JPH1163509A - Heating cooker - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To enable provision of a safety function which prevents the improper setting of cooking by a user or dangerous cooking by automatically preparing a cooking sequence for cooking before execution. SOLUTION: This cooker is constituted so that the heating, the thawing, the cooking method for and oven, a grill, etc., the time, the power, etc., can be set. Conditions such as the weight, shape, etc., of food 2 within a heating room 1 are detected, and based on them, a food identifier 15 specifies the kind of food, and a control circuit 10 automatically makes a cooking sequence, referring to the data of a data base part 15 such as the performance of the cooker, the specific heat, the thermal conductivity, etc., of food. Moreover, this compares the setting of the cooking method, etc., by a key operation part 11 with the cooking sequence being automatically prepared, and issues an alarm if it is improper setting. Furthermore, based on the cooking sequence, this expresses some examples as the recommendation examples of cooking method, etc., on a display 12, and urges user to change the setting.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a heating cooker such as a microwave oven and a microwave oven for heating, thawing, and oven-treating food, and more particularly to an automatic cooker which specifies food before cooking and automatically generates a cooking sequence. The present invention relates to a cooking device capable of cooking.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, heating cookers such as microwave ovens have many functions such as thawing by microwave heating and oven cooking by heater heating, and cooking methods have been diversified. There has been a demand for an automatic cooker that allows anyone to easily cook.

[0003] Therefore, various sensors, for example, 1) a humidity sensor for detecting the amount of water vapor emitted from a heated food, 2) a burn sensor for judging the color tone of the surface of the food, and 3) an infrared ray for detecting the temperature of the surface of the food. Sensor 4) Thermistor that detects temperature rise in atmosphere 5) Weight sensor that detects the weight of food with a strain gauge, etc. Automatically controls heating time, microwave intensity, etc. using a sensor that detects the degree of cooking completion, such as a sensor Cookers have been put to practical use.

The method of controlling by these sensors is as follows.
After cooking is progressed based on the cooking sequence such as heating time and heating intensity set by the user's key operation, etc., the degree of completion is detected, the next stop is modified, and the heating intensity is fine-tuned Things.

[0005] In this method, an automatic temperature stop is not performed by deciding a stop time suitable for each food, but an excessive temperature rise or over-burning is monitored and adjusted. A basic cooking sequence is set by a user. It is due to.

However, it is necessary to have experience to perform the setting by the user optimally for various foods. Even if the setting is not always optimal or there is a setting error, the food is cooked as it is. As a result, there were cases where the user could not be satisfied with the cooking.

[0007] To solve this problem, as a method of specifying the type of food and automatically generating a cooking sequence suitable for each food, an odor sensor as disclosed in JP-A-5-18539 has been proposed. The method used has been proposed.

[0008]

However, in this case as well, it is assumed that heating is performed until the smell peculiar to the food is generated, and when the food can be identified, the heating time and the like are corrected. Although it is possible, if the type of cooking (range function, oven function, etc.) was wrong, it could not be handled. Dangerous cooking, for example, eggs or chestnuts with membranes or shells, and if there are no cuts or cracks, the shells may rupture and cause burns or injuries. Even in such a case, since the food is not identified before heating, cooking is started without issuing a warning, and thus there is a problem that safety is not considered.

The present invention provides a heating cooker with a safety function that prevents a user from making inappropriate cooking settings and dangerous cooking by automatically creating a cooking sequence before cooking is performed. The purpose is to: It is another object of the present invention to automatically perform everything from the start to the end of cooking.

[0010]

In order to achieve the above object, a heating cooker according to the present invention includes a means for specifying a food in a refrigerator, a means for automatically generating a cooking sequence, and a reference for automatically generating a cooking sequence. It has a database unit in which the specific heat and the thermal conductivity of the food to be stored are stored.

According to this configuration, before executing the cooking, the food specifying means determines what the food in the refrigerator is. When the food is specified, specific heat and thermal conductivity data relating to the food is extracted from the database unit, and a cooking sequence including, for example, a heating time is generated based on the data. At this time, if cooking is set according to the generated cooking sequence, cooking is performed according to the cooking sequence.

