itscooked

Inspiration

We developed an app that monitors whether your meat is fully cooked, so you don’t have to stand by the grill constantly. It gives you the freedom to multitask in the kitchen without worrying about overcooking or burning your food.

What it does

The app monitors the internal temperature of your meat and sends a notification to your phone once it’s fully cooked. It supports four types of meat (beef, pork, chicken, fish) and works whether you're grilling or using a frying pan.

How we built it

The software takes user input that asks for the type of meat as well as the weight in ounces, then the physical component measures the surface temperature and sends the current surface temperature to the software through the backend. The software uses that data to estimate the internal temperature. Once the meat is fully cooked, the app displays a notification to inform you that your meat has finished cooking and is ready to eat.

Challenges we ran into

One of the biggest challenges was integrating the hardware and software components of our project. Specifically, sending data from the Arduino to the backend. We had to troubleshoot issues related to serial communication, data formatting, and ensuring that the backend could reliably receive and process the incoming sensor data in real-time. Bridging this gap required a lot of debugging, research, and careful coordination between both sides of the system.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We successfully developed a fully functional app on the software side, capable of real-time temperature monitoring and user notifications. On the hardware side, we engineered a reliable temperature sensing system that accurately estimates the internal temperature of meat using surface readings. Together, these components create a cooking assistant that enhances convenience.

What we learned

We explored new software and hardware tools that were completely unfamiliar to us. We gained an understanding of what a backend is, how it functions, and how to build one using Express. We also learned how to send and receive data using Postman. Additionally, we discovered how to create and showcase an app demo using Expo Go.

What's next for itscooked

Moving forward, we plan to enhance itscooked by implementing notifications that alert you when it’s time to flip your meat, helping ensure even cooking on both sides. We also aim to introduce customizable doneness settings, allowing users to select their preferred level of doneness (rare, medium, well-done).