Changing form or shape

Taco shell forming and cooking apparatus comprising a cooking bath, a mesh conveyor belt for carrying a tortilla through the cooking bath, a plurality of wedge-shaped forming members disposed above the bath and guide means for causing the forming members to sequentially engage the conveyor belt and deform...     

Tortillas are placed on a flexible, pliable, perforated web made of woven metal. A plunger folds over the tortilla, folding the tortilla and the metal web, and the combination wherein the tortilla is fried crisp in the folded position, thus forming it into a taco shell. Thereafter the plunger with the...     

A toy potato chip maker for producing dry cooked potato chips which includes a cooking chamber with openings in opposite walls of the cooking chamber to provide a substantially horizontally alined passageway through the chamber. A continuous screen-type conveyor is mounted on a pair of rollers on either...     

The manufacture of animal feed using as a principal ingredient food waste, wherein the food waste is first ground to a fine particle size, cooked and dried, and then blended with certain additives to provide a complete animal feed.

An apparatus for preparing edible products having a cylindrical shell of coagulated egg-white enclosing a central core. The apparatus has a plurality of cylindrical moulds moving cyclically in a closed path including stations in which raw materials are supplied and stations in which the finished products...     

A high speed bun production system wherein a pan conveyor is arranged to convey empty pans in a substantially straight line to a bun moulder-panner unit in a direction toward the intermediate bun proofer and to an end of the bun moulder-panner unit remote from the intermediate proofer, whereby the amount...     

Wheat flour products are automatically manufactured with a compact rolling and shaping apparatus which comprises (a) vertically arranged rolling rollers having respective clearances slightly horizontally deviated or offset and having a slitter and cutter in the lower end part thereof, (b) a gelatinizing...     

There is disclosed a process for forming farinaceous dough ribbon of good quality and at a substantially constant rate. The ribbon is especially employed in processes involving further handling or treating of the dough as a ribbon of substantial length. Compositions comprising farinaceous solids and...     

A holder for forming and cooking a tortilla into a pie shell. The holder includes nestable apertured pans which are initially vertically separated to receive a tortilla to be cooked. The holder is then dipped into hot oil and the pans moved towards each other to form the pliable tortilla into a pie shell...     

A continuous cooking or sterilizing process employs apparatus wherein particulate foods are cooked under pressure in and by the cooking sauce with which the food is eventually packed in containers. The sauce is externally heated in a heat exchanger to the sterilizing temperature, and the food and sauce...     

An improved apparatus for preparing taco shells from uncooked tortillas comprising a vessel having shaped side walls for containing cooking oil, a conveyor assembly including a deformable endless wire mesh belt for moving the tortillas through the cooking oil and a plurality of mold members cooperatively...     

An apparatus for slicing and cooking potatoes in a chip form is disclosed herein having a cylindrical base with electrical heating elements in the sidewall thereof for holding a quantity of cooking oil. A removable basket is immersed in the cooking oil and is disposed directly beneath a potato slicing...     

A cooking machine for making hamburgers which includes a pair of aligned ovens and a conveyor adapted to travel separate spaced hamburger patties over the top of the oven, a dispenser is provided at one end of the conveyor run and intermediate the run, a mechanism is provided for rotating the hamburgers...     

A toasting apparatus includes a housing in which is mounted a heating platen having two opposed heating surfaces. Conveying means are positioned on each side of the heating platen with each conveying means being spaced from a respective heating surface defining respective paths for travel of a bun half....     

A drum of meat, consisting of an assembly of layers of meat chunks is rotated on a vertical spit, cooked by radiant heat supplied by a plurality of heating elements, and sliced by an automatically advancing paring apparatus. Certain of the heating elements are moved automatically toward the spit axis,...     

An apparatus for preparing a food product having at least a cooked batter outer shell and a filling material contained therein. The apparatus is comprised of an conventionally controlled, motor-driven, continuous conveyor belt mounted on a frame; an oil container and associated wick which oil the surface...     

