[HN Gopher] The Miele Dialog: cook a fish in ice without melting...
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       The Miele Dialog: cook a fish in ice without melting the ice
        
       Author : mckn1ght
       Score  : 54 points
       Date   : 2024-01-18 19:38 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (reviewed.usatoday.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (reviewed.usatoday.com)
        
       | Qelmo wrote:
       | I hate pages like this.
       | 
       | It literaly doesn't tell you how they do it.
       | 
       | But i lost interest at the price tag of 9600
        
         | mckn1ght wrote:
         | Yeah, I too was annoyed that they don't talk about the how at
         | all. It's a really long page, about 3x longer than it needs to
         | be.
         | 
         | My guess is infrared, but I was hoping someone more
         | knowledgeable could chime in.
        
           | mrguyorama wrote:
           | The worst part is that it is 3x longer than it needs to be
           | because every claim they make is repeated, nearly identically
           | and without further elaboration, at least 3 times. It's like
           | watching the same exact commercial 3 times
        
         | mytailorisrich wrote:
         | Not too many possibilities.
         | 
         | Perhaps constructive inyerferences in microwaves so that the
         | power, and thus heating, is precisely focused within a specific
         | volumetric location.
         | 
         | Oven beamforming.
         | 
         | Or another highly directive radiation source, again to target a
         | specific location.
        
           | throw310822 wrote:
           | The question is more... ok, target a specific location
           | _where_? Does it actually know where the different food items
           | are on the tray, where is their center and where is their
           | surface, and how each should be cooked separately?
        
             | mytailorisrich wrote:
             | Marketing material always makes it extra fancy but it's
             | quite possible that the actual manual says that _you_ must
             | make sure that what you want to heat is at the centre
             | because that 's where the energy will be focused.
        
               | throw310822 wrote:
               | Also possible, though I got the impression that it was
               | actually directing energy to specific places. And I was
               | already fantasizing about microwave oven with CT-scanner
               | :)
        
         | alfalfasprout wrote:
         | $9k isn't too bad for a high end oven tbh.
        
           | nathancahill wrote:
           | Yeah, they're going to sell some many of these if the
           | marketing is somewhat close to reality. Instant buy for
           | anyone outfitting a high-end home.
        
         | webstrand wrote:
         | 9600 might be worth it, but the fact that it's tied to the
         | internet and an app, I have no interest.
        
         | tptacek wrote:
         | If it works well, the price will plummet over the next 10
         | years.
        
       | gwern wrote:
       | https://reviewed.usatoday.com/ovens/features/we-tried-an-ove...
       | is a much better writeup.
       | 
       | It seems to be a directional microwave, where it monitors how
       | much microwave gets reflected back as a proxy for how much is
       | being absorbed by the food in each spot, so it can ramp up/down
       | the power as necessary to deliver the requested amount of energy.
       | Pretty neat.
        
         | yetanotherloser wrote:
         | that has some weird parallels with modern military radar.
         | 
         | Also, I didn't want one when I read their marketing page, but
         | now I'm intrigued.
        
           | evilduck wrote:
           | It ought to, microwave ovens have roots to obsolete military
           | radar too.
        
         | JaggedJax wrote:
         | Reading their copy and looking at the photos I was pretty sure
         | it was microwave based since that was the only thing that fit
         | with it heating "evenly throughout," the bland colors, and lack
         | of any burning or charring. Given this, I wonder how the flavor
         | will turn out in these dishes. Traditionally microwaving fish
         | and steak aren't the tastiest ways to prepare them, but maybe
         | the improved control solves that problem somewhat?
        
           | jfengel wrote:
           | Microwaving is bad for steak, since steak really benefits
           | from a browned exterior.
           | 
           | It's actually an OK way to prepare many fish, though. Many
           | fish have a delicate flavor that would be overwhelmed by
           | browning, and also a delicate texture that would fall apart
           | in most applications that would brown them.
           | 
           | Poaching is a common way to gently raise the temperature of
           | such fish until just cooked through, and you can emulate that
           | in a microwave. Put them in a glass pan, add some water and
           | flavorings (herbs, lemon, etc), and nuke until cooked
           | through.
           | 
           | That's applied mostly to smaller, whiter fish, and to salmon.
           | The bigger and redder fish like tuna, shark, etc. are more
           | likely to be cooked the way steak is -- often not just rare,
           | but raw in the center.
           | 
           | Anyway... I dunno if a $10,000 fancy microwave would be worth
           | it as a glorified fish poacher.
        
         | mherdeg wrote:
         | Was this the premise of the pilot episode of 30 Rock? The
         | trivection oven?
        
