Patent ID: 7325483

Claim:
An automated belt cooking machine for preparing batter based food products comprising: upper and lower overlapping, thermally conductive belts, said belts being counter-rotatably mounted to a frame for said machine so that, in use, a bottom run of said upper belt and a top run of said lower belt co-operate to convey batter based cooking materials to be cooked into said food products between said upper and lower belts, said lower belt extending a predetermined distance to one side of said upper belt so as to provide a dispensing platform portion of said top run of said lower belt for dispensing thereon said materials to be cooked, so that, in use, said materials are conveyed in a direction towards a mouth formed between said bottom run of the upper belt and said top run of the lower belt to receive said materials and thereafter are conveyed sandwiched between said bottom run and said top run to a downstream end of said lower belt, upper and lower heating platens mounted to said frame and in thermal contact with said bottom run of the upper belt and said top run of the lower belt, respectively, the lower heating platen extending to beneath and being in thermal contact with the dispensing platform portion of said top run of said lower belt, so that the batter based cooking materials dispensed on the dispensing platform portion are immediately exposed to heat from the lower heating platen of the top run, wherein the lower heating platen is convexly curved to provide a progressively decreasing gap between the bottom run of the upper belt and the top run of the lower belt from the mouth to a downstream end of the lower belt, wherein said materials to be cooked are initially exposed to heat from said lower platen conducted firstly through said dispensing platform portion of said top run and then continually through the remaining portion of said top run toward said mouth so as to cause said materials to gradually expand and allow the release of gases trapped in bubbles produced by heating said materials before said materials are sandwiched between said bottom run and said top run, and said materials to be cooked are then exposed to heat from said upper platen conducted through said bottom run as well as from said lower platen conducted through said top run for continuing to gradually expand said material and to apply outward pressure against the upper and lower platens and to increase the contact between the bottom run and the upper platen and between the top run and the lower platen as the materials are being conveyed through the progressively decreasing gap between the bottom and top runs, whereby heat transfer is increased to the said materials from the mouth to the downstream end of the lower belt so as to cook said batter based cooking materials.