JPS63133958A - Long-term preservation of noodle - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To enable the long-term preservation of noodles, by kneading wheat flour, buckwheat flour, water, salt, etc., rolling into a flat sheet, slitting the sheet to obtain raw noodles and cooling the raw noodle, boiled noodle or packaged noodles in vacuum, thereby forming a dry skin layer on the surface. CONSTITUTION:Raw materials 1 such as wheat flour, buckwheat flour, etc., are kneaded with additives such as water, salt, etc., in a mixer 2 and rolled with a rolling machine 3 in the form of a flat sheet to obtain a noodle web. The web is rolled to a desired thickness with a kneading and rolling machine 4 and continuously cut with a slitter 5 to obtain raw noodles 6. The raw noodles 6, their boiled product 12 or packaged material are charged into a vacuum- cooling tank 21 and cooled to form a dried skin layer on the surface of the noodle. The generation of incipient bacteria can be minimized to enable the long-term preservation of the noodles.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a method for long-term preservation of noodles such as udon, soba, Chinese noodles, and spaghetti.

[Prior art]

-I include udon noodles, spaghetti, and Chinese noodles.

Japanese buckwheat noodles are made from wheat flour as the main ingredient, and water or salt solution (recently, some of them have been supplemented with vitamins B, B, etc.)
2. Mixed with calcium, etc.) and shaped into elongated, linear or special molds, boiled and unboiled (raw udon, raw soba, raw Chinese noodles, etc.), steamed (1. Chinese food.

It can be classified as soft spaghetti).

Among these, Chinese noodles are made by adding brine, and Japanese buckwheat noodles are made by adding at least 30% buckwheat flour and a binding agent such as egg or yam.

Figure 5 is a block diagram showing the conventional method of manufacturing noodles.
In addition to wheat flour and buckwheat flour, the raw material 1 used for noodles may also be grain flour such as rice flour, corn flour, and soybean flour, as well as starch from potatoes and beans other than grains, but wheat flour is the only special ingredient. When you add water and mix it,
This protein forms gluten, giving it its unique stickiness.

This plays the role of a sticky binding substance and forms the noodles of noodles. Other flours do not have this property at all, so wheat itself has been used since ancient times to make noodles, and it has also been indispensable as a sticky binding substance for making noodles by including other flours.

Put the above raw material 1 into mixer 2, add water and additives (
Mix salt 2 fortifier, brine in the case of Chinese, vitamins, etc. depending on the desired product) by rotating the blades of mixer 1.
0 to 20 minutes before and after stirring is carried out to make the wheat flour to be mixed absorb an appropriate amount of moisture, salt, etc., and this water absorption promotes the beginning of gluten formation in the flour.

Next, in rolling step 3, this is passed through a rolling mill to form a noodle band. This is sequentially dropped between two sets of rolling rolls to make two noodle strips, and the two strips are passed together between the rolling rolls to make one composite noodle strip. This is rolled around a wooden shaft and aged to equalize the moisture content.

Next, proceed to the rolling process 4. The purpose of this is to knead the dough by applying pressure to equalize the moisture content, and to make the dough suitable for cutting into strips. If the strip is suddenly rolled thin, the surface of the strip becomes rough, so generally five to six stages of rolling rolls are used.

This also results in different noodle textures depending on the amount of water added when mixing and kneading the raw materials in a mixer, whether or not ripening is used, the type of additives, etc.

When rolling is completed to the required thickness of the product, the rolled wire is continuously cut out by rolling the strip at cutting source 5.

Generally, two sets of rolls are installed, one set serves to hold the noodle and send it to the cutting blade, and one set of rolls with a smaller diameter polishes the noodle before the cutting blade. What is cut out is raw noodles 6, which can be made into udon, soba, Chinese noodles, etc. depending on the raw materials used.

The unearthed raw noodles 6 normally have a water content of about 33%. Here you can learn about the process of making raw noodles and boiled noodles.

The raw noodles 6 are packaged by a packaging machine 7 according to the product form, weighed and sorted 8, and stored in a refrigerator 9 until shipped 10.

