Smart kitchens are ready and waiting, as we gradually warm up to them

Imagine you’re a parent with young kids, juggling work and schlepping them to and from school as well as after-school activities. And you want to have dinner ready at a reasonable time.

Enter the so-called smart kitchen. There are ovens, for example, that are equipped with Wi-Fi, so you can direct cooking sessions from the bleachers of a soccer game, to start with. They have so many features that you could, in theory, put a frozen casserole in the oven midday and program it to use the steam feature to defrost it, then set a timer and temperature for baking, and program it to keep it warm once it's cooked.

Or you could stack each component of your dinner in the oven for cooking — chicken to roast on one rack, sweet potatoes to bake on another, and asparagus to broil on top — and set the oven with the temperature, cooking time and sequence of cooking and warming so they’re all ready at the same time when you and the family are home and sit down to eat.

Today's kitchens can be outfitted with smart major appliances such as ovens, refrigerators and dishwashers. There are also plenty of small ones, like air fryers, coffee makers and sous vide devices. According to consumer review website CNET, you can expect a variety of new smart tools this year, including smart cutting boards with detachable screens that can beam in recorded cooking videos, and a bread storage box that uses photocatalysis — a light-activated chemical reaction — to slow mold growth. CNET also highlighted a GE Profile smart mixer that has a built-in scale and auto-sense technology to help determine when dough or batter is finished mixing.

And, of course, you can also add in technologies that aren't exclusive to the kitchen but are cool to have, like voice-controlled smart lighting or music.

According to a Fact.MR report, the smart kitchen appliance market reached nearly $10 billion in 2020 and is expected to surpass $93 billion by 2031, with refrigerators expected to account for 45 percent of sales. The report credits rapid urbanization, long working hours and hectic lifestyles, as well as an interest in saving energy for these sales. People are looking for convenience, the authors assert.

Not quite sure what a smart appliance actually is? At minimum, like an air fryer, it's an appliance that has a Wi-Fi connection. You can download a manufacturer's app and link that appliance to the app via Wi-Fi so you can control its actions (say, change the temperature or turn it off) or check on cooking progress from a distance, whether that is the family room next door, your backyard or the dog park. You can link them to Amazon's Alexa or Apple's Siri to give voice commands or even centralize the smart features with those manufacturers that use Alexa, Google Home, Wyze or other popular services to create home hubs, as opposed to having to open individual apps for each device.

But "smart" can mean so much more. Embedded sensors can enable automated cooking or baking, checking the internal temperature of something being cooked using a built-in thermometer, or adapt refrigeration and freezing.

For instance, interior designer Brian Brown of Brian Brown Studio showed me a Fisher & Paykel refrigerator/freezer in his office kitchen. It has the technology to cool and defrost only when needed. It has "Sabbath Mode," a feature that in refrigerators, for example, turns off control panel displays, sounds, ice and water dispensers, and interior light activation when the door is open — all of which can be set for the duration of specific religious holidays. The refrigerator also has changeable temperature zones. And, of course, it's connected to Wi-Fi.

And many smart refrigerators can identify when filters need changing or if a part is broken, as well as have built-in Alexa-enabled smart touch screens that can share notes and photos, or transparent touch screens that allow you to look inside the fridge without opening the door.

Website Lifewire noted that some can create grocery lists that sync with your smartphone, look up recipes and read the steps aloud while you cook, set food expiration dates and send messages to use food while its fresh, and use an interior camera so that you can see — while you’re at the market — if you’re low on certain ingredients.

And some even have sensors that allow you to give it a little bump if your hands are full so it can open the door for you — and will pull the door shut if it wasn't closed securely.

The Miele DGC wall oven is filled with features, including steam cooking, combi-steam, roasting, baking and broiling. I got a bread baking demonstration at Pirch in Westfield UTC, a premium fixture and appliance retailer, that showed how a baker could select on the digital screen what type of bread was being baked — from challah to focaccia — and even gave a choice of how brown the bread should be. It's plumbed to bring in water for steaming, so the dough, a braided loaf, first was steamed for more rise and then automatically switched to baking at the temperature aligned with the type of bread and until it reached the requested level of browning.

