Food or edible material: processes – compositions – and products – Processes – Including gas-liquid contact
Patent
1996-09-16
1998-12-29
Yeung, George
Food or edible material: processes, compositions, and products
Processes
Including gas-liquid contact
2611221, 426519, 426592, A23L 200, C12G 300
Patent
active
058537821
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to an arrangement for continuous addition of nitrogen gas to a beverage such as beer, mineral water or still drink and method for continuous addition of nitrogen gas to a beverage as beer in said arrangement.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
By addition of a certain amount of nitrogen to beer in connection with the production it is known that the beer foam that is formed by beer dispensed in connection with consumption will be more firm and stable. With the present technique this addition takes place by adding nitrogen gas to the beer in tanks or conduits by way of scattering means as for example sinter tubes. The amount of nitrogen gas which is dissolved in the beer is hard to control during such conditions and an uncontrolled foaming during the production may lead to a loss of foam forming proteins.
In some connections it is desirable to add nitrogen gas also to mineral water or still drinks since the nitrogen gas, which is set free in connection with pouring the beverage into glasses, forms smaller gas bubbles than the CO.sub.2, bubbles which means that the rising speed of the bubbles of nitrogen gas is slower. The sparkling character of the beverage will consequently remain during a longer time.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
According to the invention there is now proposed a solution to the problem of controlling the amount of nitrogen gas which is dissolved in a beverage of a kind mentioned above during continuous operation. The invention comprises an arrangement which is mainly characterized in that it comprises means arranged to increase the pressure in a flow of beverage to a desired high level, means to add a predetermined amount of nitrogen gas under pressure directly into the pressurized flow of beverage, at least one static mixer to mix gas and beverage and to disperse the nitrogen gas in the beverage, a holding cell in which the nitrogen gas is completely dissolved in the still pressurized beverage and means at the outlet of the holding cell, which means are arranged to lower the pressure to a suitable level for packaging of the beverage.
The pressure increasing means is suitably arranged to increase the pressure of the beverage to at least 10 bar. If the arrangement according to the invention is connected after a pasteurizing plant the pressure of the beverage at the outlet from this is 6-7 bar. If the beverage arrives from a storage tank the pressure is lower and the increase of pressure then takes place in two stages.
The pressure increasing means may with advantage consist of a centrifugal pump. The pump is frequency controlled if the flow of beverage is varying. Otherwise the pump works with a constant number of revolutions.
The static mixer is suitably provided with an inlet for nitrogen gas under pressure. The inlet consists in its simplest form of a thin tube which ends in the mixer. The advantage of adding the nitrogen gas to the mixer is that the flow in the same already is turbulent.
According to the invention the static mixer comprises at least four twisted mixing elements, at which the direction of flow is changed at least four times. The number of static mixers which are present in the arrangement depends on the flow, the temperature and the desired amount of dissolved nitrogen.
Suitably, the holding cell in the arrangement according to the invention comprises vertically arranged tube elements through which the pressurized beverage containing nitrogen gas is brought to flow alternating upwards and downwards. By arranging the holding cell in this way there is obtained a further mixing at each bend of the tubes, which makes it easier for the nitrogen gas to be completely dissolved in the beverage.
If such is desired, an apparatus which measures the content of nitrogen gas in the beverage is arranged at the inlet to the arrangement in front of the pressure increasing means. These measurements are conveyed to means which are arranged to adjust the amount of added nitrogen gas to the desired end content in the beverage. Such an arrange
REFERENCES:
patent: 3728129 (1973-04-01), Sargeant
patent: 4610888 (1986-09-01), Teng et al.
patent: 5049320 (1991-09-01), Wang et al.
Alfa Laval AB
Yeung George
LandOfFree
Arrangement and method for continuous addition of nitrogen gas t does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this patent.
If you have personal experience with Arrangement and method for continuous addition of nitrogen gas t, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Arrangement and method for continuous addition of nitrogen gas t will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFUS-PAI-O-1422170