Food or edible material: processes – compositions – and products – Measuring – testing – or controlling by inanimate means
Reexamination Certificate
2001-04-06
2002-09-10
Yeung, George C. (Department: 1761)
Food or edible material: processes, compositions, and products
Measuring, testing, or controlling by inanimate means
C099S325000, C099S468000, C099S470000, C426S510000, C426S511000, C426S524000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06447827
ABSTRACT:
The present invention generally relates to the technical field of processing a food product in particular fish in a food processing unit defining an interior space having an ambient temperature and a relative humidity controllable by the food processing unit.
The state of the art food processing of a food product generally comprises a thawing step in which the food products in particular fish are submerged into pool of salt water being recirculated so as to provide a good temperature transfer between the fish and the salt water. This operation is continued until the fish temperature reaches approximately 0° C. Next, the fish are removed from the salt water pool during a staging step and exposed to the ambient temperature initially in the range from 10° C. to 18° C. and slowly increasing to approximately 60° C. Next, the fish are pre-cooked during a pre-cooking step in which the fish are exposed to an ambient temperature of approximately 100° C. until the fish temperature reaches approximately 65° C. Next the fish are spray cooled during a spray cooling step in which the ambient temperature is reduced from approximately 100° C. to approximately 20° C. by spraying the fish with cooling water until the fish reaches a temperature of approximately 50° C. Finally, the fish are chilled during a chill conditioning step during which the ambient temperature remains in the temperature range 20° C. to 30° C. until the fish reaches the ambient temperature.
In the state of the art food processing techniques the entire process lasts for approximately eighteen to nineteen hours from frozen food product to treatable cooked food product. Thus the time needed for processing the food products is very long and expensive, since the product flow is determined entirely on the basis of the process. Further the food product quality during the processing is generally not continuously monitored, potentially causing non-suitable food products to complete the entire process and unnecessarily contributing to the energy consumption.
Hence the state of the art food processing techniques are accomplished without specific considerations regarding processing efficiency and quality for any particular food products. These considerations include energy consumption of the processes, food processing quality defining timing and duration of operations and food processing repeatability.
An object of the present invention is to provide an environment for thawing, cooking and cooling of a food product or food products in particular fish, which environment avoids any oxidation of the surface of the food products during the thawing, cooking and cooling.
A further object is to establish environment enabling an improved energy transfer between the food products and the environment while limiting dehydration of the food products.
An additional object is to provide a reduction of the food processing time employed in state of the art food processing methods and apparatus thus achieving a reduction of the processing time and saving working hours associated with the processing.
A particular advantage of the present invention is utilisation of heat energy by conservation or reuse of established temperatures and relative humidities during the thawing, cooking and cooling of food products.
A particular feature of the present invention is that thawing, cooking and cooling may all be implemented in one processing chamber by continuously changing the internal environment of the processing chamber or in a series of processing chambers interconnected via ports and transporting the food products from one processing chamber performing one operation to a next processing chamber performing a second operation.
Above mentioned object, advantage and feature together with numerous other objects, advantages and features which will become evident from below detailed description of a preferred embodiment of the present invention is according to a first aspect of the present invention obtained by a method of processing a food product in particular fish in a food processing unit defining an interior space having an ambient temperature and a relative humidity controllable by said food processing unit and comprising following steps:
(a) thawing of said food product during a thawing period by inserting said food product in said interior space of said food processing unit and ejecting steam and water into said interior space while continuously re-circulating air within said interior space so as to increase said ambient temperature to a first temperature and said relative humidity to a pre-set relative humidity value,
(b) cooking of said food product in said interior space of said food processing unit during a cooking period by firstly discontinuing ejecting water into said interior space while continuing ejecting steam into said interior space so as to increase said ambient temperature from said first temperature to a second temperature, and secondly as said ambient temperature reaches said second temperature recirculating air within said interior space to maintain said ambient temperature at said second temperature,
(c) cooling of said food product in said interior space of said food processing unit during a cooling period by discontinuing ejecting steam into said interior space while ejecting water into said interior space and continuously re-circulating exterior air within said interior space communicated from outside of said interior space so as to decrease said ambient temperature to a third temperature, and
(d) calibrating said food processing unit by determining duration of said thawing period, duration of said cooking period and duration of said cooling period by utilising temperature sensitive means measuring a core temperature of said food product and establishing said duration of said thawing period, duration of said cooking period and said duration of cooling period according to said core temperature of said food product so as to terminate said thawing when said core temperature reaches a predetermined first core temperature, terminate said cooking when said core temperature reaches a predetermined second core temperature and terminate said cooling when said core temperature reaches a predetermined third core temperature,
so as to establish an interior environment in said interior space enabling energy transfer between said food product and said interior environment while limiting dehydration of said food product.
According to the realisation of the first aspect of the present invention the method provides thawing, cooking and cooling of a food product while continuously monitoring the conditions of the interior space of the food processing unit. Thus providing a very accurately controlled environment in the interior space optimised for the food product to be processed. Further the method according to the first aspect of the present invention ensures that energy consumption caused by heating the interior space is kept to a minimum by utilising the conditions of a previous process environment to establish a following process environment in the interior space. Thus thawing, cooking and cooling is performed as a continuous sequence so as to achieve low energy consumption of said food processing unit.
The food product may according to the first aspect of the present invention comprise a plurality of diary products, vegetable products, fruit products. poultry products, meat products, fish products or any combinations thereof. Any product may be processed utilising the food processing unit to provide the best possible processing of that particular food product. The first aspect of the present invention may be configured to provide processing in accordance to any particular food product and will enable a user to easily conform to any desired processing.
In accordance with above described feature the first aspect of the present invention provides for the interior space of the food processing unit to define a single compartment for receiving the food product and for sequentially performing the thawing, the cooking and the cooling of the food product,
Cabinplant International A/S
Klein Howard J.
Yeung George C.
LandOfFree
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