Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Smart Home
  3. News

Find the perfect Valentine’s Day recipe with Food Network’s Date Your Dessert

Bruce Brown
By

Valentine’s Day is soon upon us. For those who plan ahead, the Food Network enlisted Amazon Alexa on Amazon Echo devices to help you find exactly the right dessert recipe to prepare and share with someone special.

The Food Network’s Date Your Dessert interactive game is quick, easy, and pays off every time in the form of a dessert recipe calculated to match your preferences. The gist of the game is you pick an ideal dessert based on clues about the dessert’s “personality.”

Recommended Videos

To get started, just say, “Alexa, ask Food Network to play Date Your Dessert.”

Alexa begins the game by introducing the three different sweets. For example, Contestant Number one, “Shows you a good time, but I’ve heard they’re a total heartbreaker.” You can ask for more clues or move on to receive clues about the next contestant. After you’ve heard about all three contestants, you are prompted to declare one of the contestants a match.

Related
Broken Heart Chocolate Cake Image used with permission by copyright holder

When you choose a contestant, Alexa tells you the recipe name, such as Broken Heart Chocolate Cake. Alexa offers to email you the recipe or lets you start over to choose another dessert. If you play the game on an Echo device with a screen, you can also view the ingredients, recipe directions, and a step-by-step cooking video for the dessert.

The emailed recipe comes complete with an ingredient shopping list. You can print the ingredients list as is, add the ingredients to a shopping list, or the skill will automatically add the ingredients to the online cart for the big chain grocery store closest to your location.

The Food Network, one of several Discovery brands, surveyed more than 2,000 adults in early February. One of their findings was that one in three of those surveyed who own a voice assistant use the assistant to find at least one recipe each week.

We spoke with Liesel Kipp, Senior Vice President of Product and Design at Discovery. According to Kipp, Discovery is enthusiastically adding apps for user engagement via voice assistants with the network’s brands including the Food Network. Viewers can connect with the Food Network on both Amazon Echo and Google Assistant with multiple apps for each.

For example, while Date Your Dessert is available for Amazon Echo devices only, you can command Google or Alexa to ask Food Network any of the following:

  • …to spin the flavor wheel.”
  • … for chicken Parmigiana recipes.”
  • …for vegan mushroom recipes.”
  • …What are some French toast recipes for brunch?”
  • …for butternut squash lasagna recipe by Giada.”
  • … for grilling recipes for lunch by Bobby?”
  • …to give me recent recipes from The Pioneer Woman.”
  • …to give me popular recipes from Alton Brown.”

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Bruce Brown
Bruce Brown
Contributing Editor
Digital Trends Contributing Editor Bruce Brown is a member of the Smart Homes and Commerce teams. Bruce uses smart devices…
How to control your holiday lights with Alexa
Christmas tree with presents.

You can make your holiday lights a little easier to manage by tying them to an Alexa voice command, which allows you to turn the lights on whenever you want with a quick phrase. It’s a great little trick for the modern home, and it's easy to set up too. Here’s everything you need to do.

Note: We’re assuming you have a speaker with Alexa built in, such as any of the Amazon Echo speakers, the Ecobee SmartThermostat, and other related devices. Otherwise, this won’t work.
Step 1: Find an Alexa-compatible smart plug

Read more
What the lights on your Amazon Echo device mean
best cyber monday echo deals get a dot for just 22 and show 5 50 1

Have you ever walked into your room to find your Amazon Echo device flashing yellow? What about during a big thunderstorm, when your whole house loses power -- when the electricity restores, a blue light starts pulsing on your Echo. One thing we love about Amazon Echo gear is that, in addition to Alexa, your smart speaker employs a coded language of pulsing and solid colors to communicate device status and other pertinent notifications. What those colors and lights mean, though, isn't obvious at first.

We've put together a helpful guide to help you understand what each of the colored lights means. If you ever forget what a certain color represents and your device is lit up, you can say, "Alexa, what does your light mean," and she will explain what her current status light represents.
Blue
Powering up and command responses

Read more
How to use your Alexa device as an intercom
An Amazon Echo in living room.

Are you tired of having to yell upstairs to summon your spouse from their study? Fortunately, for those of us with more than one Alexa-powered smart speaker, you can use the Alexa app and voice commands to intercom with the different devices throughout your home. It's all through a useful Alexa feature called Drop In, and it's pretty simple to use. We've assembled this guide to teach you how to use Drop In with your Alexa gear, as well as how to make announcements to all of your devices at once.
What is Drop In?
The Drop In feature (available in the Alexa app and through Alexa voice commands) is a communication tool that functions like a two-way radio. When you "drop in" on a compatible Alexa device, such as an Amazon Echo speaker or Echo Show, the caller will be able to hear and speak through the Echo device they've pinged. If it's an Echo Show you're pinging, you'll be able to see through the device as well.

Likewise, the receiver of the Drop In will be able to respond to the caller, as well as hear the audio from the caller's room. If it's two Echo Shows that are sharing the Drop In, the receiver will be able to see the caller, too.

Read more