Even in the freezer case, consumers can find a growing number of baked snacks, from pretzels and cookies to savory appetizers to breadsticks and poppable mini pizzas, said Ed Cordiano, program manager, bakery and prepared foods, Linde L.L.C., Murray Hill, N.J.
“Baked snacks combine two things that busy consumers crave: convenience and comfort,” Mr. Cordiano explained. “Premium items are not only crowd-pleasers but also help improve margins for bakeries and supermarkets. Out-of-the-box quality depends a lot on the temperature of ingredients as well as on how the dough is processed after leaving the mixer.”
By tightly controlling the temperature of flour and other dry ingredients coming into the mixer, baked snack producers can achieve more consistent mixer cycle times and more repeatable results. The Linde Dry Ingredient Chilling system uses liquid carbon dioxide to accurately chill flour, sugar or other dry ingredients as they flow within the pneumatic conveying system from the silo to the mixer. Better consistency, Mr. Cordiano noted, improves downstream handling operations, such as forming and extruding, and can contribute to the quality of finished baked goods.
