Patent ID: RE39828

Claim:
A process for continuously cooking foodstuff while being able to provide excellent control of the properties of the cooked foodstuff, said process comprising the step of: placing a foodstuff to be cooked on an upper surface of a perforate, moving belt; heating at least one surface of the foodstuff to be cooked with a color development and sealing flame; aiming said color development and sealing flame so that the heat therefrom passes into the entrance of an elongated cooking chamber surrounding said moving belt, said cooking chamber having a product feed and a product discharge; passing said foodstuff to be cooked through a plurality of cooking phase assemblies for introducing hot air to produce cooking vapors and moving the cooking vapors concurrently along said elongated cooking chamber and said cooking vapors increasing in velocity along said cooking chamber as the foodstuff to be cooked moves from the product feed to the product discharge , the cooking phase assemblies being in communication with a heat source, the heat source being remote from the color development and sealing flame and the elongated oven ; venting said cooking vapors from said cooking chamber near the product discharge; and removing the resulting cooked product from the moving belt.