Freezing and packing mixed small units of diverse food prods. - using chambers and connected conveyor tunnel supplied with cryogenic gas

摘要

Small quantities of diverse prods. a frozen in a set of modular chambers supplied with cryogenic gas. Each chamber is connected to a conveyor tunnel which is thus maintained at a low temp. The tunnel is supplied with supplementary cryogenic gas. The tunnel is used for freezing larger units of prod. than the chambers can accommodate. An extn. fan system evacuates residual gas from the tunnel. Frozen prod. from chamber(s) and/or tunnel is packed into a thermally insulated container together with a supply of cryogenic prod. The chambers are pref. mounted removably on top of the tunnel. The cryogenic gas employed in the process is pref. carbon dioxide. The conveyor band is pref. stainless steel and the tunnel and chambers are insulated with expanded polyurethane. The process is for freezing small quantities of a variety of food prods. to be packed together for controlled temp. distribution to individual customers with domestic type frozen storage cabinets. Making up this type of mixed package is prohibitively expensive for producers equipped only with industrial plate freezers and blast freezing tunnels.