AI, Automation and Robots: 7 DIY Electronic Projects for the Kitchen

Automate your kitchen space with Raspberry Pi Pico, Arduino, and other DIY projects.

Building electronics for the kitchen doesn't immediately come to mind, but just look at the huge home appliance industry, and you'll realize that it's the perfect place to tinker around.

From robots to machine learning, there are plenty of amazing DIY projects for the kitchen.

1. Raspberry Pi Pico Stove Monitor

Using a combination of sensors alongside machine learning, this small circuit will detect when your food is burning on the stove. Considering how many injuries and death are caused by fires in home kitchens every year, it's a fantastic use for the inexpensive Raspberry Pi Pico microcontroller. What makes this project particularly exciting is the use of Sensor Fusion on the Edge Impulse platform. Using this machine learning software you can build a smart system to detect different cooking states: idle, active (cooking), and burning.

The prize sensor at the heart of this experiment is The Grove - HCHO from Seeed Studio which is used to detect VOC gases. In other words, to detect Volatile Organic Compounds which are found in things like paint, new furniture, and of course burning food. If you can't get your hands on a Pico board, this setup will also work with other RP2040 boards such as those available from Seed and Arduino.

2. OnionBot: Raspberry Pi Robot Sous Chef

Looking for a robot sous-chef to help you in the kitchen? Then start with OnionBot. Designed by engineering student Ben, this Raspberry Pi powered project can stop a pot of water from boiling over, and tell you when it's time to add the next ingredient. It's the kind of invention that's fun to imagine taking on the most boring and tedious cooking tasks. So far it can only make tomato pasta, but who knows where this open-source project could go in the future!

Designed to fit on a kitchen benchtop, the hardware includes an overhead sensor arm that houses a wide-angle Raspberry Pi camera, a wide-angle thermal sensor array, plus a small air blower to solve the problem of condensation. Add to the setup a servo motor to control the stove's heating knob, and a Raspberry Pi touchscreen to display recipe prompts. A lot of hard work went into image classification to power the machine learning model (Google AutoML). The result? An awesome kitchen robot that helps automate pan cooking.

3. Cheeseborg: An Arduino + Raspberry Pi Grilled Cheese Robot

Cheesborg is a robot that uses a vacuum arm to stack bread and cheese together before sending it on to be spayed with butter and pushed onto a grilled sandwich press. Wait just a few minutes, and you've got yourself the perfect grilled cheese sandwich. What's even better? You can control all of this with a simple Google voice command.

If this sounds like the kind of delicious robotic project you want to create, you'll need an Arduino Mega and a Raspberry Pi, alongside mechanical components like a stepper motor, winch, bearings, screws, etc. While there isn't a tutorial you can follow, taking a look at the video will give you a good idea of how the system operates. Many people are catching on to why smart homes are a good idea, but we've yet to see this in homes!

4. Ripeness Detector for Vegetables and Fruit

Machine learning is used in this project to create a functional system for detecting when a fruit or vegetable is ripe. For those of us who are never quite sure when the best time is to bite into a piece of fruit, it's a fun project to build for the countertop. Otherwise, it could come in handy at a grocery store, or farm, assisting in production processes. Just reading about the chemistry research that went into the project makes you think that it would make a great science experiment for school!

The controller used in this project is the Arduino Nano 33 IoT which allows data to be uploaded to a web application where the calculations happen. For the eyes of this project, you will need the AS7341 11-channel visible light sensor from DFRobot, plus a couple of LEDs to let you know if the fruit or veg is good to eat. Head over to the Arduino Project Hub for everything you need to know about the design.

5. Arduino Nano Temperature Coaster

Sometimes you might drink your coffee too soon and burn your mouth, while at other times you end up forgetting your mug altogether leaving you with cold coffee. Well, now you no longer have to guess with this nifty Arduino temperature sensing coaster. When your coffee is just the right temperature for drinking, an LED and buzzer will let you know it's time to drink up!

Using components that are often found in starter kits like the TMP36 temperature sensor, this is a simple build that fits into a custom design 3D printed coaster. Of course, you can use other found materials if you don't have a 3D printer at home. Because it uses an Arduino Nano, the parts are small enough to possibly squeeze into various setups. You can find everything you need over on the Arduino Project Hub page, alongside the code. Keep in mind that you'll want to make adjustments to the temperature thresholds according to your taste.

6. Raspberry Pi Pico Sous Vide Water Bath

If you want to add a bit of science to your kitchen, try making your own water bath at home. Use it to replicate expensive sous vide machines in restaurants to slow cook ingredients to perfection. This system uses a PID controller which is a fancy way of saying that it heats and cools the water to maintain a consistent temperature. Choose your heating device carefully making sure that it can withstand continuous power-cycling.

You will need a Raspberry Pi Pico for this job, along with a stainless steel temperature sensor, OLED screen, a relay switch, and a suitable heating device—they use a handy instrument from Rommelsbacher called an immersion heater. All together a relatively minimal setup, simply follow the instructions on GitHub and you'll be making the perfect hamburger in no time. If you're looking for more projects that use this tiny microcontroller, check out our list of projects for the Raspberry Pi Pico.

7. Raspberry Pi Smart Bartender

One way to impress guests at your next party is to build a smart bartender to pour your drinks. You can make any sort of drink just by customizing the code and then using the onboard screen to select your choice.

The housing is made from wood and 3D printed parts while the brain of the operations is a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B. You will need some food-grade silicone tubing and several pumps running to different flavored bottles at the back. It requires a lot of wiring but once it's up and running, you've got yourself a robotic bartender for life.

DIY Projects for the Kitchen

If you have a love for food and a love for electronics then these projects are for you. Even if you don't, it's the perfect place to use all kinds of environmental sensors like heat, gas, and temperature. Take on a fun project or get inspired to design your own solution to a problem you're having in the kitchen.