Friday, September 18, 2009
QPID Software Is Now Open Source!
I've had several requests for the QPID source code and finally had some time to clean things up a bit and set up a code repository. So in case you're curious how QPID works or could borrow a code snippet for your own Arduino project, you can now access the source code on GitHub. Note that this repository only contains the QPID-specific code; the WiServer code is hosted separately in the Async Labs repo.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Time To Kick Things Up A Notch
Other than the lack of a real enclosure, I'm pretty satisfied with QPID at this point. It does everything I originally wanted it do, and it makes hours and hours of smoking at a precise temperature an easy, hassle free activity. Perhaps it's time to take things to a whole new level...
One of the longest-running debates in the history of food is the correct smoker temperature to use. Some people go with 225 for ribs, others say 250, while some think 200 is best. I think it's time for a little science and technology to turn this debate on its head.
I came across this very interesting (and very technical) article about sous vide cooking, which is French for 'in a vacuum'. The food is sealed in plastic in a vacuum and then slowly cooked in a water bath at a low temperature for a long period of time (sound familiar?). The article does a great job of explaining how heat affects the meat and why holding a lower temperature results in a more tender meat. The key to the whole process is keeping the temperature of the food within a precise temperature range... something that QPID could potentially do!
Sous vide employs water baths to heat the food; the higher specific heat of water allows for rapid heating of the food, and the food temperature will then mirror that of the water bath so maintaining the temperature is quite easy. I'm not about to dunk ribs in a vat of hot water, but I think the way in which the water heats the food can be approximated with some clever software.
Instead of setting the temperature of the smoker, QPID could be configured to quickly reach and hold a specific meat temperature. So perhaps the smoker would start out at 225 initially, but would then scale back to a lower temperature to keep the meat at just the right point. The hardware is already there to do this, all that's required is a little programming.
One of the longest-running debates in the history of food is the correct smoker temperature to use. Some people go with 225 for ribs, others say 250, while some think 200 is best. I think it's time for a little science and technology to turn this debate on its head.
I came across this very interesting (and very technical) article about sous vide cooking, which is French for 'in a vacuum'. The food is sealed in plastic in a vacuum and then slowly cooked in a water bath at a low temperature for a long period of time (sound familiar?). The article does a great job of explaining how heat affects the meat and why holding a lower temperature results in a more tender meat. The key to the whole process is keeping the temperature of the food within a precise temperature range... something that QPID could potentially do!
Sous vide employs water baths to heat the food; the higher specific heat of water allows for rapid heating of the food, and the food temperature will then mirror that of the water bath so maintaining the temperature is quite easy. I'm not about to dunk ribs in a vat of hot water, but I think the way in which the water heats the food can be approximated with some clever software.
Instead of setting the temperature of the smoker, QPID could be configured to quickly reach and hold a specific meat temperature. So perhaps the smoker would start out at 225 initially, but would then scale back to a lower temperature to keep the meat at just the right point. The hardware is already there to do this, all that's required is a little programming.
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