Baking tongs

Baking tongs for holding a filling of dough which is baked in a baking oven space at a baking temperature to produce sheets of wafers, the baking tongs comprising:

• (a) a pair of baking plates each having a dough treating side, said baking plates cooperating with each other for movement between
• a clamped and filled condition in which said baking plates are heated and held together so that said dough treating sides are in generally face-to-face spaced relationship at a certain distance from each other so as to define a space therebetween, the filling of dough to be baked being disposed in said space between said dough treating sides;
• and
• an unclamped condition in which said baking plates have been moved apart for removal of baked wafer sheets and entry of new dough to be baked;
• said baking plates also being capable of assuming an unfilled, clamped condition in which said baking plates are generally in the same position as in said clamped and filled condition but are not acted upon by a filling of dough subject to the heat of the baking plates;
• (b) each dough treating side being defined by an edge which borders each such dough treating side, each dough treating side having a geometric center within the area bounded by said edge;
• (c) the distance between said dough treating sides of said pair of baking plates in said unfilled, clamped condition thereof being smaller at said centers of said baking plates than at at least certain portions of said edges, said distance between dough treating sides increasing in at least one direction from said centers to said edges;
• and
• (d) the distance between said dough treating sides at said centers, when said baking plates are in said clamped and filled condition and when they are at the baking temperature, being equal to or less than the same distance taken at at least certain portions of said edges.