Patent ID: 8057837

Claim:
A method for preparing a full fat, reduced or low fat microwave expandable pieces article by filling with a food charge comprising microwave expandable pieces and thickened oil, comprising the steps of: A. providing a microwave popcorn bag or container having a sealed portion and an open sealable top portion in an open configuration and in a vertically aligned orientation defining an upper orifice; B. filling the bag or container through the upper orifice with a quantity of microwave expandable pieces; C. filling the bag or container through the upper orifice with a quantity of a thickened liquid oil, said oil having a melting point of <25Â° C., a native viscosity, and wherein the thickened oil is prepared from an oil that has been thickened to a viscosity of at least twice its native viscosity by (i) solubilizing a cyclodextrin component in water to form a cyclodextrin-water mixture (ii) adding liquid oil to the cyclodextrin-water mixture to form a slurry of an oil/cyclodextrin/water mixture having cyclodextrin at least partially complexed with liquid oil, (iii) causing the slurry to separate into separate portions, wherein one portion is a thickened oil/cyclodextrin composition comprising oil that has been complexed with cyclodextrin, and (iv) segregating the thickened oil/cyclodextrin composition from the remainder of the oil/cyclodextrin/water mixture to provide a thickened liquid oil; and D. sealing the open top end of the popcorn bag or container after the bag or container has been filled.