1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a heating cooker which heats an object to be cooked with heating fluid, and a heating cooker tray which is placed in a heating chamber of the heating cooker to support the object to be cooked.
2. Description of the Related Art
One of the conventional heating cookers which heat objects to be cooked includes an upper heater provided on the ceiling of a heating chamber and a lower heater provided on the rear side of a bottom plate of the heating chamber, in which a food product is placed on a turntable provided on the bottom plate in the heating chamber so as to be cooked with the upper and lower heaters (see, e.g., JP H2-306030 A).
However in the conventional heating cooker, the lower heater is blocked from the food product by the turntable and bottom plate, so that heat is not conducted smoothly from the lower heater to the food product, thereby causing a problem of uneven heating of the food product between the upper side and the lower side.
As a solution to such a problem, there is conventionally a heating cooker for heating food products with steam, in which two steam outlets are respectively placed on each of the upper and lower sides of two side walls, which are opposite to each other in the heating chamber (see, e.g., JP 2003-302051 A). In this heating cooker, tall grill netting is placed on a turntable provided on the bottom plate in the heating chamber, and a food product is placed on this grill netting so that the food product is located between the upper outlet and the lower outlet in the vertical direction. The heating cooker aims at implementing even heating of the upper and the lower sides of the food product by sending steam to the upper side and the lower side of the food product from the upper outlet and the lower outlet. Moreover, when an object to be cooked is meat, the object to be cooked is placed on the grill netting so that meat juices and oil which ooze with heating are made to drop on the turntable to prevent the meat from being soaked with meat juices and oil.
However, the conventional heating cooker needs grill netting to ensure even heating from both upper and lower sides even in the case of cooking the objects to be cooked which are free from oozing of juices such as cookies and pizza. More specifically, the grill netting is placed on the turntable, onto which a square plate or the like is placed so that the objects to be cooked, such as cookies and pizza, are put in the square plate for cooking. Thus, there are many instruments to use, which causes a problem of too much time and effort in cooking. Moreover, the heating chamber needs to house grill netting and a square plate in addition to the turntable, which causes a problem of upsizing of the heating chamber. Further, it is necessary to clean the grill netting after cooking, which causes a problem of too much time and effort in maintenance. Moreover, when an object to be cooked is cooked through heating from only the upper side, the object to be cooked is directly placed on the turntable, so that grill netting becomes unnecessary and will be placed out of the heating cooker. Therefore, it becomes necessary to secure a space to place the grill netting out of the heating cooker, thereby causing a problem in which the grill netting placed out of the heating cooker becomes obstructive and gives an untidy impression.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds