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US 9,375,021 B2Granted
Combination oven with reduced smoke flavor transfer
AssigneeAlto-Shaam, Inc.
InventorsJ.K. Raghavan, Janus Bartelick, Joshua Paul Wittig
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A combination oven for cooking with heat and steam provides a boiler system for creating steam and includes a smoker appliance for generating smoke flavor during the cooking process. An oven controller detecting the use of the smoke appliance institutes a flushing and filling of the boiler after such use to reduce the transfer of smoke flavors to food that is subsequently cooked in the oven.
Claims10
A combination oven comprising:
- an insulated housing including a door closing to define an interior cooking cavity and opening to provide access to the cooking cavity;
- a cooking cavity having a first heater communicating with the cooking cavity to heat the cooking cavity;
- a boiler chamber defining a volume for holding water and providing a port communicating between the volume and the cooking cavity:
- a boiler heater positioned to heat water in the volume of the boiler chamber;
- an electronically actuable pump to provide a cleaning solution into the cooking cavity during a cleaning cycle;
- an electronically actuable water valve communicating between a water source and the boiler chamber to provide water thereto;
- an electronically actuable drain valve communicating between the boiler chamber and a drain;
- a smoker appliance having a second heater electronically controllable to introduce a vaporizable smoke material into the cooking cavity only upon activating the second heater wherein the second heater is a resistance clement for heating contents of the smoker appliance with electrical current;
- and
- an electronic computer communicating with the water valve, drain valve, and smoker appliance and executing a program stored in memory to:
- activate the smoker appliance during a cooking cycle by activating the second heater and setting a flag, and
- check the flag to determine whether the smoker appliance has been activated during a given cooking cycle to control the water valve and drain valve so that
- when a cleaning cycle is activated after the a given cooking cycle and before a next cooking cycle immediately following the given cooking cycle and when the flag indicates that the smoker appliance was activated in the given cooking cycle, activate the water valve and drain valve to flush and refill the boiler chamber.
10 more elements
A method for operating a combination oven of a type having:
- an insulated housing including a door closing to define an interior cooking cavity and opening to provide access to the cooking cavity;
- a cooking cavity having a first heater communicating with the cooking cavity to heat the cooking cavity;
- a boiler chamber defining a volume for holding water and providing a port communicating between the volume and the cooking cavity;
- a boiler heater positioned to heat water in the volume of the boiler chamber;
- an electronically actuable pump to provide a cleaning solution into the cooking cavity during a cleaning cycle;
- an electronically actuable water valve communicating between a water source and the boiler chamber to provide water thereto:
- an electronically actuable drain valve communicating between the boiler chamber and a drain;
- a smoker appliance having a second heater electronically controllable to introduce a vaporizable smoke material into the cooking cavity only activating the second heater wherein the second heater is a resistance element for heating contents of the smoker appliance with electrical current;
- and
- an electronic computer communicating with the water valve, drain valve, and smoker appliance, the method comprising the steps of executing a stored program on the electronic computer to:
- (a) activate the smoker appliance during a cooking cycle by activating the second heater and setting flag;
- and
- (b) check the flag to determine whether the smoker appliance has been activated during a given cooking cycle to control the water valve and drain valve so that when a cleaning cycle is activated after the given cooking cycle and before a next cooking cycle immediately following the given cooking cycle and when the flag indicates that the smoker appliance was activated, in the given cooking cycle, activate the water valve and drain valve to flush and refill the boiler chamber.
10 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.