In addition, in addition to the above, the present invention provides a means for comparing a cooking sequence set by a user with a cooking sequence automatically generated, and issues a warning in accordance with a result of the comparison.
Means for displaying a recommended example. According to this configuration, when the user executes the cooking sequence set according to the food, it is checked (compared) using the automatically generated cooking sequence whether or not there is an error in the cooking sequence. . Then, as a result of the comparison, if there is an inappropriate part in the user setting, a warning is issued or a recommended cooking sequence is displayed. In this case, the recommended cooking sequence is an automatically generated cooking sequence.

[0013] Further, according to the present invention, as means for specifying the food, means for utilizing image information of the shape and color of the food in a refrigerator using a camera, and a food by a container on which the food is placed are analogized. Means. According to this configuration, from the shape and the like of the container detected by the means for detecting the container on which the food is placed, the food that may use the container refers to the data on the relationship between the food and the tableware in the database. Is extracted. On the other hand, image data of foods having a strong correlation with the image data of the shape and color of the foods captured by the camera is searched from the database, and the most probable food is identified from these.

[0014]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an electric circuit of a microwave oven according to the present invention, which includes a heating chamber 1, food 2, a turntable 3, a magnetron 4, a transformer 5, a magnetron output control switch 6, a power supply unit 7, a weight sensor 8, and a weight detection. A circuit 9, a control circuit 10, a key operation unit 11, a display unit 12,
The camera includes a CCD camera unit 13, a heating room slit window 14, a food recognition specifying unit 15, and a database 16.

The key operation unit 11 has a "start key" 1
1a, a "warm" key 11b for "heating", and other keys for "thaw", "oven", "grill" and the like (not shown). By opening / closing the magnetron output control switch 6 under the control of the control circuit 10, the power from the power supply unit 7 is output / interrupted and converted into a high frequency using the transformer 5. When generated, the food 2 is heated by high frequency. The operation of each part of the microwave oven configured as described above will be described with reference to an example in which the food 2 is heated and cooked.

First, when the food 2 is placed on the turntable 3 in the heating chamber 1, the weight detection circuit 9 transmits the weight of the food 2 to the control circuit 10 by the weight sensor 8. At the same time, through the heating room slit window 14 that allows the heating room 1 to be viewed,
The shape, thickness, color tone, etc. of the food 2 and its container are captured by the CCD camera unit 13 and transmitted as an image to the food recognition and specification unit 15.

As means for capturing the shape of the food 2 and the like,
In addition to the CCD camera, a monochrome or color image pickup tube such as a MOS may be used. Shape data from an ultrasonic transducer or a shape sensor using infrared rays can also be used or used together. Desirably, by using a color camera, the color of the food 2 as well as the shape and color tone can be captured in detail, so that the accuracy of specifying the food can be increased.

The database unit 16 stores food image data in a database.
Then, the data in the database unit 16 having the strongest correlation with the image data of the food 2 sent is searched, and the food is specified.

Further, in order to further improve the specific accuracy, other means can be used together. For example, by storing the image data of the container on which the food is placed and the data of the food that is likely to use the container in the database unit 16, a means for estimating the food in the food recognition and specification unit 15 can be added. That is, the tableware data having the highest correlation with the image data of the received tableware is searched, and the relevant food is extracted.From both the extraction result and the search result based on the image data of the food, the most likely result is obtained. Food is selected. Alternatively, it is also possible to add a condition for determining whether or not the food is a frozen food by detecting the surface temperature of the food with an infrared sensor and transmitting the information to the food recognition and specification unit 15.

When the type or condition of the food is specified, the information is transmitted to the control circuit 10. In addition to the above, the data of the performance of the microwave oven and the specific heat and the thermal conductivity of the food as shown in FIG. 2 are stored in the database unit 16. The cooking amount is calculated by calculating the amount of heat required for heating the food in consideration of the value of the weight of the food from step 9. Database part 1
6 stores not only the specific heat and the thermal conductivity but also appropriate heating times and heating intensities that are empirically known for various foods, and generates a cooking sequence by selecting the data. You may.

In this case, since the cooking sequence differs depending on the amount of food, it is necessary to store the cooking sequence corresponding to various weights for various foods. is there. Therefore,
Only the representative weight is stored, and when there is no data, an error may occur with respect to the optimal value because an approximation value is selected or a proportional calculation is performed. This is a method of performing calculations each time from specific heat, heat conductivity, and the like, which can reduce the amount and generate a cooking sequence in detail for every weight. In the table shown in Fig. 2, the ingredients of the food are based on "Fourth Edition Food Composition Table / Women's Nutrition University Press" and the specific heat and thermal conductivity of food are based on "Science of Food Heating / Shoko Shibukawa, Asakura Shoten" It is.

