Patent Application
20210235709
The present invention pertains to the art of food production and, more particularly, to the automated production of bread products.
Bakery operators sometimes purchase partially finished food products that are then finished in the bakery before being sold to consumers. For example, bakery operators can purchase frozen unproofed bread dough, which they thaw, proof and bake prior to sale. Depending on the desired bread product, the bread dough may be manually scored after proofing and before baking to help control expansion during baking and to give the resulting bread product its traditional look. Generally, it is preferred that the amount of time and labor required to finish such partially finished food products is kept to a minimum. Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide bread dough that is scored before purchase by bakery operators. Unfortunately, attempts to score bread dough during initial production have shown that it is difficult to make a cut in the dough that stays intact through freezing and thawing. Most attempts either produced shallow dents that did not open up or deeply segmented loaves that were misshaped.
The present invention successfully achieves the goal of scoring bread dough before purchase by bakery operators by scoring dough pieces while the dough pieces are frozen. The scoring can be perfoinied in an automated process in various ways, preferably by a saw blade, water knife or laser. In one embodiment, a coating or treatment is applied at the scores.
Additional objects, features and advantages of the invention will become more readily apparent from the following detailed description of preferred embodiments thereof when taken in conjunction with the drawings wherein like reference numerals refer to common parts in the several views.
Detailed embodiments of the present invention are disclosed herein. However, it is to be understood that the disclosed embodiments are merely exemplary of the invention that may be embodied in various and alternative forms. The figures are not necessarily to scale, and some features may be exaggerated or minimized to show details of particular components. Therefore, specific structural and functional details disclosed herein are not to be interpreted as limiting, but merely as a representative basis for teaching one skilled in the art to employ the present invention. Additionally, as used in connection with the present invention, terms such as “parallel” and “perpendicular” do not necessarily require, for example, that the relevant items be perfectly parallel. Instead, these terms include a margin of error of +/−5° (regardless of whether the error is by design or due to inherent manufacturing limitations) so long as the error does not prevent the present invention from functioning as intended.
As discussed above, it would be desirable to provide bread dough that is scored before purchase by bakery operators. However, attempts to score bread dough during initial production have shown that it is difficult to make a cut in the dough that stays intact through freezing and thawing. The present invention successfully achieves this goal by scoring dough pieces while the dough pieces are frozen. Because the dough pieces are rigid when scored, they are deformed by the scoring but do not spring back to their original shape afterwards, which would tend to result in the scores closing back up. As a result, the scores remain intact all the way to receipt of the dough pieces by end users, i.e., bakers, and through the later production steps, i.e., thawing, proofing and baking. In addition, scoring dough pieces while the dough pieces are frozen allows the location and profile of the scores to be precisely placed on the dough pieces. Also, coatings or treatments can be applied at the scores because the scores remain open in the frozen dough pieces. Notably, this type of functional scoring is distinct from stamping bread dough with a design, as with a Kaiser roll for example. The functional scoring helps control expansion during baking (in addition to giving the resulting bread product its traditional look).
With reference to
Turning to
Rotary cutter 105 includes a driveshaft 125 and a plurality of circular blades 130-134. Driveshaft 125 is aligned perpendicular to direction 120. Accordingly, the axis of rotation for rotary cutter 105 (labeled 140) is also aligned perpendicular to direction 120. Rotary cutter 105 is configured such that contact between rotary cutter 105 and conveyor belt 110 or dough sheet 115 causes rotary cutter 105 to rotate in a direction 145 as conveyor belt 110 travels in direction 120. Alternatively, a motor and transmission (not shown) can be provided for driving rotary cutter 105, i.e., for causing rotary cutter 105 to rotate in direction 145.
Blades 130-134 are fixedly coupled to driveshaft 125 such that rotation of driveshaft 125 results in rotation of blades 130-134. Each of blades 130-134 is configured to cut dough sheet 115 as dough sheet 115 is being transported by conveyor belt 110. Specifically, blades 130-134 have blunt-edge dough engaging portions and are configured to cut dough sheet 115 into dough strips 150-153. Later, dough strips 150-153 are cut crosswise (i.e., in a direction parallel to driveshaft 125) to form a plurality of dough pieces. For purposes of the present invention, “cutting” (and its variants) means that the dough is cut all the way through. “Scoring” (and its variants) means that the dough is cut only part of the way through. Also, while five blades are shown, other numbers of blades can be used depending on the width of dough sheet 115 and the desired width of dough strips 150-153.
Rotary cutter 105 is supported above conveyor belt 110 by a support structure 155. The details of support structure 155 are not important to the present invention. However, it can be seen that support structure 155 includes identical left and right supports 160. Each support 160 has a base 165 and a pair of columns 170, supporting a bearing 175, which can incorporate a drive motor. Bearings 175 receive the ends of driveshaft 125 to facilitate rotation of rotary cutter 105.
As noted above, blades 130-134 are blunt-edge blades. The blunt-edge cutting of dough is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,902,754, for example, which is incorporated herein by reference. This patent discloses a cutter including a blunt-edge dough-cutting or dough-engaging portions configured to pull a first surface or skin of a dough toward a second surface or skin of the dough when the cutter is impinged on the dough. This tends to pinch the two surfaces together and also, when desired, severs the dough, resulting in a dough product that more closely resembles a hand-formed dough product. That is, the dough product has rounded edges rather than straight or sharply-angled edges.
Turning to
With reference now to
In particular, the dough engaging portion (not separately labeled but clearly shown in
A dough piece produced in accordance with the present invention is shown in
After formation of dough piece 300, dough piece 300 can be partially proofed and then frozen in steps 1020 and 1025. Once frozen, dough piece 300 is scored in step 1030, and, in some embodiments, a coating or treatment is applied to the score in step 1035. Eventually, dough piece 300 can be transported to a bakery operator, for example, who thaws, fully proofs, bakes and sells the resulting bread product.
After scoring, scored dough pieces 410 are optionally transported by conveyor system 100 beneath or through a coating mechanism 420. Coating mechanism 420 is configured to apply one or more coatings or treatments 425 to each of scored dough pieces 410 to produce coated dough pieces 430. In particular, the coatings or treatments 425 are applied at scores 415. This is facilitated by the fact that scores 415 remain open after formation due to the rigidity of the frozen dough. The coating or treatments 425 can take various forms, for example butter, garlic sauce, or the like.
Based on the above, it should be readily apparent that the present invention provides scored dough pieces where the scores are only formed after a freezing step and remain intact through later production steps, particularly thawing and proofing, as well as apparatuses and methods for producing the scored dough pieces. While certain preferred embodiments of the present invention have been set forth, it should be understood that various changes or modifications could be made without departing from the spirit of the present invention. In general, the invention is only intended to be limited by the scope of the following claims.
