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I happened onto this manual just now and it got me to thinking about solar drying again.
click the image to download the manual
The document was prepared as a training manual for a Zimbabwian project funded by the Austrian Embassy titled Establishment of a production, sales and consulting infrastructure for solar thermal plants in Zimbabwe.
Its a comprehensive manual covering many designs and processes which you will see in illustrations from other documents you have read over the years. The 110 page book contains descriptions of many different dryers as well as examples of many different crops and their dryers. It also presents a great deal of technical data on drying but even though the title of the project nothing about markets, packaging and selling.
Solar drying should be all the rage currently giving its potential to impact global food shortage and climate change – but we still seem to be where we were decades ago.
I must claim to having heard first hand of an area where a nut is used as a food, after having been eaten and excreted by an animal. In this area there is a strong belief that kernels from a marula nut that has been eaten by a goat are much more tasty than the untreated kernels. But here's a new one.
 click the image to visit the websiteThere are of course coffees that have passed through digestive tracts but here the coffee is used to brew a dark beer, which has apparently sold out on its launch day, although only.
The flow sheet on the pack label needs to be studied!
If you are like me you enjoy getting a simple understanding of a food process/technology, even if you are never likely to use it!
from: EFWE
(click image for full story online)
Thes is the case with this masters thesis, which presents a nice simple (two different levels of detail) explanation of the sugar cane process. It includes the two main juice extraction systems diffusion and milling in parallel, although I am not sure whether this occurs in often in practice.
Here is a short and very simple article on designing a factory that would meet the FDA's requirements.
click the image to visit the website
I find the well structured approach, via six focus areas, and the simple first person language easy to read and absorb.
Its interesting that the heart of beer development outside of Europe could be argued to have started in the US moved to Britain and then back to the US and that the UK is now moving towards learning from the US.
click the image to visit the website
This 3 or 4 page article is a very nice overview of the current status and of the history of how things developed in the US and the UK.
What at first glimpse seems to be a rather crude processing technology that produces mass market foods, is growing in the UK and seems to be attracting attention.
click the image to visit the website
At first glimpse it also appears to be an energy intensive process, but it needs to be compared to the energy input along the whole value chain and over time. I also needs to be seen as a cooking process, a preservation technique and as food packaging.
Some time ago I did a Google Plus post on a recent study that claimed the nutrition provided by canned beans was cheaper than that fom dried beans. I noted that this seemed unlikely and undertook to follow up on it. I contacted the author and received the paper on which the report was based. The reason was clear, in calculating the cost of nutrition from dried beans the cost of preparation time was included. This is the correct approach but the time calculated for dried beans was not just for the preparation and cooking, but included the hours that the beans were soaked in water. Canned obviously beans did not have such a cost included and the total cost worked out to be lower than the dried beans.
This just shows how careful one needs to be in these kinds of evaluations. Other issues that could be important when convenience, considering canned foods is the low cost of storage, the long shelflike and the reduced in home cooking needs. On the negative side the high cost of packaging and the limitations on the products that can be offered through canning.
The recovery of food from Food Industry waste will become more and more attractive as food prices increase and per capita availability decreases.
In general technology is already available to recover value but the viability limits what is done. This is an interesting approach to improve viability by addressing the logistics of handling waste.
click image to visit the site
Projects like these improve the sustainability of the Food Industry.
You might be thinking I have been employed by GEA to promote their website, but its just that once I am on an informative website like this, I see lots that's worth sharing.
click the image to visit the website
This article on fruit juice, only a few pages long, gives a bit on history of the market segment and the technology that went with it, something on health benefits, the current world situation and trends. After that is of course the bit that says how much GEA can help juice manufacturers.
Having linked to their separator, decanter and process based information, I also saw they have general information like that above and of course process information linked to other Unit Operations – so there will probably be more!
GEA is an enormous processing equipment group that includes previous independent processors such as Westfalia, Wiegand, APV Kestner and Niro from the days when I still worked in processing.
click the image to visit the website
This website is that of the separator, decanter and process line part of their business. It presents a wealth of general information on many beverage and dairy processes with links to their equipment pamphlets. Each process is described in detail with a process flowsheet.
While you might be tempted to dismiss this as a source of information because of it equipment supplier link, I believe the information is general enough and unbiased to be useful.
Here is another story looking at product development focussing on premium products which avoid heat treatment in processing.
The BRIS process uses ambient temperature air which has been dried using heating and silica gel to a few percent relative humidity, in a counter current drying tower.
 click the image to visit the websiteThis application by Naturex, a French company more focussed on natural ingredients for the food & beverage, nutrition and health and personal Care industries, is a first for them. The products main selling point appears to be their good organoleptic properties and their ease and quality of reconstitution.
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