In theory, you could mix and knead the dough the night before and let it proof overnight, then before you leave for work, put it in the oven, and set it to start baking at a certain time so you can have fresh bread waiting in the oven at the end of the day.

Pretty cool features, right? Admittedly, however, not everyone ends up using them.

Indra Gardiner and Paul Bowers renovated their Mission Hills kitchen in 2022. They bought a smart Bosch oven and Sub-Zero refrigerator.

"Our oven and fridge are both online, and I have access to them from my phone to monitor and control the fridge temperature, and I can start/stop the oven, which is good for preheating," Bowers said. "But honestly, I’ve used the features once or twice and think it's cool but never really use them for any practical purpose."

However, he did acknowledge having some comfort knowing he could control the oven remotely.

"I needed to roast some vegetables for dinner tonight and needed to take Stella [the couple's dog] to the park," he said. "I usually avoid unattended cooking — suppose there's some emergency while I’m out — then, I remembered I could turn off the oven remotely if necessary."

What is it Bowers loves to use? Their new Sonos music system. They installed ceiling speakers that turn on at 5 a.m. daily so he can enjoy music each morning while making tea.

His wife, a trained baker, also has barely used any of the features. Gardiner pointed out that their oven has a speed baking feature she hasn't tested out that would allow them to program what they’re cooking. Based on how you program it — such as what's being cooked, its weight and whether it's frozen or raw — the oven figures out the cooking settings and time.

"For people who don't cook much or are new to cooking, that's amazing," she said. "But I’m a very hands-on cook. I need to see and touch what I’m making. I never just leave it up to a timer to tell me something's done.

"I like the experience and the satisfaction of the process of cooking. I don't want to lose that because the machines can do it for me. I’m sure there are people who appreciate the convenience, but that's not what I’m looking for. I’m not that kind of cook; I’m old-school that way."

But she does love their induction cooktop.

"I love cooking on that thing," she said. "I love how fast it heats everything and how efficient it is and how even it is. And the other thing that's nice, as we get older, is that the burner automatically shuts off when you remove the pot."

Bowers and Gardiner aren't the only ones who have invested in smart appliances but don't really use the features. Brown has designed several smart kitchens for clients with technologies he knows they’re ignoring. The appliances just happen to fall within their budget. But along with the smart refrigerators and ranges he installs, there are other smart technologies in the kitchen he knows are used.

"I like to use a lot of different layers of light," Brown said. "I light toe kicks and obvious design undercounter lighting for the counter. That's a no-brainer. You have your pendants and overhead lighting. But we have programmed different scenes for the kitchen. One family in particular entertains a lot, but they also use the island for kids’ homework. So, we created different scenes based on the function that the kitchen was being used for.

"If I’m standing at the stove, I could say, ‘Alexa, turn on the light on the stove’ or just say, ‘Alexa, set scene to cook mode’ and that scene will come on. If you want homework mode or what we call ‘family mode,’ then the pendant lamps are brighter so the kids can do their homework. In ‘entertaining mode,’ everything dims but the undercounter lighting is brighter than normal for extra prep."

Interior designer Traci Taylor of Arise Interiors recently installed Smart Glass in a client's living room and kitchen.

"The homeowners can instantly make the windows opaque, providing privacy without blocking the ambient light," she said.

With all these cool smart features embedded in the latest appliances, why aren't buyers making use of them, especially given how pricey they are? That Miele oven at Pirch? It tops out at more than $8,000. The Fisher & Paykel model in Brown's office sells for about $7,600 for one 24-inch column.

Some people like the idea of investing in all the latest and greatest features, but when it comes down to it, they default to what they’re used to. It may be generational: As people come of age who are more at ease not just with increasingly advanced kitchen technologies but with adapting to how they evolve and can change how they cook, they may be more open to actually using features that offer more convenience and automation.

But Brandon Ewers, a sales adviser at Pirch, said that it's all about education and the timing of the education.

"People get busy in life, they get these appliances installed and when they decide to use them, they don't know how," he said. "I like to tell clients that once we get it installed, they should play around with it because everything we showed them at the time they bought it, they’re not going to remember.

"So, play with it, watch some YouTube videos, and then come in for a demonstration — because at that point, they’ll have questions related to how they want to use it."

Golden is a San Diego freelance writer and blogger.