The spray drying process of cheese powder
Cheese
powder is mainly used in dips, dressings, biscuits, chips and direct as
flavouring on hot dishes like spaghetti and soups. In order to spray dry cheese
it is necessary to bring it into a liquid form. This is done by a normal
melting process where the cheese rind, if any, is removed, the cheese is
disintegrated, and during heating and agitation, melting salts, such as
phosphates and citrates, are added together with water.
The aim is to
obtain a solid content of about 35% and a temperature of 75oC in
order to get a feed, which is not too viscous for atomization. The drying is done in
a conventional dryer. The cooling of the powder is done in a VIBRO-FLUIDIZER™ supplied with
ambient air in the first section and cold dehumidified air in the last section.
The integrated belt dryer FILTERMAT™ has proved especially advantageous for cheese
powder, as it is discharged in an agglomerated form. Further the fines fraction
is practically zero and does thus not present any operational problems.
As a certain amount of aroma is lost during the drying it is
recommended to use aged cheese. In order to avoid problems with the odour form
the exhaust air this may be filtered through activated carbon filters.