JPS6044906B2 - How to unzip - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a novel method for thawing foods, beverages, pharmaceuticals, microorganisms, and various other frozen objects in an extremely short time and efficiently without impairing the quality of the frozen objects.

Conventionally, various methods have been used to thaw frozen objects such as frozen beef, whale meat, other meats, and frozen macros.

The easiest way is to take it out of the freezer and simply leave it outside or sprinkle water on it.
This method takes an extremely long time to thaw, and the thawing time varies depending on the season, making it problematic from a sanitary perspective.
However, there is an unavoidable decline in quality, making it unsuitable for industrialization. Another method is to store frozen items in a regular refrigerator and thaw them, but if the frozen items themselves are at an extremely low temperature, the inside of the refrigerator itself will be cooled, significantly delaying thawing. Apart from the above, there is a method of thawing by actively applying heat, such as using a microwave oven, but this method is too costly and difficult to scale up, so it is not preferred as an industrial thawing method. It's not a thing. Pressure thawing is a method that has recently received attention as an industrial thawing method. In this method, the frozen object is placed in a container and strongly pressurized to lower the freezing point of the ice and thaw it, but if the pressure is reduced too quickly, it will immediately refreeze, so it is not possible to reduce the pressure slowly. However, since this decompression takes time, the entire thawing time inevitably becomes longer. Moreover, it requires precise equipment for pressurization and depressurization, and has the disadvantage of being extremely dangerous. The present invention has been made to solve all of these drawbacks, and is an industrially novel method for thawing a frozen object within an extremely short period of time without altering its quality, and is also economical and cost effective. It requires no effort, has no danger, is easy to operate, and can be freely scaled up to a large scale.

In other words, the present invention is a completely new idea that completely changes the conventional idea regarding thawing. Water that has been adjusted to a predetermined temperature is sprayed onto a gas in a cyclone, and heat exchange is performed on the gas. The most important point is to control the temperature, add water vapor directly to the temperature controlled gas containing water vapor to adjust the temperature, and bring the obtained gas at a specified temperature into contact with the frozen object to thaw it. . Further, in the present invention, the temperature of the gas when it leaves the thawing chamber is controlled to -1 to +2°C by adjusting the amount of directly added steam.

With this, whether the frozen object placed in the thawing chamber is at low or high temperature, for example, at -50°C or -5°C,
Just by adjusting the amount of steam added, the temperature of the thawed product can be raised to +2°C.
By increasing the amount above, it is possible to prevent quality deterioration. A major feature of the present invention is that the gas that has entered the thawing chamber is directly introduced into the cyclone, where it is sprayed with water.
The purpose of this method is to attach bacteria and water to the cyclone wall using centrifugal force, and then separate and remove them from below.

This eliminates most of the adhesion of germs to the thawed product and prevents it from spoiling. The invention will now be explained in detail by way of some examples with reference to the drawings.
The drawing illustrates one embodiment of the apparatus used in the method of the present invention, and is a schematic cross-sectional view.

Using this device as an example, while explaining its effects,
Both the decompression method according to the present invention and the apparatus for implementing the same will be explained. The gas temperature device 1 is
Water or a temperature-controlled liquid is sprayed inside the chamber, and the gas and liquid introduced into the chamber are brought into direct contact with each other to perform gas-liquid heat exchange. It saturates with.

Therefore, any device that can perform such an action can be used as appropriate, but a cyclone type device equipped with a liquid spray device is most suitable. The illustrated device is a cyclone consisting of an outer cylinder 2 and an inner cylinder 3, and the inner surface of the outer cylinder 2 and the outer surface of the inner cylinder 3 are provided with liquid spray devices 4 and 5 having a large number of liquid spray holes, respectively. Set it aside so that the liquid can be sprayed at a predetermined temperature. The liquid spray device can also be provided in either one of the outer cylinder 2 and the inner cylinder 3, or a part thereof. These liquid spray devices 4 and 5 include
Temperature-controlled liquid is supplied from the temperature-controlled liquid tank 6 via a pipe 9.

