C. Stephanidis and M. Antona (Eds.): UAHCI/HCII 2014, Part III, LNCS 8515, pp. 463–474, 2014. © Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2014 The FOOD Project: Interacting with Distributed Intelligence in the Kitchen Environment * Laura Burzagli 1 , Lorenzo Di Fonzo 1 , Pier Luigi Emiliani 1 , Laura Boffi 2 , Jakob Bak 2 , Caroline Arvidsson 2 , Dominic Kristaly 3 , Leonardo Arteconi 4 , Guido Matrella 5 , Ilaria De Munari 5 , and Paolo Ciampolini 5 1 CNR-IFAC, via Madonna del Piano, 10 50019 Sesto Fiorentino (FI), Italy 2 Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design, Toldbodgade 37b, 1253, Copenhagen, Denmark 3 Vision Systems SRL, Str. Aurel Vlaicu 61bis, 500188 Brasov, Romania 4 Indesit Company SpA, via Lamberto Corsi 55, 60044 Fabriano (AN), Italy 5 Università degli Studi di Parma, Parco Area delle Scienze 181/a, 43124 Parma, Italy {l.burzagli,l.difonzo,p.l.emiliani}@ifac.cnr.it, {l.boffi,j.bak,c.arvidsson}@ciid.dk, kdominic@vision-systems.ro, Leonardo.Arteconi@indesit.com, {guido.matrella,ilaria.demunari,paolo.ciampolini}@unipr.it Abstract. Kitchen activities involve complex and articulate interactions with heterogeneous technologies and devices. In this paper, outcomes of the FOOD AAL-JP project are presented, related to the development of a kitchen environ- ment implementing ambient-assisted-living features, aimed at increasing safety, autonomy, engagement and reward in dealing with food-related activities. Keywords: ambient assisted living, smart kitchen, user-centered design. 1 Introduction Many among daily living activities, are related to food: grocery shopping, food prepa- ration, cooking, eating and kitchen washing-up are indeed a relevant share of the daily tasks. Besides its obvious link with health, food is important as a mean for social engagement as well: from time immemorial, having food together is a way for keep- ing and strengthening good relationships with family, friends or in more formal contexts. Also, food is a prominent cultural media, it is strongly connected to local cultural heritage, and is currently gaining more and more popularity in TV shows, books and magazines. Food impacts on daily life, therefore, well beyond its mere sustenance aspects. Notably also, food activities are among most complex daily living activities, very often requiring to the user considerable knowledge and mastering of a number of techniques, tools, appliances. Moreover, kitchen work implies several safety concerns (related to fire, flood, sharp tools, food preservation…). The altogeth- er makes the management of kitchen activities a challenging and multi-faceted com- ponent of daily living, essential to support independent life and useful in fostering social participation. * On behalf of the FOOD AAL-JP consortium.