A continuous rotary hamburger grill has means for forming unshaped balls or scoops or other quantums of ground meat into hamburger patties as it presses them into cooking relation with the rotating grill plate. The meat quantums deposited on the grill plate at a loading station are carried thereby beneath...     

A noodle making machine including a cylindrical dough magazine with a powered plunger therein and an apertured expressing die on the end of the dough magazine, wherein the expressing die can be removed from the end of the cylindrical magazine, the magazine removed from the remainder of the machine to...     

The present invention relates to the meat-packing industry. The production line of the present invention comprises, mounted in a closed loop in the direction of production flow, a sausage meat feeder, filling and batching means, block molds, heat and cold treatment chambers, means for discharging the...     

Method and apparatus is disclosed for processing food products such as potato chips and the like. A frying medium mist is contained in a vat in which the water vapor or steam being released from the product and the frying medium being generated rises upwardly through a pre-treatment chamber in which...     

An apparatus to make cookies which consists of a drum shaped device known as a die roll for shaping the cookies. The drum shaped die roll receives dough from a feed hopper and deposits the shaped dough on the surface of a transfer conveyor at a first location. The drum is provided with knurls on its...     

A food extruder wherein an extruder plate has perforations between its inside and outside surfaces and is sandwiched between a food chamber and a fluid housing is disclosed. Food enters the chamber and is passed through the perforations in the extruder plate. A rotary knife within the fluid housing cuts...     

A fortune cookie making machine includes a first rotatable assembly having a number of griddles in which the cookie blanks are passed through an oven where they are baked. Thereafter a transfer mechanism strips the cookie blanks one at a time from the griddles and deposits them in a second assembly for...     

Food products, for example, hamburger patties, are more rapidly cooked than with existing system and with reduced shrinkage. A cooking appliance is provided having a plurality of parallel spaced heat transfer fins. An array of projecting cooking grills on which the hamburger patty is impaled are thermally...     

A cooking utensil comprising a pan with a flat bottom and vertical side means formed integrally with said bottom, and an array of evenly spaced substantially uniform holes formed in a portion of said bottom to provide a food extrusion area, the remaining portion of said bottom providing a food holding...     

A deep frying basket has a pair of welded wire spring baskets which nest together to define a dish shaped space between them. A pair of more or less spaced parallel wires are welded to each of the wire spring baskets, one pair being welded to the inside bottom of the inner basket and the other pair to...     

A tortilla making apparatus having first and second cooking and compressing surfaces reciprocally mounted relative to each other and a feeding means reciprocally mounted with the first surface for feeding dough to be heated and compressed and for ejecting finished tortillas.

A compact tortilla press and oven unit. The press delivers formed tortillas to the oven wherein they are toasted on a plurality of rotating oven discs. The tortilla is initially received by a first oven disc upon which a first side of the tortilla is partially toasted. Upon completion of one revolution...     

A continuous meat processing line having a patty-forming machine at the inlet end, a cooking portion, a transfer section, a quick freeze section and a packing section at the outlet end. The cooking portion has a first cooking section adjacent to the patty-forming machine and a second cooking section...     

A taco boat fryer in which foldable product carrier sections are linked together and pushed sequentially through a vat containing hot cooking oil. Each product carrier has a pair of hinged plates that are pushed together as the carrier section enters the vat at one end and are pulled apart as the carrier...     

Method and apparatus for preparing a flat, formable product, such as a piece of milled corn-based product, having a soft, moist, and substantially fiberless consistency, with a corrugated shape. The apparatus comprises a pair of lower rollers, a pair of upper rollers and upper and lower forming elements...     

A deep frying basket has a pair of welded wire spring baskets which nest together to define a dish shaped space between them. A pair of more or less spaced parallel wires are welded to each of the wire spring baskets, one pair being welded to the inside bottom of the inner basket and the other pair to...     

Food products, for example, hamburger patties, are more rapidly cooked than with existing system and with reduced shrinkage. A cooking appliance is provided having a plurality of parallel spaced heat transfer fins. An array of projecting cooking grills on which the hamburger patty is impaled are thermally...     