Boiled noodles are put into a boiling tank 11 using a basket that passes through the boiled noodles tank. In this boiling tank 11 (approximately 10
2 to 3 minutes after turning off the heat, the noodles are continuously exposed to water in the cooling tank 12, cooled with cooling water at 6°C, and passed through the preservation improvement treatment tank 13. and is sent to the packaging machine 7.

Manufacturing is currently being carried out using the process described above.

[Problem that the invention seeks to solve]

The problem with the above conventional method is that it does not have a long shelf life. For example, in summer, the product only lasted for 1 to 2 days, and about 10 to 20% of the products were returned. Also, even in winter, it lasts for 5 to 6 days, but in stores it only lasts for 3 to 4 days.

Solving this problem not only saves energy, but also has great advantages in improving product yield. (Currently, the return rate is said to be around 10-20%.) Conventional manufacturing causes several problems in processing methods and processing techniques.

The first problem is the contamination of raw materials, manufacturing machinery, and factory environments with bacteria and microorganisms. First, when the raw material wheat flour was inspected, the number of live bacteria was detected to be about 5 to 6 x 102, and the number of filamentous bacteria was about 1 to 2 x 10. However, since this amount is so small that it does not directly cause spoilage, the water content is low, and the water activity is low, so it has been considered that it does not pose a problem.

In other words, the powder itself does not deteriorate.

However, during the 10 to 20 minutes of mixing in the kneading (mixer) process, due to frictional heat and air contamination, the number of viable bacteria was 1 to 5 x 1.
0', and filamentous fungi grow about 3 to 7 x 10 times.

This increased number of bacteria will become a problem later on.

In other words, in the heat-treated noodles (boiled noodles) 14, sterilization and killing can be done if desired during the process, but in the case of raw noodles 6, it is an important factor.

In addition, an increase in the number of bacteria of about 10' to 102 was observed in the rolling and elongation step 3.4.

In other words, it can be seen that how to suppress the initial bacteria greatly affects the shelf life of the final product.

In addition, for boiled noodles (packaged noodles), after boiling,
After cooling with cooling water at about 6℃, the water is drained and packaged individually.However, in the case of simply packaged noodles, if left at room temperature of 25 to 30℃, the
In 0 hours (about 2 days), the number of bacteria reaches about 1 to 2 x 106, and it completely decomposes.

Furthermore, when stored at 6°C, the same results as above were obtained in about 6 days. In other words, in the past, products were not sterilized and products were preserved at temperature regardless of the presence or absence of moisture content, thereby suppressing the surface-increasing effect.

By the way, in the past, hydrogen peroxide treatment was used, but it is now considered a carcinogen and is completely banned, so it is no longer used.

For example, in the case of boiled thick udon noodles, the weight of cut raw noodles is 100g, and the noodles are left in a boiling tank of about 95 to 98℃ for about 20 minutes, and then immersed in a cooling water tank of about 6℃ for about 3 minutes. The product weighs approximately 240g. In other words, the moisture content becomes extremely high, which causes a large area-increasing effect.

The second problem is the cooling process of the refrigerator 9.

First of all, among the noodles, raw noodles are not sterilized, but are individually packaged, cooled with air in the refrigerator 9 to prevent the growth of bacteria, and distributed to -S consumers on the distribution line. go. In the air cooling method, as shown in FIG. 6, indirect cooling is performed from the outer surface of the packaging material 15.

First, the packaging material 15 is cooled, and then the air 19 therein is cooled, and the noodles are cooled sequentially from the surface to the center of the noodles.

Although this sequential cooling is thermodynamically effective, there are problems with the product. The reason is that it takes a large amount of time and heat energy cost until the temperature is transferred to the coolest noodles. If it takes a long time, the initial number of bacteria will not be zero, so it will continue to multiply and increase to a certain amount.

In terms of energy, air is 19%, packaging materials are 15%
The equipment must be designed to take a correspondingly large cooling load. The same thing can be said for boiled noodles 14, but there is another problem.

This is due to the higher moisture content compared to raw noodles 6, as shown in the previous section. In other words, as the noodles are repeatedly packaged and air-cooled, the moisture retained in the noodles evaporates due to the second law of thermal energy (heat moves from a high place to a low place), and inside the packaging container, moisture is absorbed from the outside. The cooling heat causes condensation 29 inside the package. This condensed water becomes a problem.

