Cooking Simulator Ensures You'll Never Waste Perfectly Good Steak Again

If you've ever been too scared to waste money on a prime piece of steak or fish for fear of ruining it with a too-hot pan or too much heat, here's a new cooking toy for you.

Researchers at the Tokyo Institute of Technology developed a cooking simulator that shows you how food moves and browns as you cook it. Including a force feedback frying pan, a digitual spatula, and some 3-D images of steak and onions, the simulator lets you feel the weight of the food as you "cook" it. You can see how long it takes to cook it medium, medium-rare, or rare (or well-done, if that's your thing), all without wasting some money on actual meat.

It does look like the meat is harder to flip in this digital pan, but hey, practice makes perfect, right? As the researchers say in the video, they're working to develop the machine so it tells you how cooked a steak is in five or 10 minutes, which may make cooking new foods less intimidating. "We believe this could actively support people while they are cooking," he says. We're hoping there are also cheering sound effects as you plate your meal.