In a continuous, ongoing, pressure-cooking operation bones are first ground into particles and then combined with liquid to form a slurry which is pumped into the lower end of an upright cooking tower. As the slurry is forced upwardly through the tower, it is subjected to pressure from the head of liquid...     

An apparatus for automatically making food products in piece form wherein dry ingredients are provided in a flexible sealable bag and placed in a dough preparation station of the apparatus. The necessary amount of liquid to form a dough-like substance is introduced into the ingredients and the dough...     

A process for preparing precooked lasagna in which the ingredients are mixed and then extruded to form at least two uncooked strips of pasta. After passing the strips through the cooker, they are deposited into a cooling tank where they are allowed to accumulate. A separator and guide means aligns the...     

A mixture of shredded potato, egg, flour, pepper, baking powder and onion are combined to form a potato pancake mixture. Discrete units of the mixture are deposited on a moving grill over a vat of cooking oil. At the discharge end of the vat of cooking oil the moving grill is raised vertically and then...     

Flexible sheets of foodstuffs, such as a tortilla, are prepared for cooking by automatically wrapping each tortilla around a perforated inner cooking cylinder and telescoping an outer cooking cylinder over the so-wrapped inner cylinder. The wrapping and telescoping operations are carried out with the...     

In a continuous, ongoing, pressure-cooking operation bones are first ground into particles and then combined with liquid to form a slurry which is pumped into the lower end of an upright cooking tower. As the slurry is forced upwardly through the tower, it is subjected to pressure from the head of liquid...     

The present invention provides an apparatus for manufacturing boiled noodles. The apparatus comprises substantially a raw noodle manufacturing unit, a boiling unit for boiling raw noodle elements fabricated by the raw noodle manufacturing unit and a control unit controlling operations of the raw noodle...     

In this cooking extruder the nozzle head (12) is disposed in a nozzle plate (10) and the passage (34) through which the material for the envelope body is supplied extends at an angle to the axis of a filling tube (42) through which the filling material is introduced into the extruded envelope body. When...     

A machine for making cookies for removably mounted cylinders that spread the dough on a conveyor belt and the dough is automatically formed into cookies. Mechanism for sprinkling material are positioned so that the particulate material falls on the surface where the dough is going to be deposited and...     

A rotatable platform rotatably mounted in a refrigerated compartment is adapted to support a plurality of chunks of meat thereon. An arm in the refrigerated compartment is in operative proximity with the platform and mounted to sweep chunks of meat off the platform. A meat grinder in the refrigerated...     

A tortilla maker includes a frame which comprises a base (10), and two vertical spine members (32,34) which are secured to the rear edge of the base (10) and extend upwardly therefrom. A lower tortilla-making element (42) is rotatably connected to the two spine members (32, 34). An intermediate tortilla-making...     

A synchronized press and method for forming bakery products. A press plate presses a portion of bakery product ingredients against a rotatable disc in a continuous motion. A conveyor belt deposits portions of the bakery product ingredients on the disc at timed intervals. A gearing mechanism synchronizes...     

Apparatus for centrifugally spreading a body of dough to form a generally circular soft pizza crust. The apparatus minimizes the likelihood that dough in the central portion of the crust will tear during centrifuging of the dough.

A potato chip manufacturing machine comprising a frame, an elongated oil cooking kettle mounted on the frame, and an oil circulation circuit connected to the oil for causing flow of cooking oil in a longitudinal direction through the cooking kettle. Flow retarding paddles are horizontally mounted in...     

In a machine for preparing precooked lasagna. A mixer for combining ingredients necessary for the preparation of pasta and an extruder for forming at least two uncooked stirps of pasta. After passing the strips through the cooker, they are deposited into a cooling tank where they are allowed to accumulate....     

A machine for manufacturing cooked foodstuffs such as crepes comprises an upwardly directed rotatable concave hot plate (31) which is slightly inclined. A radially disposed pouring tube (38) is arranged above the plate (31) and has holes (78) for dispensing pre-made food mixture onto the plate (31) in...     

A food product cooker having a main frame, a cooking oil pan, a plurality of product carriages, and a main drive endless chain for moving the carriages about the main frame to and from the cooking pan. A food product cooker particularly adapted for producing shells for enchiladas from tortillas, with...     