In other words, there are aesthetic issues, and the packaging is re-contaminated by fungi in the air before being taken out of the refrigerator and delivered to the consumer.
Fall onto the surface of the noodles. Fungi will begin to increase again from this point of fall, accelerating the rate of decomposition.

The third point is the contamination of the packaging materials for manufactured noodles.

Ordinary packaging materials are purchased from film manufacturers in the form of rolls or bags printed by printing manufacturers, stored in a packaging material storage room, and used for packaging manufactured products as needed. Strangely, sterilization is not performed at any stage of the process.

The shape of this packaging material 15 is as shown in Fig. 7, and it is used in a roll shape and processed into a bag shape. 1
Contamination on the order of ~2x10'' was discovered.In other words, even if efforts were made to sterilize the salmon roe noodles and prevent surface buildup, no effect on the shelf life could be expected unless the problem with the packaging material was resolved.

The present invention utilizes vacuum technology and ozone utilization technology to improve the preservation of noodles.

[Means for solving problems]

The present invention involves kneading wheat flour or buckwheat flour, water with one salt, etc.
This is a long-term storage method for noodles by vacuum cooling fresh noodles 6 rolled into a flat shape and cut into thin strips, boiled noodles 14 made by boiling the noodles, or packages 16 thereof, and forming a dry film on the surface thereof.

Further, in the present invention, ozone is added during the vacuum cooling.

Further, in the present invention, the water is sterilized by adding ozone to the above water.

[For production]

Since the raw noodles 6 or the boiled noodles 14 have a dry film on their surface, it is difficult for bacteria to grow therein, so the raw noodles 6 or the boiled noodles 14 are hard to spoil and can be stored for a long time.

〔Example〕

FIG. 1 shows a block diagram of a method for long-term preservation of noodle necks when the present invention is applied to fresh noodles 6. The same parts as in FIG. 5 are given the same reference numerals, and only the different parts will be explained.

The raw noodles 6 are sent to a vacuum cooling step 20.

FIG. 3(A) shows a device for carrying out this vacuum cooling process 20, which consists of a vacuum treatment tank 21 and a vacuum pump 22, and which collects the sludge that has come out into the vacuum treatment tank 21 (cooling tank). Carry it in and pay cents.

A cooler trap 23 is provided in this vacuum cooling tank 21 .

This cooler trap 23 is normally provided outside the cooling tank, but it is provided inside the vacuum cooling tank 21 because it is affected by released and absorbed heat and causes a significant reduction in the efficiency of vacuum cooling. This liquefies water vapor directly evaporated in the vacuum cooling tank 21, requiring fewer spacers than an external cooling trap, and since it is located inside the tank, cleaning is extremely easy. Because of this, it is necessary to disassemble and clean it.

Further, the raw noodles 6 put into the cooling tank 21 are cooled according to the following principle. Water boils at 100°C under atmospheric pressure (when people live on the ground), but under vacuum it boils at 0°C.
It boils even at ℃.

This relationship is as shown in FIG. 3 (b).

In other words, the vertical axis shows the degree of vacuum, and the horizontal axis shows the temperature. For example, at a vacuum level of 5 mmHg, water boils at about 3°C.

Therefore, if the vacuum is maintained at 5 mmHg, the water will continue to boil at about 3°C, and anything containing that water will be cooled down to 3°C. Moreover, since the boiling heat transfer is used at this time, the raw noodles 6 are cooled uniformly and quickly, and if they contain moisture, there will be no temperature unevenness at all.

In other words, no temperature difference occurs between the outside and inside of the raw noodles 6.

At this time, the water naturally evaporates, and the latent heat of vaporization during evaporation is about 750 ca j! / kg, so cooling is effective. The amount is determined by the initial charging temperature. Even when cooled in a refrigerator, there is water retention, so there is no problem at all in the final product.

In addition, when this latent heat is absorbed, a thin dry film is formed on the surface of the noodles, and even if fallen bacteria and the like are resistant to adhesion, the surface water activity value is low, so the increase in bacteria can be prevented.

In addition, this dry film prevents the temperature of the raw noodles 6 from being uneven, so when the raw noodles 6 are released outside, it is possible to prevent water vapor from condensing inside the packaging material, and the condensed water droplets return to the product. , so-called re-drip contamination can also be prevented. Therefore, it has become possible to manufacture raw noodles that have a shelf life of 6 days and that look good even on store shelves.

