Abstract:
Disclosed herein is a splatter shield. The splatter shield includes an upper shield, a lower shield disposed underneath the upper shield, and an opening in the upper shield. The lower shield is inverted from the upper shield.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0001]    Cooking foods in a frying pan on a range top oven is very common. The flying pan is typically a shallow pan that is used to fry, saute or sear foods. The range tops typically consist of a plurality of burners which are typically fueled by electricity or natural gas. The user cooks the food by activating the burners after placing the food in the frying pan and the frying pan onto the burner. A problem arises when some common food items, such as oil, butter or grease, become hot and splatter out of the frying pan and consequently create a mess on the range top which is difficult to clean. The simple solution may initially appear to be to place a lid on the frying pan, but two desirable traits of a frying pan make a lid undesirable; 1) a lid does not allow air into the food which a lot of foods need for proper cooking and 2) a lid does not allow the user to easily stir the food as is often desirable when cooking. 
         [0002]    Conventional frying pans lack a convenient method of containing the splatter and preventing the range top becoming a mess. Some splatter containment devices have been invented in the past but they are either very cumbersome, do not clean easily, do not store easily (when not in use), do not easily fit on various sizes of pans or do not allow the user to stir the food without removing the splatter shield. 
         [0003]    Accordingly, there is a need for a splatter shield that contains the grease, allows the user to easily stir the food, is easy to clean, stores conveniently and can be fitted easily to different size frying pans. 
       BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
       [0004]    Disclosed herein is a splatter shield that sits on a frying pan as the frying pan is used to cook foods. The splatter shield consists of two bowl-like members which are temporarily affixed to each other in an inverted manner. The upper shield and lower shield have a scallop cut out of each one in the front of the shield to allow the user to stir foods as they are cooking foods in the frying pan. The lower shield is shorter than the upper shield and the lower shield sits on the top edge of the frying pan. The upper and lower shields are typically formed of a metal material to be able to withstand the heat. 
         [0005]    The two bowl-like shields are easily detachable from each other such that the lower shield can be flipped and nested into the upper shield for ease of storage. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0006]    Referring to the drawings wherein like elements are numbered alike in the several Figures: 
           [0007]      FIG. 1  depicts an ISO view of the splatter shield sitting on a frying pan; 
           [0008]      FIG. 2  depicts an ISO view of the upper bowl-like member of the splatter shield; 
           [0009]      FIG. 3  depicts an ISO view of the lower bowl-like member of the splatter shield; 
           [0010]      FIG. 4  depicts an ISO view of the lower bowl-like member flipped and stored within the upper bowl-like member; and 
           [0011]      FIG. 5  depicts the splatter shield of  FIG.1  sitting on a smaller frying pan. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
       [0012]      FIG. 1  illustrates an ISO view of the splatter shield  10 . The upper shield  20  sits on top of the inverted lower shield  30  which sits on the top edge  45  of a frying pan  40 . A large opening  25  appears at the front of the upper shield  20  and a large opening  35  appears at the front of the lower shield  30  so that the user can easily stir the food without disturbing the splatter shield  10 . The lower shield  30  is inverted to allow the splatter shield  10  to rest on the frying pan  40  without falling into the frying pan  40  or off of the frying pan  40 . 
         [0013]    Another advantage of having the lower shield  30  inverted is that it easily allows the same splatter shield  10  to sit in and therefore be utilized with different size pans. This can be seen in  FIG. 5  wherein the same splatter shield  10  of  FIG. 1  now sits on a smaller frying pan  40 . Another aspect best seen in  FIG. 1  is that the lower shield  30  is shorter (in vertical height off of the frying pan  40 ) than the upper shield  20  to allow the user easy access to stir the food in the frying pan  40 . 
         [0014]    Now referring to  FIG. 2 , the upper shield  20  is shown separately and inverted (for ease of description). The upper shield  20  resembles the shape of a mixing bowl with a large opening  25  positioned in the front of the upper shield  20 . This large opening  25  allows the user to stir the food without disturbing the splatter shield  10 . The upper shield  20  is made of a high temperature capable material—typically a metal material such as steel, copper, stainless steel or aluminum. Stainless steel and aluminum are desirable for their non-corrosive benefits. Copper is desirable for its appealing aesthetics. Furthermore it is desirable to make the upper shield  20  and the lower shield  30  out of thin sheet metal to one prevent the splatter shield  10  from absorbing a large quantity of heat and thereby effecting the cooking (and cooking time) of the food. A splatter shield  10  formed of thin sheet metal is also inexpensive to produce and will have minimal mass. The inside of the upper shield  20  and/or lower shield  30  may be coated with a non-stick material to ease cleaning of the splatter shield  10 . 
