Plaited Biscuit Extrusion With Rotating Eccentric Nozzles
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing processes for producing shortbread biscuits in a plait shape are not versatile enough to vary the shape and often result in broken dough strands due to the plastic structure of shortcrust-pastry doughs, making it difficult to achieve a dichotomy of flavors and colors.
Innovation Solution
An extrusion process using an extruder with rotatable mouths and eccentric nozzles, combined with volumetric dosing pumps and conveyor belts, allows for the continuous extrusion and helicoidal winding of multiple dough strands, ensuring they remain intact and form plaited biscuits with distinct flavors and colors.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional extrusion processes are used to produce plaited biscuits, then production can be achieved, but the dough strands break due to the plastic structure of shortcrust-pastry doughs
Solution Approach 1:
The patent changes the physical parameters of the dough by controlling temperature and viscosity to prevent strand breakage. The dough is kept at a temperature that maintains its plastic structure during extrusion, and the extrusion parameters are adjusted to ensure smooth, continuous strands without breaking.
Solution Approach 2:
The dough is prepared in advance with specific characteristics (plastic structure, controlled viscosity) before extrusion to ensure it can be extruded as continuous strands without breaking. The dough formulation and pre-treatment are optimized beforehand to prevent strand failure during the plaiting process.
2Adaptability or versatility
If existing plaiting methods are used, then biscuits can be produced, but shape variation is limited and versatility is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The extrusion system is designed with multiple nozzles that can be configured in different arrangements, allowing the same equipment to produce various plait shapes (two-strand, three-strand, four-strand plaits). The system can handle different dough types and produce different shapes without requiring completely different equipment, achieving versatility through multi-functional design.
Solution Approach 2:
The extrusion system is divided into multiple independent nozzles, each capable of extruding separate dough strands. This segmentation allows flexible configuration of nozzle numbers and arrangements to create different plait patterns, enabling shape variation while maintaining a manageable system structure.
3Adaptability or versatility
If multiple dough types are used to achieve flavor and color dichotomy, then product attractiveness improves, but process complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple extrusion chambers and nozzles are merged into a single integrated extrusion head assembly. This allows different dough types to be extruded simultaneously through different nozzles and combined to form plaited structures with flavor and color dichotomy, achieving product variety while consolidating the equipment into one compact unit.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The process produces biscuits with a helicoidal development, showcasing a dichotomy of flavors and colors, with improved breaking strength and crumbliness, and can be easily implemented industrially without complex equipment.
Implementation Method 1
at least two dosing devices, which are each arranged between a respective chamber of the extruder and said at least one rotatable mouth, the apparatus further comprising a conveyor belt arranged under said nozzles, preparing at least two doughs for biscuits having a prefixed viscoelasticity, compressing said food doughs in the respective chambers of the extruder and pushing them in predetermined flow rates from said dosing devices toward a respective dispensing nozzle
Implementation Method 2
continuously helicoidally winding up the strands of the doughs exiting said at least one rotatable mouth by rotating said at least one mouth, thereby obtaining a semifinished product comprising at least one continuous plait of said doughs having each a helicoidal development and being plaited with each other
Implementation Method 3
a conveyor belt arranged under said nozzles, preparing at least two doughs for biscuits having a prefixed viscoelasticity, vertically directed towards and onto said conveyor belt in motion, joining the free ends of said strands to each other by anchoring them onto said conveyor belt
Data Source
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AI summary
A process for producing biscuits and similar bakery food products having substantially a plait shape is described, wherein strands (21a,21b) of at least two doughs for biscuits or similar bakery products are continuously extruded from an extrusion die (3) having at least one rotatable mouth (4) provided with at least two eccentric dispensing nozzles (20a,20b), the free ends of said strands are joined to each other by anchoring on a conveyor belt (5) arranged under said extrusion die (3), and the strands (21a,21b) are continuously helicoidally wound with one another by rotating said at least one rotatable mouth (4), thereby obtaining a semifinished product comprising at least one continuous plait (22) of said doughs having each a helicoidal development and being plaited with each other. The process further comprises cutting said semifinished product into parts of a prefixed length, and subjecting said parts to baking, thereby obtaining said biscuits.