A controlling apparatus controls a series of processes such as a kneading process, a fermenting process, a breathing process and a baking process of material within a bread baking mold based on the temperature of the bread baking mold detected within the baking chamber. The controlling apparatus controls...     

An apparatus and process for producing cheese straws and the like is disclosed, the apparatus including a mixing and extruding device from which the mixed dough is forced through a die having a plurality of outlets. The dough is received on a conveyor where it is cut into segments and baked. The process...     

An apparatus for producing soybean flakes by cooking raw soybeans and squashing the cooked soybeans into flakes. Saturated steam from a boiler is passed through a superheater to form superheated steam and this superheated steam is led into a pressure cooker. The raw soybeans are cooked by superheated...     

A housing for receiving a working amount of dough, a shaft mounted on a central axis within the housing, a first wall, curved on a radius from the central axis and having a plurality of apertures formed through it. A feed cylinder mounted on the shaft, the cylinder having a surface eccentric about the...     

An extruder for food, having; a rotary cylinder fitted to a tip of an extrusion nozzle for extruding a food material; at least one feed opening formed in the outer periphery of the rotary cylinder, from which a different food material is fed; a stationary cylinder so fitted as to cover the feed opening...     

An automatic egg product cooking apparatus that fills three-piece molds with a uniform amount of egg material. The molds undergo slow, low temperature cooking and the cooked egg product is thereafter dumped and the mold cleaned. The apparatus and method is used to produce a cooked egg product having...     

An apparatus to facilitate producing scrambled eggs on a heated grill surface comprises a frame. At least one egg ring having a lower edge portion is adapted to be disposed in intimate contact with the grill surface for movement therealong and to define with the grill surface an enclosed region within...     

A tofu making apparatus according to the present invention is designed for small business or for domestic use. The tofu making apparatus can automatically and consecutively produce uniform tofu in a simplified manner since such important factors for successful tofu as the boiling time period and the...     

A doughball processing apparatus having cooperating press plates includes workpiece sensing means for determining the presence or absence of a workpiece on a conveyor belt for delivery to the processing position between the press plates. A control system is provided to manipulate the various components...     

This invention relates to apparatus and methods for producing formed articles such as tortillas. Embodiments include apparatus comprising a non-sticking, heat tolerant, endless conveyor belt moving at desired constant speeds to position tortilla dough balls between the heated platens of a tortilla press....     

Disclosed is a machine for moving bakery pans in a stepwise fashion to enable rows of cups in the pans to be filled with dough packets. The rows of cups are spaced apart a predetermined distance which will vary depending upon the type of bakery product being made. The pans are carried by a converter...     

Baked goods and in particular hard biscuits and crackers which are hollow and which are adapted to contain a filling are inverted subsequent to baking so that the biscuit or cracker can have a filling inserted therein from the side of the biscuit or cracker that had been contacting the bottom of the...     

A device for bending an elongated dough product includes a first endless conveyor for conveying the products along a conveyance path. The first conveyor includes a plurality of spaced apart passages. The device further includes a second endless conveyor which includes a plurality of spaced apart mandrels....     

A baking apparatus with a plurality of spaced-apart female molds, and a co-acting top tray provided with and equal plurality of hollow spikes adapted to extend downwardly into the female molds which produce an elongated cavity in a bread roll baked in the apparatus. The distance between the lower end...     

A baking apparatus includes cover molds and pan molds having recesses adapted to be engaged to define baking chamber as the cover and pan molds engage, a device for feeding dough into the recesses of the molds and a device for shaping the doughs in the recesses of the molds into desired shape. The engaged...     

A food product cooker having a main frame with a loading path and a discharge path, a cooking oil pan, a plurality of product carriages, and a main drive endless chain for moving the carriages about the main frame to and from the pan, with each of the carriages including a food product holder for holding...     

Disclosed is a machine for advancing bakery pans in a step wise fashion along a production line. A rotary indexer having three radially extending arms mounted on a common shaft and spaced apart 120.degree. relative to adjacent arms is used to advance the pans step-wise one cup at a time. Each arm has...     

