Expansible food container

Abstract

An expansible container is provided for use during the cooking of food in a radiant energy device such as a microwave oven, with the container being configured or otherwise designed to provide entertainment to onlookers as the container expands in size during the relative rapid cooking of food in the container and/or with the fully expanded container of cooked food providing an interesting article, character, figure or configuration that is of novel, interesting or entertaining appearance. The container is formed from relatively flexible materials that define a closed chamber which contains food to be cooked. In its deflated form, the container is collapsed to assume a relatively flat, thin configuration which, in most preferred practice, displays or is configured to provide an entertaining or amusing shape. The inflation of the container during cooking of its food contents in a device such as a microwave oven may be rendered even more entertaining by selecting the food contents to comprise a substance such as popcorn that generates various types of entertaining noises such as “popping” noises during the cooking process. Once inflated, the container retains its expanded or inflated form to provide a measure of lasting entertainment or amusement. If popping corn is the food being cooked, the cooking time typically requires about one to about six minutes.