Sam Stein Associates, Inc.

Stein Associates, Inc.

Raymond E Booth

Michael E Miller

A breading machine for selectively dispensing flour breading or free flowing breading and wherein the machine has a frame and conveyor apparatus supported in the frame defining a conveyance path having a product inlet end and a product outlet end, and a hopper pivotally attached to the frame at the inlet end and movable between a breading dispensing position and a hopper cleaning position, frame support apparatus pivotally attached to the frame at the outlet end and selectively adjustable to provide for flour breading of a food product wherein the said product is flipped over at the outlet end of the conveyor apparatus or for free flowing breading to be applied to the food product wherein the said product exits from the conveyor apparatus in the same manner in which it is initially introduced to the conveyor apparatus, and wherein the frame support apparatus is also adjustable between a conveyor apparatus supporting position and a cleaning position above the conveyor apparatus, and breading pumping slot apparatus pivotally attached to the frame for providing breading to the input end of the conveyor apparatus and adjustable between a breading dispensing position and a cleaning position.

Breading machine

A breading machine for selectively dispensing flour breading or free flowing breading and wherein the machine has a frame and conveyor means supported in the frame defining a conveyance path having a product inlet end and a product outlet end, and a hopper pivotally attached to the frame at the inlet end and movable between a breading dispensing position and a hopper cleaning position, frame support means pivotally attached to the frame at the outlet end and selectively adjustable to provide for flour breading of a food product wherein the said product is flipped over at the outlet end of the conveyor means or for free flowing breading to be applied to the food product wherein the said product exits from the conveyor means in the same manner in which it is initially introduced to the conveyor means, and wherein the frame support means is also adjustable between a conveyor means supporting position and a cleaning position above said conveyor means, and breading pumping slot means pivotally attached to the frame for providing breading to the input end of the conveyor means and adjustable between a breading dispensing position and a cleaning position.

Apparatus is disclosed for providing a very light pre-dusting coating on a food piece intended for batter-coating. The apparatus includes a movable belt on which is provided a preliminary coating of breading material on which the product pieces are placed. A series of drag plates are then provided across the belt supported from above in a position to engage the breading material on the belt and to provide a standing wave of breading material pushed up by contact with the drag plates. These plates then distribute the standing wave of breading material over the top of the product while the plate lower edges remove a majority of the top coating. After this the product goes along the belt and is then subject to a second pre-dusting treatment by a plurality of parallel linear curtain assemblies mounted above the belt with each of the curtain assemblies divided vertically into segments which are fully swingable independent of each other and arranged to engage the product pieces on the belt lightly so as to leave a final top coating on the product pieces that is only two or three dust particles thick.

Apparatus for pre-dusting food products

A machine is presented which is specifically designed to accept a batch of mixed cut-up poultry parts, to coat the parts in a wet coating unit with a liquid mixture of water and egg or milk solids by tumbling them in a smaller volume of the liquid mixture, to transfer the parts with a short drip time by gravity to a dry coating unit, there to tumble them in a smaller weight of flour and coat them with the flour to an appearance equal to or better than hand coating, to continue tumbling them while excess dry material is removed from the tumbling volume and stored, to stop after a pre-set dry tumbling time and present the fully coated parts with a minimum of excess flour for hand removal, while properly cycling a sifting mechanism to entrap dough balls above a desired minimum size. Each successive batch may be liquid coated while the preceding batch is hand removed. The operator may determine the number of successive batches processed before changing the liquid mixture or removing the entrapped dough balls.

Tumble batter and breader machine

A method is presented of coating a food product with a finely divided particulate coating material comprising the steps of providing a flow of said coating material to a moving belt which provides a product path centrally thereof; splitting said flow and providing a bed of said material of predetermined thickness on a central portion of said product path while diverting parts of said material flow laterally on both sides of said central portion; placing a food product on said central portion; advancing said product and said coating material down said path; and discharging said coated product at the end of said path. The method also includes the additional steps of moving the laterally diverted parts of material flow laterally inwardly on top of the food product on the central portion of the product path, and assisting excess coating material under and around the product to return to circulation.

Process of coating food with particulate material

A patty stacker is presented which is fully adjustable over a wide range of length, width and thickness of frozen or reasonably stiff meat patties or other flat food shapes hereinafter called patties; which accepts a predetermined configuration of individual patties either plain or frozen on a rectangle of paper from the discharge point of a separate conveying means in one or more parallel independent lanes; which quickly attains and retains a reasonably positive hold on the individual patty as it enters the conveying means; which accelerates the patty to a predetermined rate of speed; which conveys the patty in a horizontal plane past patty sensing means; which delivers the patty in a reasonably controlled manner into the top of a substacking volume; which counts patties into a reasonably stable substack at a level below the plane of the conveying means; which drops the substack in a reasonably controlled manner into a main stack volume; which repeats the substacking operations as necessary to obtain the predetermined full stack count required; which moves the counted and completed stack out of the stack volume to a take-away conveyor in a reasonably controlled manner while the first substack of a new stack is being formed; and to do all of the above at high speed, say at about the rate of 120 patties per minute per lane.

Patty stacker

A machine is presented which includes a liquid-coating or battering unit associated with a dry-coating or breading unit, the units being useful separately or when combined as described. The battering unit includes a batter reservoir in which an open mesh wire belt under tension travels beneath a submerger wheel so as to gently nip the product and drag it below the surface of the batter. In the breading application unit, the loose breading material is stored in a hopper above which is a flat slider plate over which passes an open mesh wire conveyor belt in its product-advancing run. This belt then passes downwardly after discharging the coated product, to a lower point in the hopper where the belt is inclined upwardly toward the opposite end of the unit at the inlet end of the slider plate. This portion of the conveyor belt is the breading material elevating run and it travels close to an inclined bottom wall of the hopper. During the latter part of this run, the conveyor passes through a slot of limited dimensions which causes the conveyor belt to pump the breading material upwardly toward the product-advancing run where the dry material is pumped up from the elevating run to the product-advancing run through the wire mesh of the belt. In three embodiments a V-shape splitter then splits the upper portion of the breading material flow while providing a bed of this material of predetermined thickness on a central product path while diverting parts of the breading material flow laterally to both sides of the central path portion. The liquid-coated food product is placed on the central path portion downstream from the splitter and, as the product advances along the run above the flat slider plate two side plows, one each side of the product path, converge the breading material on each side of the path toward the center over the traveling product. In a first embodiment, the battering unit is placed directly above the breading unit with reverse flow in the two units. In a second and third embodiment, the battering unit is placed ahead of, and generally nearly in horizontal alignment with the product-advancing run of the breading application unit. Preferably, a tamper plate is provided to bear down on the breading material above the product to flatten out the breading material on top of and around the food product. A take-away conveyor may be used for discharging the coated product outside of the machine, in the first and second embodiments, while the third embodiment does not require this conveyor.

Growing community of inventors

Sandusky, OH, United States of America

Raymond E Booth