         | wefarrell wrote:
         | "The truth is, it's actually difficult for any microwave oven
         | to melt ice. That's because solids tend to transmit, rather
         | than absorb microwaves, and because the hydrogen bonds in ice
         | are stronger than (and harder to induce vibration/heating in)
         | those of liquid water"
         | 
         | Interesting
        
         | CoopaTroopa wrote:
         | >That's because the Dialog's underlying technology is based on
         | medical devices used to reheat donated organs that are kept
         | cold for transport.
         | 
         | The first guy to make the jump from heating donor organs to
         | heating your food probably got a couple of weird looks. I
         | wonder if there was any viewing the Silence of the Lambs before
         | the connection was made.
        
         | dang wrote:
         | Ok, we've changed to that URL from
         | https://www.miele.com/brand/en/revolutionary-
         | excellence-3868.... Thanks!
        
       | wkdneidbwf wrote:
       | this revolutionary microwave will cook a fish in ice while
       | simultaneously draining your wallet to completion.
        
       | blovescoffee wrote:
       | I love cooking and science. I cannot figure out why anyone would
       | want to cook a salmon in ice? even if it's possible, what's the
       | actual value?
        
         | nsxwolf wrote:
         | Wondering the same thing. Is this a culinary technique, or just
         | a way to show off some novel directed energy cooking
         | technology?
        
         | lifestyleguru wrote:
         | Showing off to other rich obnoxious people.
        
           | FpUser wrote:
           | This, except "obnoxious". Nice uninformed person could still
           | fall for it
        
             | lifestyleguru wrote:
             | They have no interest to befriend nice non rich people.
        
           | drewcoo wrote:
           | Which presumably sells more ovens!
        
             | bombcar wrote:
             | A surprisingly large number of these high end ovens are
             | sold into houses where they are literally never used. I'm
             | talking touring a ten year old house and I open the oven
             | and the original manual is still taped to the grill.
             | 
             | At least in this case it might be shown off as a party
             | trick.
        
               | lifestyleguru wrote:
               | It made one wife once very excited though.
        
         | hammock wrote:
         | The frozen outer layer seals in moisture and flavor, preventing
         | the food from overcooking or drying out during the cooking
         | process
        
           | aacid wrote:
           | don't we have more effective ways to seal in moisture and
           | flavor than freezing fish in block of ice?
        
             | hammock wrote:
             | Yes. But not more effective ways of demonstrating this
             | technology
        
               | blovescoffee wrote:
               | If this technology is actually worth $10k, there should
               | be a demonstration of an actually valuable cooking
               | process with it. This contrived demo makes it feel less
               | valuable than it might be (I don't really know if it's
               | actually valuable...)
        
               | itishappy wrote:
               | Scroll down. This is the first of ten examples.
        
           | thfuran wrote:
           | Doesn't not overcooking it also prevent overcooking?
        
           | mrkeen wrote:
           | Let's say I've got a cooked fish sitting in ice, scales &
           | eyeballs included, how do I get that to a state where I could
           | serve it? Is there a recipe where already-cooked frozen fish
           | is an ingredient?
        
             | bagels wrote:
             | You serve the whole fish, it's not that uncommon in some
             | cuisines. I can't imagine why you'd want raw fish skin and
             | cooked meat though (there has to be some heat gradient due
             | to the ice touching the outside of the fish)
        
           | Ekaros wrote:
           | Now I wonder about process of freezing fish inside block of
           | ice. Does that affect the fish texture?
        
             | thfuran wrote:
             | Surely it makes the fish crunchier.
        
             | blovescoffee wrote:
             | Freezing is often worse than non-frozen but is actually
             | fine for preserving freshness of fish. But actually putting
             | a whole fish in an ice-block - I don't think anyone does
             | that.
        
             | dekhn wrote:
             | Modern fishing frequently does on-ship flash freezing and
             | the results are often better than fresh fish. At least one
             | reason is that the freezing kills parasites. But also the
             | fish will stay viable longer.
             | 
             | The important detail is the method of freezing. Just
             | tossing a fish into a regular freezer doesn't work. Flash
             | freezing doesn't create large ice crystals which mess up
             | the tissue.
        
           | blovescoffee wrote:
           | But then I would just vacuum seal and cook sous vide with an
           | immersion circulator which would cost 1/20th the price of
           | this oven
        
         | brokencode wrote:
         | I don't think there's a reason for it, it's just really cool.
        
       | blackbear_ wrote:
       | Oh, I thought this was one of those fancy consulting interview
       | questions with a twist.
        
       | dingnuts wrote:
       | I'm a fan of Miele but isn't this just an ad? Couldn't the HN
       | post be a link to something interesting about the technology
       | instead of an advertisement?
        
