The heating cooker includes a first heater disposed below a tray to heat the tray, and second heater disposed over the tray to heat the tray. In addition, the heating cooker includes a controller that controls output of the first heater and switches energization of second heater in accordance with a kind of object to be heated and a quantity of object to be heated. Furthermore, second heater includes two plane-shaped insulators and a plurality of planar heat generators that are sandwiched between insulators, and the controller heats regions that are disposed over and below the tray to be opposed to each other by controlling energization of the first heater and second heater. Furthermore, second heater has a distortion suppressor between the plurality of planar heat generators, and the distortion suppressor suppresses internal distortion of insulators caused by heating of the plurality of planar heat generators of second heater.

In a processing reactor having a microwave plasma source, the microwave radiator is mounted on a rotary microwave coupling for continuous rotation.

A microwave heating apparatus and method of heating. The microwave heating apparatus including: a housing that contains a heating chamber adapted to receive an article to be heated, the chamber being at least partially defined by electromagnetic shielding; a microwave source for generating microwaves, the microwave source being located outside of the heating chamber; and an antenna arranged substantially within the heating chamber and configured to supply the generated microwaves substantially within the heating chamber, the antenna being configured to directly deliver the generated microwaves to the article in a substantially uniform manner. The method of heat treating organic matter with a microwave heating apparatus including a microwave source located outside of a heating chamber, the method including: generating microwaves with the microwave source; supplying the generated microwaves within the heating chamber with an antenna arranged substantially within the heating chamber, wherein the antenna comprises a loop that extends about an internal circumference of the heating chamber; introducing the organic matter into the heating chamber and through the loop via an opening of the heating chamber; heating the organic matter with the generated microwaves; removing the organic matter from the heating chamber through a further opening of the heating chamber.

The invention relates to a system (100) for preparing at least one food product (1), comprising: a cooking chamber (10), in which at least one preparation area (5) is provided, wherein the at least one food product (1) can be positioned and prepared at the least one preparation area (5), at least one antenna arrangement (30) for supplying energy of electromagnetic energy (80) into the cooking chamber (10), whereby the at least one food product (1) can be heated, one transmission device (40) for operating the antenna arrangement (30), wherein at least one antenna (31) of the antenna arrangement (30) is oriented depending on the preparation area (5) and is operable according to at least one operation mode by the transmission device (40), so that a performance-optimized temperature zone distribution for heating the food product (1) can be generated.

In a processing reactor having a microwave plasma source, the microwave radiator is mounted on a rotary microwave waveguide coupling for continuous rotation, to form the reactor for processing a workpiece.

In a method for treating food in a food handling device with a parameter configuration a measured value distribution of a surface property of the food is determined after expiration of the period of time by means of a sensor. A pattern of change is calculated from a comparison of the p-th measured value distribution with a measured value distribution determined previously. An assessment value Bq which represents a difference between a deviation of a target distribution from the measured value distribution and a deviation of the target distribution from a prediction pattern is calculated for all patterns of change stored hitherto. The prediction pattern is formed by superimposing the measured value distribution with the respective pattern of change, and the parameter configuration is set for which the assessment value Bq meets at least one predetermined criterion.

The heating cooker includes: a heating compartment having a bottom tray mounted at the bottom part; a light source provided on the upper side of the heating compartment; a light-receiving element for receiving light transmitted by the bottom tray out of the light emitted from the light source, the light-receiving element being provided on the lower side of the bottom tray; and a determining part for determining, on the basis of a light-reception signal detected by the light-receiving element, the presence/absence or the size of a heating object placed on the bottom tray in the heating compartment. Thus, a heating cooker capable of preventing leakage of steam and detecting the presence/absence of food in the heating compartment, even when heat cooking using steam is performed, is provided.

A damper opening/closing mechanism includes: a damper which swings about a shaft to open and close a flow passage; an actuating lever which swings so as to swing the damper about the shaft; a reciprocating part which moves reciprocatively; and elastic members which are attached to the reciprocating part and positioned on forward-and-backward both sides in a swinging direction of the actuating lever and moreover which elastically bias the actuating lever along with reciprocative motions of the reciprocating part.

A cooking device includes a casing, a heating chamber (102) provided in the casing and having an opening on a front side thereof, and a heat shield member (122) for blocking heat that transfers from the heating chamber (102) toward the casing. At least a part of the heat shield member (122) is located in a position that enables the heat shield member (122) to receive water droplets dropping through between the heating chamber (102) and the casing (101). The configuration reduces the possibility that a motor (133) and other components located below the heating chamber (102) fails by becoming wet due to condensate water.

A microwave heating device includes: a heating chamber in which objects to be heated are placed; a microwave generator that generates microwaves; a microwave radiator that radiates the microwaves generated by the microwave generator into the heating chamber; and a divider that divides a space of the heating chamber into at least two divided chambers.