Instant noodles which are formed in a block of a plurality of noodles having a plurality of indented portions in the longitudinal direction and separate at the indented portions into short noodles upon cooking in a cooking pot containing boiling water.

Disclosed is a machine for manufacturing bakery products wherein a main drive motors powers feeding means for advancing rows of individual dough packets step-wise along an assembly line to a Ferris-wheel type conveyor including rows of cups into which individual dough packets are deposited row by row....     

An apparatus is described for use in forming a flexible food item into a rigid bowl-shaped shell during submersive cooking which includes a support member and a basket with a base portion and a side wall portion. The apparatus further has structure for positioning the food item to be formed between the...     

An apparatus and method are provided for processing batter materials, such as food batter, including sausage batter for wieners and the like, without incorporating the use of any casing for the batter. An elongated ribbon or flow of proteinaceous batter material is extruded or otherwise formed and treated...     

This invention relates to a food production apparatus which is preferably used in the preparation of foods such as fried potatoes. In the invention, powder obtained by pulverizing and drying potatoes or the like is provided with water and stirred, and the resulting mixture is extruded to be formed into...     

An apparatus and system is disclosed for extruding commodities such as rice bran and which includes symmetrically disposed beater bar segments on the extruder rotor that will simultaneously impact symmetrically positioned knives mounted within the extruder housing. The apparatus preferably includes a...     

A food depositing apparatus for depositing hash brown potato strands includes a plurality of depositing assemblies. Each of the depositing assemblies includes a plurality of outlets. A pump member coupled to the inlets of the depositing assemblies provides pressure to force a potato slurry through the...     

A gas-fired, double-sided griddle apparatus for high-volume commercial cooking comprises double-sided griddles, each having a lower platen having a horizontal lower cooking surface and an upper platen having an upper cooking surface; a positioning mechanism for moving the upper platen of each griddle...     

A food fryer and processor for solid food, such as potatoes, and having a rotatable blade and a rotatable paddle for cutting the food product into segments and ejecting the segments into an adjacent perforated basket within a receptacle having hot oil therein for frying the food product. Several types...     

An apparatus for preparing, cooking, and dispensing a food product. A rehydration chamber in the apparatus combines a quantity of dehydrated food product and a quantity of heated rehydration liquid to produce a quantity of rehydrated food product that is sufficient to produce an individual portion of...     

A food extruder machine includes a molding barrel having several axial holes spaced in a circumferential direction for passing a major material and a core. A die head has a fine narrow die hole arranged opposite a cone part at an extreme end of the core via an annular clearance. A sub-material supplying...     

A gas-fired, double-sided griddle apparatus for high-volume commercial cooking comprises double-sided griddles, each having a lower platen having a horizontal lower cooking surface and an upper platen having an upper cooking surface; a positioning mechanism for moving the upper platen of each griddle...     

The present invention discloses and provides a dough preparation and dividing machine capable of receiving substantially spherical, filled encrusted dough balls and forming them, with a minimum of dough working, into flattened, "D"-shaped configurations to increase the output of a conventional encrusting...     

A high speed food processing device wherein the device has a continuous moving belt of non-stick material for carrying the food product, and an upper and lower heat platens capable of moving with the food product so that there is no interruption of the forward movement of the continuously moving belt...     

An apparatus for preparing food paste is provided. The apparatus includes a container for holding paste ingredients, a mixing and kneading assembly for preparing the food paste within the container, and an extrusion system for pressing the paste into a desired noodle shape. The mixing and kneading assembly...     

A rolling mill for use in a noodle making apparatus, of the type adapted for rolling a noodle sheet of a predetermined width, includes a plurality of rolling sections arranged in a set and each having pairs of upper and lower rolls. The set includes a pair of grooved rolls for pressingly forming a plurality...     

An automatic food processor for producing an aqueous extract of protein and oil containing seeds is disclosed. The processor includes a cooking facility as well as seed griding mill and a screened filter. In one embodiment the filter is a centrifuge screen. The processor allows airless griding of seeds,...     

