Linde says its new Cryoline MC uses the low temperature of liquid nitrogen or carbon dioxide tofreeze food rapidly and carefully. The Cryoline MC uses a stream of liquid nitrogen that flows overa stainless-steel rim to perform the crust freezing process.
The taste, freshness and quality of frozen foods depends on how quickly they are cooled downafter harvesting or production. Rapid cooling is especially important for delicate foodstuffs suchas fish or seafood.
Linde says its design serves to keep products moving along the production line and improves theindividually quick-frozen process, the company claimed. A connected tunnel freezer, the Cryoline MT,allows the cold gas generated by the liquid nitrogen to flow with the product once it leaves thecrust freezing area. Since the two process machines are connected, none of the cold is lost, savingon energy.
By using the crust freezing process, the surfaces of products such as shrimps, berries ormushrooms are hardened first to avoid deformation and sticking. The products are then passes throughthe Cryoline tunnel freezer to further freeze and stabilise them. Depending on the products, theycan be packaged right away or first glazed with water.
Linde says it took particular care to eliminate traps for food particles from the freezer. Atouch screen control panel gives operators access to all data recorded by the machine, providingtraceability information.
Cryogenic gases such as liquid nitrogen, which has a temperature of -196C, allows foods to befrozen quickly. The low temperatures achieved keep products close to the quality levels they wereoriginally. The individual quick frozen process allows foods to be taken out of the packagingseparately, meeting changing consumers' demands for products that can be used as part of a mix, orportioned out.