         | webstrand wrote:
         | Yeah, I'm torn. The oven _is_ interesting, but the article is
         | not.
        
         | mckn1ght wrote:
         | A better link was surfaced in
         | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39046841, but I can't edit
         | the URL. Maybe dang will come along and help with that.
        
       | hammock wrote:
       | Miele's new Dialog oven is technically a combi
       | microwave/convection/steam oven (similar to what Starbucks heats
       | up your food in), but uses longer wavelength radiation than a
       | standard microwave. Longer wavelengths can penetrate food more
       | deeply.
       | 
       | It's called RF solid state cooking. It uses radio frequency as a
       | heat source. It allows for much higher precision (compared to
       | traditional speed cooking methods that combine microwave
       | technology and traditional oven elements) due to the RF signals
       | providing a feedback loop. They respond back and help the oven
       | understand and target specific zones within the cooking cavity.
       | 
       | Hence the name: "Dialog"
       | 
       | By regulating the oven's heat in one place, you can cook the fish
       | while the ice stays frozen. Another such example is making cooked
       | and raw salmon at the same time, by focusing the oven's action at
       | specific areas of the salmon
        
         | resolutebat wrote:
         | Ok, that's the marketing spiel, but how does this differ from a
         | regular microwave?
        
           | londons_explore wrote:
           | I suspect it uses phased array antennas to:
           | 
           | * Direct microwaves at different parts of the food
           | differently. That way you can cook some stuff lots while
           | leaving other parts cold.
           | 
           | * Detect which parts of the food are cooked - by watching the
           | absorption of microwaves across a broad range of frequencies,
           | you should be able to detect chemical reactions that happen
           | at certain temperatures - eg. ice turning to water, or raw
           | egg becoming cooked egg.
           | 
           | Combine these two things, and you can cook food far 'better'
           | - and get all of your meat to the perfect temperature while
           | overcooking none.
        
             | londons_explore wrote:
             | Notably, I don't think you _need_ phased array antennas to
             | do this. A few bits of spinning metal to scatter microwaves
             | in random directions could instead be controlled by servos
             | and lots of maths to send microwaves in very specific
             | directions.
             | 
             | And as long as you make sure you have feedback, you can
             | realtime adjust the microwave power every few microseconds
             | to do all the same things.
        
               | joshspankit wrote:
               | My intuition says phased arrays are the more reliable way
               | to do this. Less moving parts and more control. As well,
               | it feels like phased arrays in general are at a really
               | good maturity to be used for this kind of application.
        
           | vosper wrote:
           | Because a regular microwave can't do what was described in
           | the comment you're replying to? A microwave just heats
           | everything - maybe irregularly, but not intentionally
           | irregularly
           | 
           | > By regulating the oven's heat in one place, you can cook
           | the fish while the ice stays frozen. Another such example is
           | making cooked and raw salmon at the same time, by focusing
           | the oven's action at specific areas of the salmon
        
           | zebracanevra wrote:
           | https://youtu.be/wMwjHnspohU?t=585
           | 
           | The oven knows how to cook the food. It knows this because it
           | knows how much energy has been put in to the oven, and how
           | much energy was not put in to the food. By subtracting how
           | much energy was put in, from how much came out, it obtains
           | the kilojoules of energy the food absorbed, or the Gourmet
           | Unit.
           | 
           | Does Miele also design missiles?
        
             | hammock wrote:
             | >Does Miele also design missiles?
             | 
             | The technology comes form a company called Goji Food
             | Solutions. This is the founder - he has a bunch of other
             | patents, mostly focused in the medical devices, biotech and
             | healthcare spaces:
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shlomo_Ben-Haim
        
               | bombcar wrote:
               | It's a reference to
               | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZe5J8SVCYQ
               | 
               | > The missile knows where it is at all times. It knows
               | this because it knows where it isn't. By subtracting
               | where it is from where it isn't, or where it isn't from
               | where it is (whichever is greater), it obtains a
               | difference, or deviation. The guidance subsystem uses
               | deviations to generate corrective commands to drive the
               | missile from a position where it is to a position where
               | it isn't, and arriving at a position where it wasn't, it
               | now is. Consequently, the position where it is, is now
               | the position that it wasn't, and it follows that the
               | position that it was, is now the position that it isn't.
        
         | FpUser wrote:
         | >"The frozen outer layer prevents the food from overcooking or
         | drying out during the cooking process."
         | 
         | Other cooking tech does this as well. Wrapping in leaves and
         | clay for example.
        
