Baking & Snack - December 2013 - 63

EQUIPMENT
Dough Handling

Bakers automating gluten-free and artisan
bread lines must incorporate gentle dough
handling equipment to maintain integrity
from mixer to oven.

by Charlotte Atchley
At the end of an automated bread line, a baker wants to
find a steady stream of finished product at the same high
standard of quality. However, some bread doughs are more
challenging to automate than others. Gluten-free, artisan
and breads with particulates can pose some obstacles.
Even though these types of bread doughs each
exhibit different characteristics and present different challenges, the priority is the same: Maintain the
dough's integrity from the mixing bowl into the oven.
Equipment and processes that respect the dough's
needs ensure that the finished product quality is consistent with the baker's standards.
"Bakers have to rely on two things," said Merle
Cooper, Adamatic sales manager, Belshaw Adamatic
Bakery Group, Auburn, WA. "One, that their equipment
is designed for that particular dough, and two, that you
get consistent dough to the machine."
Before the mixer, dough quality is a matter of ingredient sourcing and following the fundamentals of baking.
The mixer is the first place these factors come together
but not the last place that quality is determined. "A
baker needs to be a disciplined manufacturer," said Eric
Riggle, vice-president, Rademaker USA, Inc., Hudson,
OH. "It's mixing from a discipline approach, always the
same temperature, the same mix time. It's controlling
and understanding each step of the way."
Stephen Marquardt, sales director, Zeppelin
Systems USA, Odessa, FL, agreed that control of variables is important to accommodating the challenges
presented by gluten-free and artisan doughs, includ-

ing dough temperature
and fermentation time.
For gluten-free, artisan and doughs
with particulates, once mixing is finished, it's up to dough handling systems to deliver that
dough to the moulder and makeup line as unchanged as
possible to ensure that the finished product will come out
the other side meeting the baker's expectations.
Gluten-free dough runs the gamut of loose and batterlike to stiff and low in hydration. Artisan dough is full of
water and gas, making it sensitive to the rigors of machining. Particulates in conventional bread dough can
break and lose their appeal, and they definitely can cause
concern for allergens. Making it to the oven requires the
right equipment for the right dough and plenty of control in order to maintain integrity.

Creating a tension-less
continuous dough sheet is
critical to ensuring challenging doughs start off production on the right foot.
Rademaker USA

Transfer with care
When approaching dough handling processes with challenging products, it's critical to focus on the consistency
of the dough and expectations of the finished product.
For example, while a conventional bread line might include a divider, gluten-free dough for the same finished
product type might be too runny to handle with such a
system. "When you have a dough that's harder to machine, dough consistency becomes even more important," Ms. Cooper said. The dough's body determines
how it will be transferred and machined.
For artisan doughs with less than 63% hydration,
Ms. Cooper recommends the company's Adamatic

December 2013 / Baking & Snack / 63

Baking & Snack - December 2013

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