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Ovens & Ranges

IBM's Watson Supercomputer Is Now a Cookbook Author

Would you try a Thai quiche? How about pancetta cider?

Chefs at the Institute of Culinary Education working with Watson from a laptop Credit: Flickr user "IBM Research"

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By now, you ought to be familiar with the culinary abilities of IBM's Watson supercomputer. Heck, they even come baked into Miele's new HR 1956 DF Dual Fuel Range. But today Chef Watson is going through yet another rite of passage familiar to all master chefs—publishing a cookbook.

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The book is called Cognitive Cooking with Chef Watson, and it includes more than 65 recipes created using insanely complex computer algorithms.

Of course, Watson didn't actually write the recipes. Instead, it processed a virtual mountain of data about food that already exists to suggest strange, exciting, and possibly delicious new flavor combinations. The writing was handled by chefs from the Institute of Culinary Education (which partnered with IBM three years ago), who turned the new ideas into actual recipes.

CNN Money adds that Watson examined data on "flavor interactions, food chemical compositions, nutritional information, and cultural preferences" in order to come up with the new flavors.

But Watson won't be resting on its laurels. Its silicon is also powering a web app that combines the supercomputer's foodie smarts with your desires to whip up a hundred different recipes for each wacky meal idea you can come up with. Pulled pork crepes? Sure. Quinoa muffins? No problem!

And if 65 recipes in print form aren't not enough for you, don't fret. CNN notes that Watson may be publishing more cookbooks in the future. Who knows... maybe in a few years it'll be able to write them itself?

Indian Turmeric Paella
Credit: Flickr user "IBM Research"

Indian Turmeric Paella from "Cognitive Cooking with Chef Watson"

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