【Today's Menu】How to make a shopping list in the car using an AI voice recorder

Ideas for meals that come and go in the car heading to the supermarket. I thought it would be convenient if I could record this on a voice recorder and make a note, so I tried it out.

How can I efficiently create a shopping memo?

In the car heading to the supermarket, I face the problem of what to make today. Even though it's my usual routine, I still haven't decided on the menu, not even when leaving the house or bringing the shopping basket.

Meanwhile, ideas for the menu come to mind vaguely while driving and I realize that if I could efficiently jot these down, I could shop in the shortest route possible.

So, I bought an AI voice recorder called "Plaud NotePin S." It can be attached to the arm like a wristband and has the function to convert voice to text. This seems perfect. I found it interesting when I actually used it, so I'm reporting on it.

The spoken voice can be seen in the smartphone notes

The supermarket I commute to from home is about 20 minutes by car. This isn't a special shopping trip; it's the usual scene. I brought along my new companion, the AI voice recorder, for the first time.

I wear it on my arm like a wristband, and it records what I say with just one button press.

The feeling of wearing it first surprised me with its lightness. I can focus on driving to the point where I forget I’m wearing it.

Additionally, I was drawn to the idea that I could leave menu ideas that came to mind while driving simply by voice, and that later AI would transcribe them into text. However, I set off still somewhat skeptical about what exactly would change.

The several seconds waiting at a traffic light turned into time to take voice notes

as I set off with the Plaud NotePin S on my arm. I started muttering out loud the things I thought of while waiting at the signal. "Today, I want to eat something hearty rather than something light." "It would be easy if there were grilled meat."

The action of pressing the button is one-touch, and there is almost no time spent away from the steering wheel. Since there’s no need to take out my smartphone and type, both my gaze and hands remain focused on driving.

When I reviewed it on my smartphone app, seeing my thoughts transformed into text was surprisingly natural. The content I muttered in the car immediately became text, and when I saw the spoken words organized into sentences with punctuation, it was quite moving.

In the few seconds until the traffic light turned green, what used to be a time that produced nothing unexpectedly turned into a time to consider the menu.

Moreover, this is where it gets AI-like: when I tried asking, "Create a shopping list from what I muttered today," it responded.

The three lines "meat (cooked or for grilling)", "kimchi", and "ingredients for soup" came back just as a list. What I had been thinking about while driving was completed as a shopping memo. This was the biggest discovery of the day.

What I had been contemplating while driving naturally transitioned into action.

By the time I arrived at the supermarket, a general direction for the meal plan was already decided, and the shopping list was ready. On that day, I chose grilled chicken thighs with salt koji, two types of kimchi, and ingredients for soup. Usually, I would spend time going back and forth in front of the supermarket shelves, but with the shopping list, everything was decided smoothly. Just having a clear purpose made shopping efficient and felt different in a good way.

I packed the ingredients I bought at the supermarket into a cooler bag and loaded them into the car. Even while doing this series of tasks, I had a natural sense of organizing what to do next in my mind. What to put in the refrigerator first, what to cook first. The realization that what I had been thinking about while driving directly connected to my actions was an unexpected benefit.

At the dining table, I arranged the chicken thighs I bought along with rice, fish balls, and burdock root miso soup, and kimchi. When I paired the well-cooked skin of the chicken thighs with the sourness and spiciness of the kimchi, I found myself eating as I expected. Rather than worrying about forgetting something, it was a major discovery that since the meal plan was already decided while driving, everything went smoothly in preparation after returning home.

What changed when I tried using an AI voice recorder in the car?

The reason I chose the arm-mounted Plaud NotePin S in the first place was that I thought I could take notes even when my hands were occupied while driving. And after actually using it, it turned out to be not just a protective way to avoid forgetting things, but also that the time spent driving became a fun time to think about meal planning together.

Looking back, I think I had been feeling some pressure in the back of my mind every time I went shopping, thinking “I have to decide.”

It's natural and comfortable to decide on meals while talking to myself during drives. No special preparation is needed; you can start simply by sitting in the driver’s seat as usual, which makes it easy to use when doing a lot of shopping on weekends and also easy to continue as a habit.

The brief moments at traffic lights can serve as triggers to spend the weekend a bit more richly. This has made thinking in the car enjoyable.

Product Name: Plaud NotePin S
Price: 27,500 yen
Size: 51 × 21 × 11 mm
Weight: 16.6 g
Battery: 270mAh
File Transfer: BLE/Wi-Fi
Number of Microphones: MEMS × 2
Full Charge Time: 2 hours
Storage: 64GB
Optimal Recording Range: Up to 3m
●PLAUD

Interview and Text by SYURI

Search Plaud NotePin S on Amazon