Food or edible material: processes – compositions – and products – Processes – Separating a starting material into plural different...
Patent
1998-05-22
2000-03-14
Simone, Timothy F.
Food or edible material: processes, compositions, and products
Processes
Separating a starting material into plural different...
99542, 99544, 99635, 99638, 99642, 99643, 426481, 426518, A23N 300, A23N 312, A23N 1500, A23N 1502
Patent
active
060369892
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
CROSS-REFERENCES TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application is a U.S. national application of international application serial No. PCT/GB96/02453 filed Oct. 7, 1996, which claims priority to British Serial Nos. 9520535.7 and 9608117.9 filed Oct. 7, 1995 and Apr. 19, 1996, respectively.
This invention relates to apparatus for removal of the cores from vegetables, especially floretting vegetables such as cauliflower and broccoli (calabrese), thereby separating the edible portions from the cores.
In the frozen food industry, there is a need for automated apparatus which will reliably and speedily prepare large volumes of vegetables for freezing, by separating the edible portions from the cores, while the vegetables are still in prime condition following harvesting. Various prior proposals have been put forward especially for large machines with multiple cutting heads but there is still a commercial requirement for a relatively low-cost machine having a more modest throughput. It is an object of the present invention to provide such a machine.
According to the invention, apparatus for the automated removal of cores from vegetables comprises conveyor means including vegetable supports for indexed advancing of vegetables from a loading station to a cutting station and a cutting head assembly comprising one or more cutter elements movable in a core-excision cutting movement, in which the cutting head assembly is movable between a cutting position in registration with a vegetable support in the cutting station and a core discharge position displaced from the pass of the conveyor means.
According to another aspect of the invention, a method of removing the cores from vegetables comprises placing vegetables in the inverted state on supports carried by a conveyor means, advancing said conveyor means in indexed manner to bring successive vegetables to a cutting station, and excising the cores from said vegetables, in which the cores are excised by one or more cutter elements forming part of a cutting head assembly movable between a cutting position in registration with a vegetable support in the cutting station and a core discharge position displaced from the pass of the conveyor means.
It is to be understood that the cutting head assembly is displaced from the pass of the conveyor means when the assembly is either to one side of or above the conveyor means.
In the use of the invention and after excision of the cores, the remaining edible portions may be removed from the conveyor for freezing.
The invention is particularly appropriate for generally ball-shaped vegetables which can be placed individually, inverted or core-uppermost, on the supports, especially floretting vegetables where the edible portions form discrete florets on separation from the core. The cutter elements may comprise cutter blades which are pivotably mounted for cutting movement in which the cutting edges follow an arcuate path, whereby they cut into the vegetable rather than across, thereby enabling more complete removal of the core without accompanying wastage of significant amounts of the edible portions. The cutter blades may comprise semi-cylindrical parts which are pivotably connected together and are formed with dependent oblique cutting edges which open and close in the manner of a beak, but the blades preferably merely comprise a pair of pivotably-mounted cutter lobes having oblique cutting edges which are movable, again in beak-like manner, between a core-embracing condition when open and a core-excision condition when closed together, optionally with some overlap to provide a shearing cutting action.
Alternatively, the cutter elements may comprise C-shaped cutter blades pivotably connected together for movement between an open position and a closed-together excision position, in which at least one cutter blade has a cutting edge disposed substantially perpendicular to the plane containing the C and at least one of the cutter blades follows a respective arcuate path towards the other in moving from the open to the excision position. Pref
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