Developer cooks up a Raspberry Pie in his Raspberry Pi Microwave

What else can you do with Raspberry Pi, you asked? Well, for starters, make a Raspberry Pi–controlled microwave and then make yourself a Raspberry Pie to celebrate.

Nathan Broadbent whips up a Raspberry Pie in the Raspberry Pi Microwave he created. (Image via Nathan Broadbent)

Nathan Broadbent, a web developer from Auckland, New Zealand, likes to undertake fun open-source web application projects in his spare time.

Broadbent decided to re-design your ordinary microwave using his Arduino Nano and plugging it into a Raspberry Pi GPIO adapter.

What does a Raspberry Pi Microwave have that my microwave doesn’t?

First, Broadbent changed the microwave’s touchpad, including only the buttons he deemed necessary and set it up to be controlled via voice command (shout orders such as “Microwave, 25 seconds on defrost” as Broadbent does in his demo video below).

Since he couldn’t find an online microwave cooking database, he created one and then enabled a bar code scanner on the microwave that can look up cooking instructions on that database.

 
Broadbent created his own cooking database that works with his barcode scanner. (Image via Nathan Broadbent)

The Raspberry Pi Microwave can be controlled from your phone or iPad as Broadbent demonstrates, and will even send tweets when it’s done cooking your meal.

Raspberry Pi Microwave demonstration

Check out all of the functions of this Raspberry Pi Microwave in action. In his video, Broadbent scans a recipe on his microwave’s bar code scanner, but it doesn’t recognize the recipe. So what does he do? He simply updated the cooking instructions on the webpage, so the microwave knows exactly what to do. During the cooking process, the microwave will stop and tell Broadbent that it’s time to stir the food, as per the instructions provided on the web page.

Raspberry Pi next to a Raspberry Pie. (Image via Nathan Broadbent)

Lastly, watch as the Raspberry Pi Microwave whips up a Raspberry Pie (ironically). Broadbent provides a recipe on his blog.

Video via Nathan Broadbent, YouTube

For more details about making a Raspberry Pi microwave, check out Broadbent’s blog where he explains the engineering behind powering the Raspberry Pi with the microwave’s power source, re-designing the touchpad, and creating his original cooking database.

Finished product: Raspberry Pie. (Image via Nathan Broadbent)

Bon Appetit!