In addition, the growth of spoilage bacteria can be prevented in the vacuum processing tank 21, and compared to cooling in the cold air (refrigerator 9), it is approximately 1.
Cooling time can be increased by 0 times faster.

In other words, if there are bacteria attached to the product, they continue to grow even in the refrigerator, so it is important to cool the product quickly and prevent the growth of bacteria at a low temperature. In other words, vacuum cooling can be used to cool the noodles quickly and to suppress the heat of respiration of the raw noodles 6.

Even if boiled noodles 14 are used instead of raw noodles 6, a dry film is formed on the surface of the noodles in exactly the same manner, and the same effect is achieved.

The biggest problem when cooling products using vacuum cooling as shown in the first embodiment is packaging. In other words, when cooling is performed using a vacuum, cooling cannot be performed in a completely sealed container due to moisture evaporation and heat replacement of latent heat.

Therefore, although it would be ideal to cool the product without packaging, re-contamination may occur during packaging after cooling.

Although this method is ideal, it is not realistic.

FIG. 2 shows a block diagram of a long-term storage method for noodles when the present invention is applied to a package of boiled noodles 14. The same parts as in FIG. 5 are given the same reference numerals, and only different parts will be explained.

A package 16 in which boiled noodles 14 (or raw noodles 6) are packaged by a packaging machine 7 is sent to a vacuum cooling step 20.

As shown in FIG. 4, this packaging body 16 is made by putting the boiled noodles 14 inside the packaging material 15 and vacuum cooling it in this form. By doing so, fungal contamination can be prevented to some extent.

Another method included in the content of the present invention is a method of packaging the product as a finished product using packaging materials, as shown in the oral tradition shown in FIG. When working with this method, several holes 18 of several millimeters are made on the top surface, the bottom surface, or on one side. The hole diameter varies depending on the product weight, but the size can be determined automatically by calculating the amount of latent heat of vaporization. By using this method, it is possible to transport the product except for storing it in the refrigerator 9 immediately after cooling. In addition, since there is no direct hand contact, and since a dry film is formed, even storage conditions can be maintained.
If it can be kept at an appropriate temperature, it can be said to be an ideal packaging form.

As shown in Section 2 of the present invention, ozone may be added to the water added to the raw material 1.

As mentioned above, bacteria, microorganisms, etc. exist as initial bacteria depending on the raw materials, manufacturing machinery, and factory environment. In this embodiment, ozonated water is used for this sterilization.

The initial increase in bacteria is caused by the frictional heat during mixing and the amount of water added. That is, mixing water containing ozone in the range of several ppm to several tens of ppm into the product as mixed water (added water) is very effective.

Ozone is a molecule 03 made up of three oxygen atoms bonded together.
It is a gas with poor atomic bonds, is unstable, easily decomposed, and has strong oxidizing power.

In addition, ozone decomposes in the air, and approximately 50% of ozone decomposes after IHr.
After about 3 hours, the remaining amount is reduced to 0.

In addition, for sterilization of the first outbreak of bacteria, it has a sterilizing power that is about 7 times that of chlorine, and for example, E. coli can be killed in 2 seconds with 2 ppm ozonated water.

In other words, even if complete sterilization is not performed, the effect of reducing the number of initial outbreaks is very large. In other words, in the latter step, bacteria increase by a factor of 2, so the ideal situation is that the total number of viable bacteria is small or absent.

As shown in FIG. 3 of the present invention, in the vacuum cooling process 20, ozone is added to the vacuum processing tank 21 at a concentration of 0.1 ppm to 50 ppm.
Air containing ppm may be blown.

As mentioned above, the packaging material 15 has not been sterilized. Item 4 of the present invention is to soak this packaging material in the ozonated water used when mixing the raw material 1, as shown in FIG.
It is for cleaning. Also, packaging materials that you do not want to get wet 1
In case 5 (dry) sterilization, the packaging material is placed in a container 30 forming one chamber as shown in FIG. 8(b), and ozonized air 31 is blown into the container. This has a slower sterilization speed than water-soluble ozone, but is effective when maintained. Note that 32 is a filter.