A noodle machine has a housing with an upper opening, a receptacle deposited in the housing for receiving flour and water for making dough for noodles by stirring them by rotation of a stirring shaft positioned horizontally in the receptacle and rotated by a motor. A front cap with a center cylindrical...     

Mechanism (10) for removably securing a die (22) to the flange (18) of a discharge (14) of a cooker (12) is disclosed including first and second connector rings (30, 56). The first connector ring (30) is rotatably mounted to the flange (18) of the cooker (12) by its securement to C-shaped carrier members...     

Food contents are separated from ferrous metal cans for conversion into useful byproducts by lacerating the can bodies into strips of metal to expose their contents, advancing along a vibrating conveyor section through a liquid spray, followed by magnetic separation to remove the metal strips and separately...     

A manifold assembly for feeding dough through a plurality of dies simultaneously under substantially equal pressure, includes a longitudinally-extending manifold having an inlet end for receiving dough under pressure, an outlet end defining a plurality of extruder dies, and a top, a bottom and sides...     

An improved pasta maker (20) is provided having an upper mixing chamber (130), lower extrusion chamber (132), and a communicating passageway (157) therebetween. The mixing chamber (130) is an open top vessel, and the extrusion chamber (132) presents an outlet (148) adapted to receive a pasta forming...     

In a cracker production apparatus of the type comprising a heatable mould consisting of a stationary upper mould element, a movable ring mould and a reciprocating lower mould element or punch driven by a hydraulically actuated toggle-mechanism, the improvement wherein a twin-head mould arrangement for...     

An electric pancake maker having a liquid batter container that is thermally protected; a metering pump system arranged to dispense separate, equal portions of batter simultaneously onto a first cooking surface assembly including a plurality of concave cooking dishes; a heated smooth faced second cooking...     

A food processing system (20) includes a plurality of openable and closeable food product molds (32, 34) carried by a continuous serpentine conveyor (24) through a processing chamber (22) from a loading station (28) to an unloading station (30) and then returned by the conveyor from the unloading station...     

A rotary stamper disk includes a disk having a first side, a second side, a rotational axis and a circumferential exterior mounting surface. A first circular plate is positioned on the first side of the disk. The first circular plate has a radius greater than the disk, thereby defining a first mounting...     

In an automatic cooking apparatus, a wrapping paper supply device supplies a wrapping paper from a roll, and a wrapping paper folding device folds the wrapping paper along a center line thereof into a V-shape. A wrapping paper guide device guides and holds the wrapping paper folded into the V-shape,...     

The present invention relates to an adjustable hinge apparatus for use with a cooker having multiple stacked heating plates and a support pin extending across one side of the cooker to form a common pivot axis. The hinge apparatus includes an array of adjustable hinges formed to be positioned adjacent...     

A device for preparing puffed food products from cereals such as rice wherein the cereal is subjected to pressure and heat, the device comprising a mold having a cavity defined by a wall thereabouts, an interior surface extending about the cavity, a piston moveable into and out of the cavity, there being...     

A mechanism (10) is disclosed including a slide plate (32) having die openings (38) adapted to hold dies (42a, 42b) and slideably mounted between the axial downstream face of a barrel extension (20) and an annular pressure seal (56) and the axially upstream face of an annular pressure plate (48). The...     

A self contained frying machine having a storage area, a mixing chamber for receiving a pre-measured amount of dehydrated food product from the storage area and rehydrating and solidifying the same, a piston for compressing the rehydrated food product and forcing it through an orificed die plate where...     

A dough web feeding device is provided which includes a first conveyor, a drive means or motor for that conveyor, a reciprocating shuttle, and a separate drive means or servo motor for the reciprocating shuttle. The speed, amount of rotation, and acceleration/deceleration profile for the drive means...     

In the automatic cooking apparatus of the present invention, when a conveyor start signal is received from a master control section, a CPU uses a foodstuff detecting sensor to detect whether a predetermined amount of a foodstuff is stored in a storage and transfer device. If the detecting sensor detects...