I do not automatically associate kitchens with women, and I think this is becoming more and more of an outdated concept. Most of the men I know cook, and all of the men I knew in San Francisco did.

There was that robotic sandwich maker, I think it was, a shop thing, about the size of a whole shop.

Have you noticed the kids are all about slow food, artisinal, minimal packaging, minimal processing, etc. Pendulums will swing with only gravity to stop them until they get another push.

Ten years ago, I was working with several people On a project to get a light headliner in a new car. one company couldn't do it. They had the headliners in a different series, but could for love or money get it into a special order car because the robots couldn't do it. I asked couldn't they just put the light one in the hopper and trick the robots, but apparently the robots know better. Range Rover will work with your interior designer to customize your vehicle's finishes to match your house or wardrobe or whim.

I'd rather have hand made custom food than robot knows better! even on Star Trek, where you can program the replicator, which makes the food out of molecules or something, to your exact preferences, had the writers admitting that there was something about real food that they didn't think the replicators could manage. In reality, I imagine that would be the surprise of variations and inexactitudes.

How about this?

dcarch

ROTFl!! Amylou, it's an easy hack. Magnetic frame, old tablet. Does everything the one in the store does, removes for cleaning, doesm't cook the fridge if it fails, etc.

Now if the built in screen monitored what family members were messing with and shocked their everlovin’ hands when they touched things they shouldn’-otter....

LOL plllog! We did end up going with an LG that has wifi, apparently the only function of it on that fridge is to alert me via an app when the various filters need to be changed, and I also think that if for some reason you are away from home and have a desperate need to see what is in the fridge, you can peek inside in real time. So dumb.

I told that guy that the internet overlords already know my address, my bra size and that I listen to Christmas music year round and have a feverish obsession with pink. They do NOT need to know the contents of my refrigerator too!!!! I have a Kindle Fire that I keep propped on one of my pretty pink breadboxes by the stove should I feel the need to be otherwise entertained in the kitchen.

Now if I can actually get it delivered in one piece I will be in business. The first one I picked out took a month, only for them to deliver it completely smashed in the back and when I sent it back, they told me that the one I wanted might take 6 months or more to come in, so I had to go pick out a different one AND they had the nerve to make me pay the price difference because the first one was bought on sale and since the sale was over I had to pay full price for the new one! All this fancy pants tech for a box that gets cold.....

Well, I was pretty pissed off when we bought our current house that magnets wouldn't stick to the fridge! Then the ice maker stopped! (never had one before cause we were on a well)

Waiting for the thing to break down so I can get a NON stainless steel fridge without a space hog of an ice maker and no computer, please!

I'll take the listmaker that has a little magnet to stick to the door!

Interesting article -- but the computer in question didn't actually cook. It was more of a method for storing recipes, etc. The article says it would cost 78K in today money, and a two-week computer programming course was required to run it. The article says there's "no evidence" that even one was sold!

The guy showing me fridges at Best Buy was SO tickled about this thing! Me, not so much but I appreciate and enjoy enthusiasm! The conversation went something like this:

Had I been in the market for a new 'fridge, I might well have had a similar conversation. The whole idea of a "smart" refrigerator does not even remotely appeal to me.

There is some worth to the idea of a fridge (or pantry) that can self-inventory, but it would have to be able to say that the milk is beginning to smell like fridge, there are grapes, but they're going to be moldy by tomorrow or the next day, there's still mayonnaise, but the jar is mostly empty and just has some clinging to the sides.... If you could really tell what was in the fridge on your way home from work because your SO had to dump the kids with your mother and run off to somewhere important, that would be really useful.

How about a refrigerator with a flip down scale on the door for you to measure your weight?

dcarch :-)

I think the refrigerator should have a permanent scale in front of it, with the weight being displayed on the refrigerator door.

But it did not actually cook dinner. Rather, its functions included storing recipes, meal planning, and balancing the family checkbook.

Well, computers evolved and we have most of what is proposed here (not the robot part) in a phone or a tablet. So the vision was not stupid, we just did not have the technical means to make it something practical at the time.

For the rest, frozen meals are there for those who cant/dont want to cook. Hopefully, the sexist vision of this article (women are the one in charge of preparing meal) have changed, though I sometimes wonder.

I see more men in grocery stores than women where I live, but that may partly be because the women I do see tend to have more items in their carts, and therefore the men have to shop more often.

When I lived in Venice, I would shop at Ralphs Waterside Marina Market, which was the closest market to me. It is right across the street from the Marina Yacht Harbor, which is quite large, and some people actually live on boats in this harbor. When I went into that store, the first thing I saw was liquor and condoms, which gives you an idea of their marketing approach. One day the store had a lot of men in it but only one woman, and she was dressed like she was going to a pick-up bar in a see-through lacy knit dress and 4" stiletto heels, which could not have been that comfortable for grocery shopping. I think she was mostly interested in picking up a sailor.

I know a lot of women who only wear heals. Some women are heels addicted to the point that their ligaments are shortened and it's painful for them to walk in flats. They wear slippers with heels. As to men in the store, I think as you alluded some of it may be where men congregate. I don't know currently, but the Marina and surrounds used to be where men went when they divorced. I haven't done a study, but back when we actually went into stores, where I shop, there hasn't been a particular standout of one gender or another.

What I do see is that getting more and moreso as I look at younger people, some are all on this popular rediscover of homemaking, with artisanal twists, and that's not gender specific. Equally, those younger people seem equally clueless male/female. There are other culture groups, however, where equality just hasn't set in, and people fall into traditional gender roles, but often with a lot less childhood preparation. The girls don't know how to cook and the boys don't know how to fix stuff., even if they expect those things of each other ;)