The BATCH FORMULA® Mixer from GEA is a highly efficient, one-pot processor for mixing a variety of liquid food products. The system is designed specifically for use in difficult applications such as those involving highly viscous products such as ketchup, mayonnaise and sauces. This helps manufacturers to innovate, develop healthier options and local variants to meet different tastes in this highly competitive market.
Product development for these familiar products often means reducing fat and sugar content and including fewer additives. Meanwhile, quality can often require a compromise between achieving the necessary shelf life without adversely affecting the color, taste or texture of the product.
The BATCH FORMULA® Mixer is ideally suited to this application. Its design uniquely introduces powders and liquides via a vacuum below the liquid surface. This instantly wets and deaerates powders thereby creating a uniform, homogenous, highly stable product with a long shelf life, absolute reliability and repeatability. The ability to mix powders and liquids homogenously in this way is critical for manufacturing stable, long shelf life products in which the particles stay dispersed in solution and do not separate during packaging or storage. The high shear mixing system reduces the size of oil droplets and increases their dispersion to help produce emulsions that are stable and homogeneous without the risk of flocculation or sedementation. This is, for example, a critical requirement for the production of mayonnaise. If air is trapped within the product it will significantly affect its shelf life. Accurate temperature control is also critical to prevent an emulsion from cracking and to maintain the consistency of the final product.
In designing the mixer GEA used Computer Fluid Dynamics (CFD) to develop a more detailed understanding of the process, analyze the key parameters required to achieve the desired product characteristics and to optimize efficiency.
The fully-enclosed, hygienic system provides high, low and no shear mixing, can accommodate a wide range of products on the same machine and includes the following key features: heating and cooling jacket; direct steam injection; flash cooling and/or evaporation by vacuum; and a wide range of stators and knives. The one-pot design minimizes energy usage, saves time and optimizes both clean-in-place (CIP) processes and profitability. The vessel can be drained 100% for fast batch-to-batch changeover. The technology can be configured for batch or continuous operation as required.
GEA has also redesigned its market leading BATCH FORMULA® Test Mixer to help customers to prepare recipes and establish process parameters before investing in full-scale plant. The new technology provides reliable scale up to full production with enhanced hygiene, flexibility and efficiency all with a 25% smaller footprint.
GEA is one of the largest suppliers of technology for the food processing industry and for a wide range of other process industries.
As an international technology group, the Company focuses on world-leading process technology and components for sophisticated production processes.
In 2015, GEA generated consolidated ...