[Experiment example]

Next, examples will be described using a manufacturing method and an apparatus used in the manufacturing method according to the present invention.

First, in the conventional method, among the boiled noodles produced, samples A and B using boiled udon as samples had the following bacterial counts and shelf life effects.

I divided it into three parts and did a shelf life test.

Note that the time (Hr) is the time required for 10b or more fungi to rot.

In other words, it can be seen that it is greatly influenced by the number of initial bacteria and temperature conditions.

The reason why the times differ even for the same sample is thought to be due to subtle temperature differences depending on the distribution of bacteria and the location of the sample.

This confirms the common knowledge in the industry that it only lasts for 1 to 2 days in the summer and 4 to 7 days in the winter.

Next, using the same raw materials of samples A and B, the method according to the invention,
I tried processing with the device, and the procedure and results were as follows.

To explain the procedure, the initial bacterial content of wheat flour, etc. is the same. Normally water is added to this flour, etc., but the ozone generator releases the supplied ozone into water to produce ozonated water (2 types of concentration: 5opp and 1ρp11) and mix it as water with added water. At the start, it was poured into the mixer and mixed.

The mixing time after the initial addition of water was 20 minutes.

In other words, it is possible to see a greater decrease in the number of bacteria than at the time of initial closure.

For Sample A, this value for Sample B indicates that the ozone sterilization effect, which is very important for the shelf life effect, is large.

Next, what is shown is the state of bacterial growth in the sample that was cut into strips after the completion of the rolling and rolling process.

The results show that bacterial growth increases, albeit slightly, in the rolling, rolling, and cutting processes. This may be due to frictional heat during rolling, infection from the machine, or the influence of fallen bacteria. However, there is no need to worry about it, and it can be prevented to some extent by regular cleaning and preventing bacteria from falling inside the factory.

In other words, it is within a range that does not pose much of a problem unless the initial number of bacteria is small.

Next, I experimented with raw noodles and boiled noodles. First, for the raw noodles, the produced product was packaged in a packaging material with two holes of 2 fl in diameter, and a sample was packaged in a packaging material with the top open, and a sample that was completely naked was vacuum cooled. .

The method involved placing two samples of each type in the same cooling tank and examining the values. Further, the vacuum was 8+*mHg and the final product temperature was 5°C. In addition, the product temperature before input processing is 24℃.
It was put into a vacuum cooling tank. Also, the vacuum processing time is 21
It was a minute.

In addition, packaging materials are sterilized with ozone (15 minutes, ozonated water,
10 ppm) was used. According to the above data, the number of common viable bacteria and Escherichia coli is thought to be zero.

Considering the above data, the initial number of bacteria, weight, moisture, etc. are the same. As a result, there are no cooling problems with the bare processed items, but when they are taken out and packaged, or during transportation (from the vacuum cooling tank to the packaging machine), bacteria may fall and bacteria that are resistant to manual attachment may occur. It is thought that it has the shortest shelf life due to the influence of However, even with this method, it can be seen that the product lasts much longer than the non-processing method (conventional method) shown in the previous section. It will definitely keep for more than 2-3 days. In addition, as shown above, it can be seen that packaging with an open top and packaging with holes of several millimeters in diameter have a longer shelf life. As with the previous item, it seems that the slight difference in time from the cooling tank to the completion of sealing by the packaging sealing machine results in a difference in shelf life. In addition, packaging materials with holes seem to have a problem with secondary contamination, but as a result, the surface-increasing effect of the grains that forms a dry film is protected by the film, and even if they are resistant to adhesion later, the temperature It turns out that if you manage it well, it's not much of a problem compared to airtight containers. Also, if you want perfection, you can expect even longer shelf life by double-wrapping. It is also clear that there will be no condensation if the container is sealed quickly. Furthermore, in the case of a packaging material with holes, moisture to be condensed may be expelled to the outside through the holes. It was also found that vacuum-cooled food does not condense, regardless of external influences. It was also found that dew condensation is less likely to occur in naked noodles due to the air contact time, that is, if they are quickly sealed after cooling. As a result, some noodles condensed and others did not.

Next, I conducted an experiment on boiled noodles. Samples were taken in the same way as in the previous section, using naked packaging, open-top packaging, and packaging with holes.