         | the_mitsuhiko wrote:
         | They have a pretty extensive introduction including the tech on
         | YouTube. https://youtu.be/wMwjHnspohU
        
           | marssaxman wrote:
           | Ironic that the text is almost content-free, while the useful
           | information is buried in a video.
        
         | glitchc wrote:
         | I stopped reading at "longer wavelength radiation than a
         | standard microwave."
         | 
         | A microwave do not irradiate your food. Rather, it uses an
         | oscillating magnetic field to induce dipole heating (in mainly
         | water molecules but also other dipoles that may be present in
         | the food).
        
           | aceki wrote:
           | ...electromagnetic radiation?
        
             | glitchc wrote:
             | Edit: I stand corrected.
        
               | mckn1ght wrote:
               | Huh, TIL. So is this the same principle used in an
               | induction stove top to heat the pan, just applied to
               | water molecules instead of metal?
        
               | Terr_ wrote:
               | > [No electromagnetic radiation] whatsoever in a
               | microwave.
               | 
               | WTF!? Is this leaking out of some kind of weird
               | electromagnetic health conspiracy theory subculture?
               | 
               | Any trivial web search provides an avalanche of results
               | explaining otherwise--that your microwave oven definitely
               | uses electromagnetic radiation--including the EPA and
               | FDA.
               | 
               | Or is your thesis that everybody else is wrong about
               | wave-particle duality and photons aren't real?
        
           | bagels wrote:
           | Magnetic fields radiate. It's radiation. It's just that it's
           | not ionizing radiation.
        
         | ramraj07 wrote:
         | Isn't it true that ice does not heat up in even a regular
         | microwave though?
        
           | londons_explore wrote:
           | Yes, but few people know that, so this still sounds
           | impressive.
           | 
           | I suspect I could do that 'cook fish in ice' demo in my home
           | microwave after a few practice runs. The trick will be having
           | the whole block of ice at -1C so the ice is solid, but the
           | slightly salty water within the fish's body is not frozen,
           | and therefore absorbs microwaves really well.
           | 
           | Adding a little gelatine to the water will probably make it
           | work even better, because then convection currents won't eat
           | away at the ice so quickly.
        
         | ugh123 wrote:
         | Thanks! Thought this whole thing was a joke/prank until I read
         | your explanation
        
       | lifestyleguru wrote:
       | ...and that's why you're not getting payrise this year. Rich
       | people want cooked fish in ice.
        
       | rpmisms wrote:
       | I wonder if you could replace a sous vide bag with this...
        
       | atentaten wrote:
       | The strangeness of cooking a fish in ice made me think of another
       | strange thing people do with fish -- Ying Yang Fish:
       | 
       | https://www.odditycentral.com/foods/yin-and-yang-fish-a-cont...
        
         | jahnu wrote:
         | Truly disturbing!
         | 
         | > First, the scales of the live fish were carefully removed
         | without hurting it;
         | 
         | That's a bold claim
        
       | dangoodmanUT wrote:
       | Was waiting for it to have AI
       | 
       | Thank god no AI
        
         | gumballindie wrote:
         | The new corpo mantra is: "put ai in it and make it lame".
        
       | arsome wrote:
       | The GE Trivection oven again? Really?
        
       | expazl wrote:
       | Thank god, finaly! I was getting so annoyed at my ice melting
       | when cooking fish and the beeswax melting when cooking
       | tenderloin. Why didn't anyone think of this before? /S
       | 
       | When you have a product you think is cool but you don't yet have
       | a sales pitch. Wait until you figure out your sales pitch to
       | release it. This might be a great oven, but the material just
       | makes it seem like a really random gimmick that no one needs
       | outside of filming TikToks about how random it is.
        
       | cpr wrote:
       | So it's like the DEW weapons that can cook half a car in the twin
       | towers parking lot and leave the other half perfectly intact...
        
       | joshspankit wrote:
       | > The new M Chef cooking method utilises energy in form of
       | _Gourmet Units_. The appliance maintains a _constant dialog with
       | the ingredients_ to cook dishes in their entirety, until
       | achieving the desired result.
       | 
       | (emphasis mine)
       | 
       | Personally I'd take this paragraph out of the marketing
       | altogether. Making up your own units sounds suspicious, and
       | making up ones that are generic + high concept sounds even more
       | suspicious.
       | 
       | The rest of the marketing tells me they might have a product
       | that's truly new and interesting. Those (presumably real, and
       | we'll find out when the public can test it) pictures are
       | excitingly wild.
        
       | dang wrote:
       | Original URL was https://www.miele.com/brand/en/revolutionary-
       | excellence-3868.... Readers may want to look at both.
        
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       (page generated 2024-01-18 23:00 UTC)