A METHOD AND A SYSTEM FOR PRODUCING EXTRUDED EDIBLE ICE PRODUCTS

Abstract: In the production of extruded icecream bodies it is customary to cut the bodies from an extruded string of icecream when the latter, laying on a conveyor belt, has reached a ''medium frozen'' condition, whereafter the bodies are transferred to a faster moving conveyor, on which they are moved through a hard-freezing zone with a desired mutual spacing between the bodies. According to the invention several advantages are obtained by arranging for the extruded string (6) to run unbroken through a continuous freezing zone, when only constrictions or notches (12) have been provided in the string by transversely moved tool means (8, 20, 22) while the ice substance is still formable; after the hard-freezing of the string the single bodies (P) are separated from the string by a simple successive breaking action on the front end of the string, and the desired distance between the individual bodies can be produced by letting the bodies fall down onto a conveyor (18) moving at increased speed.

Description: A method and a system for producing extruded edible ice products. The present invention relates to a method of pro¬ ducing extruded edible ice products, typically round, bar shaped ice bodies optionally coated with chocolate or another material. That kind of simple bodies are well suited to be manufactured by extrusion, as they can just be cut off in desired lengths from an extruded string of frozen ice material. By its extrusion the ice substance is soft and formable, e.g. at a temperature of -5°, and for ensuring a real separation between the extruded bodies by the cutting of the extruded string the latter should be further frozen before the cutting takes place. It is a usual practice, therefore, that an ice sausage - or preferably a number of parallel ice sausages - be ex¬ truded onto a conveyor belt which brings the sausage through a first freezing zone, in which the ice material is frozen to a 'medium low temperature by which the material is reasonably stiff or self carrying, yet still easily cuttable, whereafter the sausage is conveyed through a cutting station for being cut into single bodies, which, on the same or a further conveyor, are brought through a following freezing zone in which they are hard frozen. Such a final freezing will often be effected in a special freezing store after packaging or wrapping of the bodies, but if the bodies prior to the packing should be coated with some coating material from a liquid state thereof, then the bodies should be hard frozen prior to such coating being effected, e.g. by dipping of the bodies in a bath of the coating material, as this material will be 'warm' relative to the ice material. Particularly where it is required for this reason to hard freeze the bodies prior to a possible packaging or wrapping and thus prior to their transfer to a freezing store the basically simple extrusion pro¬ cess will be less simple, because normally use should be made of two different freezing tunnel units and an in¬ termediate cutting station. With the invention it is endavoured to carry out the method such that it is possible to use a simplified equipment, advantage being taken of the special caracter of the ice material in the hard frozen condition there¬ of. According to the invention the ice sausage while being in its medium frozen condition is subjected to a pressure shaping for forming successive breaking kerbs by a simple pressing in of a kerb forming tool into the top side of the sausage, whereafter the still coherent sausage is conveyed further through a hard freezing zone, at the exit of which the single ice bodies are broken off from the sausage as now being entirely stiff. By a completely uncritical breaking influence the sau¬ sage will break just at the previously shaped kerb re¬ cesses, and no precautions whatsoever should be taken for avoiding a rejoining between the ends of the pre¬ viously coherent bodies; such a rejoining will be ex¬ cluded already due to the fully frozen condition of the material. The adding of a breaking kerb can be effected in a very simple manner inside a continuous freezing tunnel, in which the conveyor belt may pass in one stretch, inasfar as the kerb can be shaped by a simple pressing down of a tool, which shall only have to intrude notice¬ ably into the top side of the ice sausage, but not cause any severing of the sausage all the way down to the top side of the ccnveyor belt, this otherwise being a major problem. Thus, for the entire process it is sufficient to use a single tunnel and a single, continuous conveyor belt, which amounts to a considerable simplification of the conventional technique. The invention is examplified on the accompanying drawing, which shows, inter alia, that the breaking off of the ice bodies may be effected in an extremely simple manner in that the front end of the hard frozen ice sausage at an exit area from a supporting anvil meets with an overlying roller serving to force the projecting front end of the ice sausage downwardly, such that the front end portion will break off without difficulties just at the previously shaped kerb. The broken off front end portions or ice bodies may fall down onto a further conveyor belt bringing them further to a wrapping machine or to a station in which they are provided with a coating material. As a further important advantage it will be achieved that each one of the extruded bodies will be stabilized on the conveyor belt in and by the bodies being lengthwise coherent. Even entirely round bodies may then remain rested on the belt when on their way they are exposed to local shakings on the belt. The fracture surfaces appearing after the breaking off of the bodies will reveal themselves only as rather small areas at the ends of the elongated bodies, i.e. they will be quite discrete and will practically dis¬ appear by a following coating of the bodies. In the following the invention is described in more detail with reference to the drawing, in which:- Fig. 1 is a schematic side view of an extruder according to the invention, Fig. 2 is a corresponding, enlarged side view of the outlet end of the extruder, Fig. 3 is a top view of an extruded string, and Fig. 4 is a side view of an extrusion area. In Fig. 1 is shown a conveyor 2, above the left hand end of which there is mounted a slightly inclined extruder tube 4, which receives an ice material through a hose 5 and extrudes the material in a string 6 carried forwardly by the conveyor belt. Normally there will be arranged a plurality of extruder or nozzle tubes 4 in a transverse row across a suitably broad conveyor. On the conveyor the string 6 is carried through a freezing zone marked by vertical arrows f that may re¬ present a blast of cold air. Inside the freezing zone there is mounted above each string 6 - or transversely above all of the strings - a vertical blade 8, which, e.g. by means of a working cylinder 10, is depressable into the ice material, which at the particular place has been cooled down sufficiently to allow for the depres¬ sion of the blade 8 to create a lasting kerb 12 in the material. Such kerbs are shaped during the passing by of the string, with mutual spacings corresponding to the desired length of the finished products, and the strings are thereafter moved further forwardly in the freezing zone until they have become hard frozen. At the delivery end of of the conveyor the strings 6 pass onto an anvil 14, which as also shown in Fig. 2 is mounted just outside the associated end roller of the conveyor flush with the top side of the conveyor belt. When the string end has passed out from the rear edge of the anvil a distance corresponding to the length of a product body P' the top side of the string will meet a stationary, rotating roller 16, the bottom of which is located at a level slightly lower than the top side of the string, and the foremost product body P', therefore, will be pressed down so as to break off in the area underneath the foremost kerb 12. The body P thus broken off falls to an underlying conveyor belt 18, which is moved somewhat faster than the string 6, such that a desired distance will be pro¬ duced between the consecutive bodies P. These bodies are then advanced for further treatment or packaging. In Fig. 3 it is indicated that in stead of a narrow blade 8 it is possible to use shaping tools 20 that will form a portion of the body ends with a desired shape. As shown, an approximate rounded shape can be achieved by pressing such tools inwardly from both sides. It has been mentioned that that the strings should be noticeably cooled down prior to the kerbs or areas of constriction being shaped, but it is possible, neve_ct.be-- less, to carry out such shaping already at the outlet from the extruder tube 4, particularly if the ice mate¬ rial has at this place been cooled down a little more than usually or if the material is otherwise, owing to its composition, suited for such shaping; the material is not bound to be just an edible icecream substance. Also, a further possibility will be to shape the product body ends, while coherent, by means of a controlled extruder nozzle 22, e.g. a nozzle comprising an iris diaphragm or one or more wall or edge portions which may be displaced in a controllable manner for narrowing or widening the nozzle opening at desired portions thereof, particularly at the top and/or the sides of the string. When suitably controlled, e.g. through the illustrated control conduit 24, the nozzle willl then be usable for shaping the front and rear ends of the product bodies with varying or mutually different shapes, just as the bodies can be produced with other cross profiles, only less deep than the kerbs or constrictions 12. Also, the product bodies may then be shaped fully or partially conically.

