NYT Cooking adds an AI assistant for recipe changes, with mixed results

In short: NYT Cooking has added a built-in AI assistant that can help tweak recipes, but a reviewer found it is useful for simple swaps and less reliable for baking.

What happened

NYT Cooking, the New York Times recipe app, now includes an AI assistant inside the app. AI, short for artificial intelligence, is software that can respond to questions in a chat style, like a very fast helper that has read a lot of text.

In a review for The Verge, Jennifer Pattison Tuohy tested the tool while cooking on busy weeknights. She used it for common tasks like swapping ingredients and changing recipe sizes. The review says the assistant helped save a weeknight chicken dinner.

But the review also warns that the tool can give advice that may cause problems, especially when baking. Tuohy wrote that the assistant “almost ruined” a cake while she dealt with a missing Bundt pan, which is a ring-shaped cake pan. Baking is less forgiving than cooking, since small changes can throw off the results (like changing a formula instead of just seasoning to taste).

The Verge notes that the AI assistant is available to NYT Cooking subscribers and launched on iOS first. Some users and recipe purists have been skeptical, partly because NYT Cooking is valued for recipes tested by real people and for its reader comments.

Why it matters

Many people already use recipe apps to answer quick questions in the kitchen. An AI helper can make that faster, but this review is a reminder that you still need to double-check its suggestions, especially for baking where mistakes can waste time and ingredients.

Source: The Verge AI