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After a brief presentation of the general scenario to which the note is connected, the equations involved in some processes related to gastronomy and cuisine activity are derived, only by resorting to dimensional analysis. It is shown how the meat cooking time, or that one for spaghetti preparation can be quantitatively calculated on the basis of the heat conduction or thermal diffusion equations. The processes involved in baking of a good pizza (particularly in a wood oven!) or brewing a good coffee are addressed on the basis of scientific approaches.

We start this concise review from the exciting history of thermoelectricity in which such names as Luigi Galvani, Alessandro Volta, Thomas Seebeck, Walter Nernst, William Tompson, Georg Wilhelm Hegel and many others have been involved. We then move on to the main concepts in description of thermoelectric phenomena, discuss how to increase their magnitude and efficiency, formulate the requirements for modern thermoelectric materials and present thermoelectric applications that are already available.