into vectors. By performing mathematical operations on these vectors, the robot could determine the similarity between a demonstration and a specific recipe.

Grzegorz Sochacki emphasized that the recipes used were not complex, mainly consisting of chopped fruits and vegetables. However, the robot displayed impressive recognition, correctly identifying the recipe being demonstrated 93% of the time. It was also capable of detecting subtle variations, such as doubling the portion or human errors in the demonstrations.

Sochacki further mentioned that the robot's focus was not on viral food videos found on social media, as they tend to be challenging to follow. Nevertheless, as the robot continues to improve its ability to identify ingredients in food videos, it may be able to utilize platforms like YouTube to learn a wide range of recipes.