It is well known that hamburgers obtained from a fast food or quick serve outlet can be difficult to eat in a tidy manner.

Frequently hamburger fillings can fall out from between the buns of the burger, even when held with two hands. Most notably, burger fillings are forced out of the rear of the burger as a bite is taken from the front.

The problem is most noticeable with respect to large burgers that are piled high'with a number of fillings. Fillings (including sauce) can end up on the customer's hands, food tray or lap. Likewise, when the customer takes a break from eating, the burger can fall apart when temporarily placed on the tray or plate. Reconstruction of the burger may be difficult in order to resume eating.

Eating a hamburger in a moving vehicle is an even more difficult undertaking. It is common for a driver to end up with a substantial amount of the filling in his/her lap.

Not surprisingly, when a driver approaches a drive-thru'fast food outlet, the consideration of how messy the food is to eat my affect the purchase decision. This is important as statistics suggest that a significant proportion of purchases are made by drive-thru. In one particular fast food outlet, drive-thru may account for over half of total sales.

SUMMARY OF INVENTION It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a foodstuff package that facilitates the consumption of, for example, a hamburger, particularly at least reducing the amount of filling falling out of the foodstuff during eating.

In one broad aspect of the invention there is provided a foodstuff package including a wrapper element to (in use) at least partially surround a peripheral side edge of an assembled item of foodstuff.

Preferably, the wrapper will enclose the entire foodstuff item and include a perforation to allow removal of part of said wrapper and access to the foodstuff item therein.

It will be appreciated that packaging of the type described herein could be used with a variety of foods, more particularly takeaway or convenience foods, e. g. hamburgers, kebabs and sandwiches.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS The foodstuff package according to the present invention will be further described with reference to the accompanying drawings, wherein:- Figures 1 and 2 illustrate a plan and underneath view respectively of a hamburger package according to the present invention, Figure 3 is a plan view of a blank hamburger package wrapper according to the present invention,

Figures 4,5 and 6 illustrate a process of partially removing the hamburger package from a hamburger according to the present invention, Figures 7 and 8 are a general overview and underview respectively of a hamburger and package, ready for eating according to the present invention, and Figures 9 and 10 illustrate a second embodiment of the package in the form of a bag.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION The term hamburger'referred to herein encapsulates all similar foods of a sandwich nature such as chicken burgers and vegetarian burgers etc. Hamburger'is simply used as a convenient descriptive term.

Figures 1 and 2 illustrate a hamburger, constructed in the normal way, duly wrapped in a hamburger package wrap around or wrapper 10 as illustrated by Figure 3. The wrapper 10 is preferably produced from a waxed or otherwise grease resistant paper.

Dimensionally wrapper 10 is preferably the same as any normal wrapper. However, it includes a straight perforation 11 that extends across wrapper 10 (lengthways of the rectangle illustrated by Figure 2) to divide said wrapper 10 into two parts, A and B (both rectangular). In the illustrated embodiment part B is larger than part A, though this is not essential. The perforation can also go substantially through the centre, thus, resulting in part A and B being of substantially equal size.

It will be appreciated that the shape and position of perforation 11 can be varied. The preferred embodiment illustrates a straight perforation 11 offset from the lengthwise centre of wrapper 10, however, curved or diagonal perforations may be found to have advantages if, for example, the shape of the contents demands such variation.

As illustrated by Figure 3, the peripheral edges of wrapper 10 are denoted 12,13 (long parallel edges of rectangle) and 14, 15 (short parallel edges of rectangle). The final positions of edges 12 to 15 can be seen on the assembled hamburger package of Figures 1 and 2., As mentioned above, the art of wrapping a hamburger in a rectangular paper to appear as illustrated in Figures 1 and 2 is known.

Once wrapped, with perforation 11 substantially in the orientation illustrated, the hamburger is ready for sale, usually temporarily stored in a warming tray.

When the hamburger is sold the process of unwrapping for consumption can begin. The method of unwrapping is best illustrated by Figures 4,5 and 6.

Perforation 11 can be broken where it meets edge 14 to tear away part B of the wrapper. Figure 4 illustrates the initial removal of part B by first unfolding one end/edge 12 of the wrapper 16 as shown. This is followed by pulling along perforation 11 to separate it from part A. Part B continues to be removed by peeling in a clockwise direction (Figure 5) until it completely exposes the hamburger H within (Figure 6).

The direction in which the peeling takes place will, of course, depend on how the burger is wrapped.

Figures 7 and 8 illustrate the burger contained by part A, ready to eat. So long as a flap 16 formed by folded edge 13 is held on the underside of the hamburger H, part A can securely contain a burger for eating.

The primary advantage is that filling within burger H is prevented from being forced out of the back when eaten from the front. In the illustrated embodiment, part A encloses less than half of the burger H allowing maximum eating opportunity before the remains of the burger must be removed from part A. However, to make wrapping and removal of part B easier to understand by the restaurant staff and consumer, the perforation could be central along the wrapper so that either half of the wrapper could be unwound for presentation of the foodstuff.

The hamburger package 10 is a simple but useful improvement to known paper wrappers. It is envisaged that a level of customer education would be necessary in order to promote proper use of the wrapper, however, the invention requires no additional training to use because the blank wrapper of Figure 3 is the same shape as a normal wrapper and the foodstuff is wrapped in the known manner.

An alternative to using a wrapper 10 as illustrated by Figures 1 to 8, is the use of a paper bag. Figures 9 and 10 illustrate such an embodiment.

Bag 16 is separated by perforation 11 into two sections A and B as previously. Section B is removed for eating hamburger H as illustrated by Figure 10.

Bag 16 may include further straight (or possibly spiral) perforation (not illustrated) from its opening 17 that leads down to perforation 11 in order to improve removal of Section B.

Perforated bag 16 enables consumers to eat hamburger H from the bag without filling being lost, comparable to the use of wrapper 10.