Claims: C L A I M S : 1. A method of producing extruded icecream products by separation of the products from an extruded string of ice material, the extrusion products being frozen by being conveyed through a freezing zone, characterized in that the extruded material while still being deformaJ___Le_, viz. either by its delivery from an extruder nozzle or after the extrusion string in unbroken condition having passed through a first partial length of the freezing zone, is subjected to a kerb or constriction formation in the extrusion string at places thereof spaced mutual¬ ly corresponding to the length of the desired icecream products, the string hereby being left unbroken, and the string thereafter being conveyed further through the remaining length of the freezing zone so as to be hard frozen, whereafter the string is moved into a severing station, in which the intruding front end of the string is consecutively caused to be broken off as a front product body at the following kerb or constriction of the string. 2. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that the broken off product bodies are consecutively collected on an underlying conveyor, which carries the bodies with an increased speed relative to the movement of the string. 3. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that the kerbs or constrictions are shaped by the use of one or more tools for pressure forming the adjacent ends of the product bodies. 4. A method according to claim 1, characterized in that the formation of the kerbs or constrictions is effected by means of a controlled extruder nozzle having a variable nozzle opening. 5. A system for carrying out the method claimed in claim 1, comprising an extruder for extrusion of a pro- duct substance onto a conveyor belt, which passes through a freezing zone to a delivery position for hard frozen products severed from the extrusion product, characterized in that adjacent to the conveyor belt, spaced from the delivery end thereof, means are provided for periodically forming a kerb or constriction in the string shaped extrusion product, and that at the de¬ livery end means are provided for consecutively breaking off the front end portion of the extrusion string back to the next kerb or constriction. 6. A system according to claim 5, characterized in that the means for forming the kerbs or constrictions are constituted by cross movable knife or shaping tool parts mounted at a position between the entrance and the exit of the freezing zone. 7. A system according to claim 5, characterized in that the means for forming the kerbs or constrictions are constituted by a controlled extruder nozzle having a variable nozzle opening. 8. A system according to claim 5, characterized in that the means for breaking off the front end of the extruded string comprise a supporting anvil and a breaker roller mounted spaced therefrom with its under¬ side located at a level underneath the level of the top side of the extruded string.

Inventors: WALDSTROEM EJVIND, WALDSTROEM, EJVIND
Applicants: HOEYER AS O G, O.G. HOEYER A/S
Application year: 1990
Main classification: A23G9
IPC codes: A23G1, A23G3, A23G9