A cooking system in the form of a fryer is provided to reduce and/or optimize the amount of cooking medium required to operate the fryer, while improving the reliability of movement of food product through the cooking system during a cooking process. To this end, the cooking vat of the system is designed with one or more heating elements positioned to avoid generation of turbulent flow in the cooking medium. Moreover, the movement of food product along the cooking vat and/or out of the cooking vat is done reliably and in such a manner to avoid turbulent flow in the cooking medium. The automatic cooking system provides improved cooking medium life span as well as reduced overall oil volume use.