Pizza oven with conveyor

An apparatus for cooking foodstuff by conveying the foodstuff through a cooking chamber comprising:

• an autonomous oven comprising a bottom wall and top wall, two side walls, a front wall, and a rear wall defining a cooking chamber, the front wall having a front aperture and the rear wall having a rear aperture horizontally aligned with the front aperture, at least one heater disposed within the cooking chamber to heat a foodstuff in the cooking chamber;
• at least one autonomous conveyor fully operable independent of the oven and removably associated with the oven and comprising a continuous heat-resistant yieldable continuous belt-like carrier comprising a low profile configuration comprising an essentially horizontal upper flight, a front reverse curve at a front end, a lower flight and a rear reverse curve at a rear end, a drive mechanism for advancing the carrier around to convey foodstuff along the top flight, the conveyor being sized and shaped such that the elongated continuous loop can be inserted lengthwise into the oven section through the aligned front and rear apertures of the oven section as a unitary autonomous mechanism with the top and bottom flights extending through the cooking chamber and the front and rear ends extending in cantilevered fashion out from the front and rear wall apertures, respectively, the conveyor being removably carried within the oven such that the oven system and the conveyor system remain autonomous and functionally independent when separated.

A method comprising the steps of:

• providing a fully and independently operated and independently controlled oven for cooking foodstuff;
• providing a fully and an independently controlled conveyor for passing foodstuff to be cooked through the oven;
• physically combining the oven and conveyor without making either inoperable;
• causing the physically combined oven and the conveyor to separately operate concurrently to displace foodstuff along the conveyor and to cook the foodstuff while the foodstuff is displaced in the oven.

A method of making and using a conveyor oven from an autonomous, never disabled or disassembled conveyor and an autonomous, never disabled or disassembled oven, comprising the steps of:

• inserting the autonomous conveyor in a fully enabled condition through opposed apertures in the oven which is in a fully enabled condition;
• separately actuating the oven and conveyor so that each operates autonomously;
• placing foodstuff on the conveyor and displacing the foodstuff through the oven on the conveyor at a predetermined rate of displacement;
• cooking the foodstuff in the oven.

A method of making and using a conveyor oven comprising the steps of:

• providing an autonomous independently enabled conveyor;
• providing an autonomous independently enabled oven comprising an existing ingress and egress aperture;
• forming a second aperture in the oven at a location opposite the existing aperture;
• physically combining the oven and the conveyor without disabling either so that the conveyor extends through both apertures;
• separately actuating the oven and the conveyor;
• placing foodstuff on the conveyor for displacement through the oven;
• cooking the foodstuff as it is displaced on the conveyor through the oven.

A method for modifying a conventional toaster oven that comprises:

• a cooking chamber defined by top wall, two side walls, a front wall having an aperture for insertion of foodstuff into the cooking chamber, and rear wall, a heater disposed within the cooking chamber to heat a foodstuff in the cooking chamber, a removable platform for supporting the foodstuff, the method for modifying the oven comprising;
• removing the removable platform from the cooking chamber;
• physically cutting an aperture in the rear wall that is substantially aligned with the aperture in the front wall without disabling any of the elements of the oven that allow it to fully function as an oven or removing support structure for the removable platform;
• inserting an integral elongated endless conveyor system, comprising an endless conveyor and a drive, through the rear and front apertures such that both an upper and lower flight of the conveyor belt extends from the rear aperture, through the cooking chamber, and from the front aperture.