On the other hand, the key operation section 11 allows the user to select and set the type of cooking, the heating time, and the like. The control circuit 10 compares the automatically generated cooking sequence with the cooking sequence set by the user, and determines whether or not the setting by the user is appropriate, thereby determining whether the setting is appropriate for the display unit 12 using a liquid crystal panel or a CRT. And a message that warns the user if inappropriate. other,
When the user's settings are inappropriate, a warning sound is emitted using a speaker or buzzer (not shown) for voice output, so that the user's attention can be drawn and a response can be urged.

The display unit 12 can also display an automatically generated cooking sequence and a recommended example. The recommended examples are not limited to one type, and when discriminated according to the user's preference, for example, the degree of baking or the degree of temperature of the beverage may be displayed as a plurality of examples. This allows the user to change the settings by making that selection, or
It is possible to determine whether to perform cooking as originally set, and to start cooking.

As described above, when the user setting is inappropriate,
Since the change can be prompted, cooking mistakes and dangerous cooking can be prevented. Further, when the setting is not made by the user, a recommended example is displayed on the display unit 12 without performing the above comparison, and the user can simply select the selected example to start cooking. . Further, by adding a setting mechanism that automatically starts cooking, when the cooking sequence is limited to one type, it is also possible to automatically perform the entire process from the start to the end of cooking.

[0025]

According to the first aspect of the present invention, data of specific heat and thermal conductivity relating to the specified food is taken out from the database by the means for specifying the food in the refrigerator, and the data of the food is obtained by performing the calculation. An optimum cooking sequence can always be automatically created regardless of weight, and comparison with a user-set cooking sequence and automatic cooking can be performed.

Further, according to the second aspect of the present invention, when a cooking sequence has been set in advance by the user, the result of comparing the cooking sequence set by the user with the automatically generated cooking sequence results in the cooking sequence set by the user. You can be alerted if something is wrong,
Dangerous cooking can be prevented beforehand.

According to the third aspect of the present invention, a cooking sequence suitable for the food specified by the means for specifying the food in the refrigerator is automatically generated, and the comparison with the cooking sequence set by the user is performed. This is performed, and a warning can be issued when there is an inappropriate setting in the user setting.

Further, according to the invention of claim 4, since the automatically generated cooking sequence is displayed, if the user setting is inappropriate, the user can reset the cooking sequence based on the displayed contents, and the appropriate cooking can be performed. You can select a sequence.

Further, according to the fifth aspect of the present invention, by detecting the shape and color of the food using a camera, it is possible to capture detailed image data, so that the type of food can be accurately determined before cooking. Can be specified.

Further, according to the invention of claim 6, by estimating the food from the information of the container on which the food is placed, it becomes possible to further improve the accuracy of specifying the type of the food.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block circuit diagram of a microwave oven according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example of the relationship between the type of food, specific heat, and thermal conductivity stored in a database unit.

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Heating room 2 Food 3 Turntable 4 Magnetron 5 Transformer 6 Magnetron output control switch 7 Power supply part 8 Weight sensor 9 Weight detection circuit 10 Control circuit 11 Key operation part (including 11a start key, 11b "warm" key) 12 Display part 13 CCD camera unit 14 Heating room slit window 15 Food recognition and identification unit 16 Database unit

Claims (6)

[Claims] 1. A means for specifying food in a refrigerator prior to cooking, a database storing the specific heat or heat conductivity of the food, and a data on the specific heat or heat conductivity of the specified food. Means for automatically generating a cooking sequence. 2. The apparatus further comprises means for setting a cooking sequence, means for comparing the set cooking sequence with an automatically generated cooking sequence, and means for issuing a warning in accordance with the comparison result. The cooking device according to claim 1, wherein 3. A means for setting a cooking sequence, a means for specifying foods in a refrigerator prior to cooking, a means for automatically generating a cooking sequence, and comparing a set cooking sequence with an automatically generated cooking sequence. And a means for issuing a warning according to the comparison result. 4. The cooking device according to claim 1, further comprising means for displaying an automatically generated cooking sequence. 5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the means for specifying the food detects information on the shape and color of the food in the refrigerator using a camera, and specifies the food using the information. The heating cooker as described. 6. The heating apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: means for detecting a vessel on which the food is placed and arranged in the storage; and means for inferring the food from the detection result. Cooking device.