Cooking robots reduce the workload for military cooks

The Ministry of National Defense, jointly with the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy on Monday unveiled “cooking robots,” which are being operated on a pilot basis at the Korea Army Training Center in Nonsan. Since November “of last year, these cooking robots installed in the kitchen of the 28th regiment of the Korea Army Training Center have been used for four tasks including frying, stir-frying and cooking soup and rice.

At the kitchen, 24 military cooks are responsible for making three meals every day for 3,000 people. As military cooks repeat high-intensity work, such as large-scale cooking every day, they are inevitably exposed to the risk of injuries including burns and musculoskeletal disorders. The cooking robots unveiled on Monday automatically mixed the ingredients military cooks put in a container, put them into oil, fried them for a set time, and then had them on a conveyor belt. They were sparing military cooks from the hassle of cooking in front of hot caldrons.

For stir-frying, robot arms are replacing the job of military cooks by stirring ingredients in a pan. Rice washing has been automated as well. The rice washed at high speed is put into a pot with automatically measured amount of water. The military said they are able to reduce the workload for military cooks and provide quality meals by making robots by replacing manual and repetitive labor with robots. Defense Minister Seo Wook and Trade Minister Moon Sung-wook visited the army training center and had meals made by cooking robots with military trainees.

The military plans to come up with ways to install robots in military kitchens based on the results of the pilot operation. “Since it is the first time using the cooking robots, there are some parts that are not fully optimized for the cooking site,” said a military official. “We plan to review ways to deploy cooking robots suitable for each cooking facilities.”


Sang-Ho Yun ysh1005@donga.com