Food or edible material: processes – compositions – and products – Direct application of electrical or wave energy to food... – Including step of shaping in mold to form final desired...
Reexamination Certificate
2000-10-31
2001-11-27
Bhat, Nina (Department: 1761)
Food or edible material: processes, compositions, and products
Direct application of electrical or wave energy to food...
Including step of shaping in mold to form final desired...
C426S238000, C426S243000, C426S513000, C426S517000, C099S451000, C099S362000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06322832
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a manufacturing process. The invention also relates to an associated apparatus. The process and apparatus may be used exemplarily in the manufacture of elongate, axially symmetric products. In the food industry, the method and apparatus are useful in the manufacture of meat products such as frankfurters, hot dogs, sausages or wursts or in the production of baked goods such as cakes and breadsticks. The process and method may also be used for forming elongate structural members such as solid or hollow rods or beams.
Frankfurters, hot dogs and other sausages are conventionally made by first comminuting meat along with spices, emulsifiers, flavors, preservatives and other additives to form an emulsion which may be a smooth flowable paste or may contain chunks of meat, cheese, vegetable matter or other ingredients. This emulsion is then stuffed into casings which may be edible or inedible. The encased emulsion is conveyed through a cooking system which ordinarily slowly raises the temperature of the emulsion, often in several steps, in order to cook the emulsion. The heating is usually done by hot air, both dry and moist, to a final temperature of approximately 162° F.
Most households in the U.S. today prefer frankfurters to be skinless, that is, without a casing which must be removed before frankfurter consumption. In the preparation of skinless sausages, the processor must remove the skin before final packaging in vacuum-sealed plastic bags. This process involves the physical stripping of the casing by hand or machine and discarding the used plastic wrap.
A significant problem with the conventional procedure is the cost and handling of the inedible casings. A manufacturer may pay several millions of dollars per stuffer line for the casings and then pay to dispose of them. This adds a significant cost to the manufacturing process. One facility has estimated a $5 million dollar per year revenue increase if this cost could be eliminated. And this estimate does not take the front office, purchasing and machinery capital costs into account.
Simply eliminating the casing step is not considered possible because the hot dog must be formed and held together before and during the cooking step. Otherwise, the emulsion will not hold its shape and the product will be ruined. Whatever method is devised must lend itself to high speed production techniques and not alter the taste and look of the product as well.
Although the concept of creating frankfurters or wursts without a casing has been well documented in prior art patents, most of these techniques have centered upon using standard heating platens or molds to create a skin on the product before final processing. These techniques have not been met with widespread acceptance since conductive or convective heat energy is expensive. When a platen is heated, much heat is lost to the surrounding environment or through conduction to the rest of the metallic apparatus. In addition, creating a skin by such methods is time consuming, thereby reducing the production throughput or requiring significant investment in capital equipment to keep output rates high.
OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION
A general object of the present invention is to provide a new manufacturing process.
A further, related object of the present invention is to provide a new process useful in the manufacture of elongate products having an axis of symmetry.
It is another object of this invention to provide a novel method of manufacturing at least a portion of a processed food product.
It is a more specific object of this invention to provide a novel method of producing skinless sausages without the need for inedible disposable casings, thereby significantly reducing the cost of manufacture.
It is a further object of this invention to provide an apparatus for producing skinless sausages without the need for inedible disposable casings, thereby significantly reducing the cost of manufacture.
These and other objects of the present invention will be apparent from the drawings and descriptions herein. It is to be noted that any one embodiment of the invention may meet one or more of the above-listed objects. No embodiment need meet every object of the invention.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is generally directed to a manufacturing method capable of producing a range of items made of a cured or hardened flowable material. The flowable material is held in a predetermined configuration by a deformable support member. The support member is at least partially transparent to energy which is applied externally to the deformed support member to at least partially harden or cure the flowable material so that it retains the predetermined configuration upon reconfiguring of the deformable support to release the hardened or cured material.
The present invention is particularly useful in the production of skinless sausages without the need for inedible disposable casings, thereby significantly reducing the cost of manufacture. This can increase the profits for the manufacturer and reduce the cost for the consumer.
The method of the invention, however, is also useful for manufacturing other kinds of foodstuffs such as cakes or breadsticks and for manufacturing non-comestibles such elongate structural members.
A manufacturing method comprises, in accordance with the present invention, placing a fluidic or flowable material on a support member and deforming the support member so that the support member at least partially surrounds the deposited material, to thereby hold the deposited material in a predetermined configuration. Energy is then applied to the deposited material through or via the deformed support member for a predetermined period. By virtue of the application of energy, the deposited material is hardened in the predetermined configuration. After the application of the energy to the deposited material, the support member is reformed to release the hardened material. The hardened material substantially retains the predetermined configuration.
It is contemplated that the support returns to a base or starting configuration after the energy application and material hardening process, thereby enabling use of the support in a subsequent operating cycle. The hardened material is removed from the support to enable placement of a new amount of fluidic or flowable material on the support.
In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the support member is a conveyor belt which is moved about an endless track or path to implement a continuous, as opposed to a batch type, food preparation process. The deforming of the support member includes deforming the conveyor belt during moving of the conveyor belt about the endless track or path. Preferably, the conveyor belt is curled about an axis extending parallel to the track or path of the belt.
It is contemplated that the conveyor belt is transported, with the fluidic material thereon, into a tubular member prior to the application of energy. Then the deforming of the conveyor belt takes place during the transporting of the conveyor belt into the tubular member. To facilitate the curling of the belt, an upstream or infeed side of the tubular member may be provided with an infeed structure for curling the belt in a camming type operation. The infeed structure has a cross-section which varies from planar or nearly planar at an input end to a cylindrical or nearly cylindrical configuration at an output end.
In carrying out the method of the present invention, the energy is applied through the tubular member and the curled conveyor belt. These components are therefore at least partially transparent or conductive of the energy used. Preferably, the energy is a waveform energy such as dielectric radiation. Dielectric radiation may be specifically microwave radiation or high-frequency radio-wave radiation. Where the flowable material is comestible, the energy applied serves to at least partially cook the material.
In accordance with another feature of the present invention, the fluidic material is pl
Bhat Nina
Coleman Henry D.
Misonix Incorporated
Sapone William J.
Sudol R. Neil
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