Patent Application
20090250474
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to food serving devices. More particularly, it pertains to an individual food serving plate that is designed to be used by children to facilitate their independent use of utensils.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Many parents struggle to get their children to eat independently with utensils. Prior art exists that has special forms of dinnerware that seek to address this problem by either making the dinnerware entertaining or by offering features that interact with utensils. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,938,066 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,863,033 disclose food serving plates on which utensils can be mounted; the plates and utensils in these disclosures encourage children to eat by using decorations and/or entertaining toy figures that seek to make eating fun. U.S. Pat. No. 4,986,434 discloses a dish that contains a cavity that helps users load string-form pasta onto a utensil by spinning the utensil within the cavity. U.S. Pat. No. 5,638,981 discloses a plate with a hollowed out recess in the bottom that is located at or below the food-receiving surface of the plate and has a lip that overlaps and engages an edge of a utensil, such as a spoon, so that the utensil is retained within the recess and food can be smoothly slid from the plate onto the utensil.
The present invention offers a different solution to get children to eat independently with utensils than that presented by the prior art. The present invention offers features that appeal to children because the features are not only fun, but also because the features interact with utensils to assist children's efforts to load food onto utensils. Additionally, the geometry of the features in the present invention differs from the geometry of the features disclosed in the prior art.
Known prior art includes U.S. Pat. No. 4,863,033; U.S. Pat. No. 4,986,434; U.S. Pat. No. 5,172,826; U.S. Pat. No. 5,638,981; U.S. Pat. No. 5,938,066;
The general purpose of the present invention, which will be described subsequently in greater detail, is to provide a food serving plate with features that cooperatively interact with utensils to offer a young child fun assistance with their efforts to load food onto utensils.
The food serving plate may include a sloped ramp that leads to a nested depression that is elevated from the main surface of the plate. The nested depression is sized to snugly accept the leading perimeter of a utensil with a food-receiving bowl, such as a spoon. An individual using the plate can load food onto the bowl of the utensil using this feature. The individual would do so by holding the utensil with the bowl placed within the nested depression. With the utensil in place, the individual would use their other hand to manipulate the food up the ramp using a blunt utensil, such as a pusher, or other specifically configured implement. Upon reaching the top of the ramp, the individual would continue to manipulate the food over the nested depression with the blunt utensil. The food will fall from the elevated ramp onto the bowl of the utensil that is held within the nested depression. The individual may then lift the utensil to eat the food.
The food serving plate may include a slotted ramp. The slots in the ramp are designed to accept the tines of an eating utensil, such as a fork. The slotted ramp may lead to a vertical or sloped wall. An individual using the plate can load food onto the utensil using this feature. The individual would push food over to the slotted ramp with the utensil. The individual would align the tines of the utensil with the slots in the ramp and then push the food up the slotted ramp with the utensil. As the utensil progresses into the slotted ramp, the tines of the utensil first push the food up the ramp and then slide under the food once the food is sufficiently elevated on the ramp to clear the top of the tines of the utensil. A vertical or sloped wall may provide assistance as a backstop to prevent large food items from being pushed over the top of the ramp by the utensil. When the utensil is sufficiently positioned under the food, the individual can lift the fork upward to remove it from the slotted ramp and thereby load the food on the utensil.
The food serving plate may include both of the previously described features: a sloped ramp that leads to a nested depression that is elevated from the main surface of the plate; and a slotted ramp.
While other prior art discloses features that assist individuals with loading food onto utensils, none do so with the same elements as disclosed within the present invention. Prior art exists that discloses a hollowed out recess that accepts a spoon to facilitate the loading of food onto the spoon. The hollowed out recess in the prior art is positioned below the main eating surface of the plate and has an overlapping lip that will allow the utensil to be cantilevered and retained in the recess. The present invention differs from this and other prior art in several ways: the present invention uses a combination of a ramp and a nested depression to load food onto a spoon; the present invention uses a nested depression which snugly accepts the leading perimeter of the spoon, but does not snugly receive the bowl of the spoon; the present invention does not use an overlapping lip to engage, cantilever and retain the spoon within the nested depression; the present invention uses a nested depression that is below the top of the ramp, but not below the main eating surface of the plate. No other prior art exists that offers a slotted ramp to load food onto a fork.
The features of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description considered in connection with the accompanying drawing. It is to be understood, however, that the drawing is designed as an illustration only and not as a definition of the limits of the invention.
Referring to the drawings, there is shown in
The plate 1 also includes a ramp 6 that leads to a nested depression 7 that is sized to snugly accept the leading perimeter of a utensil with a food-receiving bowl 8, such as a spoon (shown in phantom). The ramp 6 may be bound on either side by a raised ridge 9 (as best shown in
It is possible to make the plate from any suitable material or combination of materials and it can be manufactured in many different sizes and in one or many colors.
Many changes and variations of the disclosed embodiments of the present invention may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the inventive concept. Such changes, modifications and rearrangements are deemed readily apparent and obvious to one skilled in the art and all equivalent relationships to those illustrated in the figures and described in the specification are intended to be encompassed by the present invention. The present invention is not intended to be limited otherwise than as required by the appended claims.