         [0015]    Now referring to  FIG. 3 , the lower shield  30  is shown separately. Similar to the upper shield  20 , the lower shield  30  resembles a shape of a mixing bowl with a large opening  35  positioned in the front of the lower shield  30 . This large opening  35  also enables the user to stir the food without disturbing the splatter shield  10 . The lower shield  30  is also made of a high temperature capable material—typically a metal material such as, but not limited to, steel, stainless steel or aluminum. The inside of the lower shield may also be coated with a non-stick material to ease cleaning of the splatter shield  10 . 
         [0016]    Referring back to  FIG. 1 , the upper shield  20  is shown together with the lower shield  30  to form the splatter shield  10 . The upper shield  20  and lower shield  30  may be permanently affixed together by rivets, screws, welds or any other attaching methods. However, more desirably, the upper shield  20  and lower shield  30  may be temporary affixed together by a variety of means, such as a snapfit design, a press-fit design or simply a gravity design. For a gravity design, the weight of the upper shield  20  sets the upper shield  20  onto the lower shield and some form of locating device prevents the upper shield from sliding off the lower shield  30 . One method to form this location is shown in  FIG. 5 . A pin  100  is press fit into the lower shield  30  and a hole  110  in the upper shield  20  mates to the pin  100  such that the upper shield  20  is prevented from sliding off the lower shield  30 . For simplicity, only two pins are shown but in reality, more pins would be distributed around the circumference of the shields  20  and  30 . Another method (not shown) of locating the two shields  20  and  30  involves the same hole  110  in the upper shield  20  but in replace of the press fit pin  100 , the lower shield  30  would include a raised portion that is bent upwards to mate with the hole  100  of the upper shield  20 . Even another method (not shown) would be to curl the outer lip  130  of the lower shield  30  upward such that the outer lip  120  of the upper shield  20  would sit inside the outer lip  130 . The snap fit designs could be very similar to the locate designs of the gravity design except the pin  100  and the hole  110  would be similar size or the outer lip  130  and the outer lip  120  would be similar size to create a snap fit design. For the case wherein the two shields  20  and  30  are temporarily affixed, the two shields  20  and  30  may be disconnected and easily cleaned and stored. 
         [0017]    Referring to  FIG. 4 , the lower shield  30  is shown flipped and stored neatly inside of the upper shield  30 . This storage configuration will allow the splatter shield  10  to be conveniently stored in a typical kitchen without using too much space. Also, since the upper shield  20  and the lower shield  30  have a bowl-like shape, the two shields  20  and  30  may easily be stored in a stack of mixing bowls, which are already taking up space in the kitchen cupboard. In this case, the splatter shield  10  almost takes up no space in the kitchen cupboards. 
         [0018]    Referring now to  FIG. 5 , the same splatter shield shown in  FIG. 1  is now sitting on a smaller frying pan  41 . This frying pan  41  has an upper edge  46  which is much smaller than the upper edge  45  of frying pan  40  shown in  FIG. 1 . However, due to the curved surface  50  of the lower shield  30 , the splatter shield  10  sits on top of frying pan  46  just as easily and just as safely as the splatter shield  10  sat on frying pan  40 , even though the upper edge  46  of frying pan  41  is much smaller than the upper edge  45  of flying pan  40 . This flexibility allows the splatter shield  10  to be easily utilized (without any modifications) for different size (or even different brands) frying pans such as  40  and  41 . 
         [0019]    The scope of this description has centered around the term frying pan but the splatter shield  10  can also easily be mated to a sauce pan, dutch oven or any other type of cooking vessel. 
         [0020]    While the invention has been described with reference to an exemplary embodiment or embodiments, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes may be made and equivalents may be substituted for elements thereof without departing from the scope of the invention. In addition, many modifications may be made to adapt a particular situation or material to the teachings of the invention without departing from the essential scope thereof. Therefore, it is intended that the invention not be limited to the particular embodiment disclosed as the best mode contemplated for carrying out this invention, but that the invention will include all embodiments falling within the scope of the claims.