Haas's automated center-cake line opens up opportunities

The Haas Group’s Convenient Food Equipment subsidiary believes it’s engineered a breakthrough: a center-filled cake production line.

Everyone in the confectionery, bakery and snack industries is looking for originality, uniqueness and differentiation. Today, more so than ever, it’s about customer inspiration. That’s where the Haas Group’s Convenient Food Equipment subsidiary believes it’s engineered a breakthrough: a center-filled cake production line.

Originally developed in Japan, sponge-batter, center-filled cakes attract children and adults alike with their innovative shapes and delicious fruit, chocolate or vanilla fillings.

Two years in development, the center-filled cake line represents the first such automated production unit in the marketplace. It’s capable of producing 20,000 pieces per hour, each piece weighing up to 45 grams. The cakes can come in one or two colors and are capable of having one or two fillings.

The moulds, which are also produced by Haas, offer a broad range of design capabilities, ranging from everyday concepts (animals and/or fruits) to seasonal or specific promotional campaigns (Santas, bunnies, figures).

The compact unit features a front oven section that automatically deposits batter on heated baking plate pairs, which are mounted on a baking tong chain. After a certain processing time, the baking plates close and move through the oven. When a full turn is completed, the baking plates open again at the oven front section.

A take-off drum gently releases the center-filled cakes from the baking plates and transfers the products to an overhead conveyor. An optional automatic cleaning device that uses cold jet blasting with dry ice pellets can clean the 74 baking plates in less than four hours.

Some of the advantages the center-flled cake line provides include:

Automatic dosing of batter and filling
Automatically controlled energy-efficient heating system
Mechanical product take-off device
Integrated automatic dosing of release agent
New baking plate material for shorter clean intervals
Modular concept for optimal machine size
Customized baking plates
Optional automatic cleaning device

Compared to usual center-filled cakes, the cakes produced by the Haas line offer more possibilities. With a final product weight of up to 45 g and a filling weight up to 30 percent of the final product weight, the items produced can not only appeal manufacturers in the traditional confectionery, baking and snack sectors, but also those looking to branch out into energy foods and meal replacement sectors.

For more information, visit www.haas.com

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With more than 30 years experience in B-to-B reporting, writing and editing — the bulk of which was dedicated to covering the bakery, confectionery and snack industries — Pacyniak has chronicled changes within the food industry since the early 1980s. A Boston University journalism degree graduate, he worked for a variety of publications before joining BNP Media in 1994 as editor of Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery magazine. In 2001, he took over as editor-in-chief of Candy Industry until 2018.