Being a particularly delicate and rapidly oxidable fruit, banana requires specific procedures and highly qualified technical operation. Backed by decades of field experience, Tropical Food Machinery has grown to become a global leader in the special area of fruit processing machinery, starting from banana technology to produce high quality puree. Tropical Food Machinery has patented the new automatic banana peeler “Cerere 6000” which has a working capacity of 6 mT/h of fresh product and a pulp extraction yield of 60%. Cerere 6000 starts a new era for the banana technology: the previous machines never succeeded in guaranteeing a high quality puree which is why the process includes manual peeling. “Cerere 6000” will guarantee you a precise automatic peeling system and a reduced use of manpower, pulp processing in inert atmosphere with anti-oxidant treatment, a constant productivity and an excellent final quality.
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Being a particularly delicate and rapidly oxidable fruit, banana requires specific procedures and highly qualified technical operation. Backed by decades of field experience, Tropical Food Machinery has grown to become a global leader in the special area of fruit processing machinery, starting from banana technology to produce high quality puree. Tropical Food Machinery has patented the new automatic banana peeler “Cerere 6000” which has a working capacity of 6 mT/h of fresh product and a pulp extraction yield of 60%. Cerere 6000 starts a new era for the banana technology: the previous machines never succeeded in guaranteeing a high quality puree which is why the process includes manual peeling. “Cerere 6000” will guarantee you a precise automatic peeling system and a reduced use of manpower, pulp processing in inert atmosphere with anti-oxidant treatment, a constant productivity and an excellent final quality.
Briefly, the industrial and technological advantages offered by “Cerere 6000” can be summarized in:
- Employment of only 10-15 operators for the operations related to the peeling, who will carry out the loading operation of the banana hands on the feeding system to the chamfering unit (operation of removal of the upper edge of the banana).
- Quick automatic banana peeling. The peeling of the single fruit is performed instantaneously guaranteeing a clear separation of peel and pulp.
- Constant cleaning with water of the surfaces in contact with the product in order to facilitate the expulsion of the residues of the peels from the peeler.
- No contact between pulp and atmospheric oxygen. The peeler “Cerere 6000” carries out automatically the peeling in a nitrogen atmosphere chamber avoiding also any contact between the pulp and the operators and the oxygen.
- Anti-oxidant treatment. The direct injections of ascorbic acid into the pulp-section avoids oxidation and preserves the natural organoleptic properties of the banana: color, taste and firmness.
After the automatic peeling, bananas are extruded and transformed into raw pulp. This process is protected by nitrogen injection that prevents oxidation. Such process is monitored by a pH meter to understand the quantity of acid to be used.
The purée pre-warming takes place in a heat exchanger by a hot water circuit. The amount of steam used to warm up the water is controlled by a temperature probe that checks the product output temperature; the user sets this temperature and PID control parameters by the PLC system.
After the pre-heating the seeds and are separated in the refining machines especially designed for this product – then all the remaining impurities are removed to obtain a clear puree without defects.
After the refining, the aroma recovery system can be installed to capture and concentrate the volatile flavours which would otherwise be lost during the concentration process.
The technology developed by Tropical Food Machinery especially for the banana puree utilizes a four-concentric-tube sterilizer that uses overheated water as heating fluid. After the initial heating stage, the cooling section has a first stage with industrial water and a second stage with chilled water that quickly cools the aseptic puree and maintains the desired yellow color. The process is protected by steam barriers.
Thermal treatments are set according to the pH and water content of the product. Sterilization of the puree is controlled by a linked double PID controller– the PLC relies on two probes -one on the holding tube and one on the heated water tank- giving the operator simple but effective supervision of the whole process. The specific banana processing control developed by Tropical Food Machinery during over 8 years of work, is able to stabilize the machine and quickly intervene in case of flow changing.
Last but not least, the aseptic filler has been specifically designed for filling banana puree in aseptic bags: it is complete with an hydrogen peroxide system to keep the filling chamber perfectly aseptic at a lower temperature instead of using the traditional steam system. This system has been tested and approved by FDA auditors.