Two samples each were boiled at 98°C for 20 minutes, and cooled by immersion in cooling water at about 6°C for 3 minutes. The temperature at the time of removal was 9.8°C. After draining, the products are kept in their respective packaging form in a vacuum cooling tank with a vacuum degree of 3 m.
mHg, and the product temperature was maximum P and 5°C. Vacuum time was 16 minutes.

In addition, the boiled product weighed 100 g when used as raw noodles, but weighed about 240 g when finished as boiled noodles.

As mentioned above, the number of bacteria is almost zero due to the boiling process, but it can be seen that the number of bacteria grows again during cooling after exposure to water.

Since this is due to contamination of the cooling water, the surface increase effect can be suppressed by always adding nearly sterile cooling water or by adding ozone.

Considering the above data, as in the previous section, the shelf life of the bare processed products is shorter than that of the other two types of packaging due to the same reason. This is because boiled noodles have a higher moisture content than fresh noodles, so it naturally takes less time for them to change. The reason for this is that the high water content and high water activity value promotes the growth of fungi.

Also, as in the previous test, there was a slight difference between the sample packaged with an open top and the sample packaged with holes. This is also considered to be the same cause as in the previous section. 3
In the case of holding at 0°C, it is clear that the rate of deterioration is accelerated, but it is also clear that the treated material lasts longer than the untreated material.

It can be seen that the shelf life of ordinary products treated with this device is clearly effective when compared with the above.

, It can also be seen that storage temperature is also important.

It has also been found that the packaging material of the present invention, which has several holes of several millimeters in size, has the longest shelf life of any existing packaging form.

In addition, in the exposure and cooling process, when ozone was added to the exposure water tank (so-called ozonated water), the following results were obtained. Two types of ozone concentrations were tested: 1 pdm and 10 ppm. The water temperature was 6°C. Measurements were taken 10 minutes after the ozone concentration was reached.

As a result of the above, if ozonated water is supplied for water quality control, secondary contamination can be prevented and products can be sterilized.

〔effect〕

As described above, the present invention uses vacuum cooling, ozone, and ozonated water in the manufacturing process of noodles as described above, so that the occurrence of initial bacteria can be minimized, and the noodles can be produced efficiently, economically, and continuously. It is something that can be done.

In addition, as a means for that purpose, the present invention supplies ozonated water during mixing with a mixer to prevent the increase of bacteria and simultaneously sterilizes. In the cooling process of exposing noodles to water, ozone is injected to prevent the growth of bacteria and sterilize them as ozonated water.For packaged noodles, we use a sterile cooling method called vacuum cooling, and the packaging material itself This provides a long-term preservation method for noodles that is washed and sterilized with ozonated water, managed and maintained using ozone, does not cause drips (condensation) on vacuum-cooled materials, and has a shelf life of 1 to 2 weeks.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Fig. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention, Fig. 2 is a block diagram of an embodiment of the present invention, Fig. 3 (a) is an explanatory diagram of the equipment that performs the vacuum cooling process, and (b) is a Figure 4 (a) is a perspective view of the package, (b) is a longitudinal cross-sectional view of another example, and Figure 5 is a graph showing the relationship between vapor pressure vacuum degree and temperature. FIG. 6 is a longitudinal cross-sectional view of the package; FIG. 7 is a perspective view of the packaging material; FIG. It is a perspective view of 6... Raw noodles, 14... Boiled noodles, 1
6...Packaging body. $ 7 m Arithmetic 2' Paper: 9th (Ro) 1st degree IC Water O Warrant Officer FLth 祿 (I) Rakujyuun 5 plays

Claims (4)

[Claims] (1) Raw noodles made by kneading wheat flour or buckwheat flour, water, salt, etc., rolling them into a flat shape and cutting them into thin strips, boiled noodles, or packages thereof are vacuum-cooled to form a dry film on their surfaces. How to store tempura noodles for a long time. (2) A method for long-term preservation of noodles according to claim 1, which comprises adding ozone to the water. (3) A method for long-term preservation of noodles according to claim 1, which comprises adding ozone during the vacuum cooling. (4) A method for long-term preservation of noodles according to claim 1, which comprises sterilizing packaging materials in a packaging machine with ozone.