Cooking robots have long been desired by the commercial market, while the technical challenge is still significant. A major difficulty comes from the demand of perceiving and handling liquid with different properties. This paper presents a robot system that mixes batter and makes pancakes out of it, where understanding and handling the viscous liquid is an essential component. The system integrates Haptic Sensing and control algorithms to autonomously stir flour and water to achieve the desired batter uniformity, estimate the batter's properties such as the water-flour ratio and liquid level, as well as perform precise manipulations to pour the batter into any specified shape. Experimental results show the system's capability to always produce batter of desired uniformity, estimate water-flour ratio and liquid level precisely, and accurately pour it into complex shapes. This research showcases the potential for robots to assist in kitchens and step towards commercial culinary automation.

翻译：商用市场长期以来一直期待烹饪机器人的出现，然而其技术挑战依然巨大。主要困难之一源于感知和处理具有不同特性的液体的需求。本文提出了一种机器人系统，该系统能够混合面糊并用其制作煎饼，其中理解并处理粘性液体是一个核心组成部分。该系统集成了触觉传感与控制算法，能够自主搅拌面粉和水以获得所需的面糊均匀度，估计面糊的特性（如水粉比和液位），并执行精确操作以将面糊倾倒成任何指定形状。实验结果表明，该系统始终能够产出具有所需均匀度的面糊，精确估计水粉比和液位，并准确将其倾倒成复杂形状。这项研究展示了机器人在厨房中提供辅助的潜力，并朝着商用烹饪自动化迈进了一步。