The tank 6 is provided with a refrigerant or other suitable cooling device 7 and a boiler or other suitable heating device 8 to adjust the temperature of the liquid in the tank to an appropriate temperature by cooling or heating. Cook 6
A plurality of them may be provided, and the temperature regulating liquid may be sent to the gas temperature control device 1 by operating valves separately for cooling and for heating. Water can also be used as the liquid used here, but in order to prevent the liquid itself from freezing if the temperature of the frozen object is low, use an aqueous solution of potassium chloride, common salt, calcium chloride, or magnesium chloride. However, depending on the case, it is also possible to use a brine such as methanol, denatured alcohol, ethylene glycol, or glycerin. The gas temperature device 1 is provided with a gas inlet 10, which is most effectively provided in a tangential direction. The inner cylinder 3 of the device 1 passes through the outlet 11 and the inlet 1 of the drip removal device 12.
Connected to 3. The drip removal device 12 removes excess water droplets from the gas whose temperature has been controlled by gas-liquid heat exchange. Also,
The drip removal device 12 is provided with a steam spout S led from the steam generator by a pipe, and steam is spouted into the drip removal device 12 as appropriate depending on the temperature detected by the temperature detector 19. ing. Complete temperature adjustment and drip removal are completed here. The gas outlet of the drip removing device 12 is connected to the inlet 15 of the thawing chamber 14, and the saturated steam that enters from the inlet 15 is sent in a planar manner through a number of small holes H drilled in the ceiling of the thawing chamber 14. It comes into contact with the frozen object evenly.

The outlet 16 is connected to the gas inlet 10 of the gas temperature device 1 via a pipe 17 and a suitable blower F such as a fan. In other words, although this apparatus is a closed system, it is of course possible to make it an open system if necessary. Reference numeral 18 is a wastewater tank installed in the device 1, which stores liquid contaminated by gas-liquid contact, and if necessary, it can be reused by filtering or other appropriate cleaning means. You can use it or just drain it.

A temperature detector 19 detects the temperature of the gas exiting the defrosting chamber.

This detected temperature. When the temperature drops below -1°C, a command is given from now on to eject steam from the steam generator V into the drip removal device 12. As the gas to be circulated in the system, in addition to air, inert gases such as carbon dioxide, nitrogen gas, rare a gases, or oxygen gas can be used as appropriate depending on the properties of the frozen object. Mixed gas can be used.

FIG. 2 shows another thawing chamber used in the present invention. The thawing chamber 20 has a cylindrical shape and has an internal thawing chamber 21 which is rotated by a motor 22 inside.
has a large number of small holes 24, and the gas that enters from the gas inlet 15'' forms a circumferential surface so that it is uniformly distributed around the circumference.

In addition, the outer cylinder 25 of the internal thawing chamber 21 has many small holes 2.
6, the gas exits from the thawing chamber through a gas outlet 16''.The interior of this thawing chamber is constantly rotating, so that thawing is extremely uniform, which is advantageous for maintaining quality. The system according to the present invention provides temperature control gas produced by a gas temperature control device sprayed with temperature control liquid and a frozen body.
Direct contact, which allows thawing to occur evenly over the entire frozen object rather than locally, resulting in extremely shortened thawing time and minimal deterioration in quality. This will give you the advantage of being able to do things.

In addition, in the present invention, the final temperature adjustment of the gas is performed by directly adding water vapor, so temperature control is easy.
In addition, thawing can be performed in a short time. Next, a method for thawing frozen beef and frozen macros using the above-mentioned thawing device will be described as an example.

Example 1 Frozen beef was used as the frozen body M, and was thawed using the above-mentioned apparatus.

That is, first, the temperature of the water contained in the temperature-controlled liquid tank 6 is controlled to +2° C. by operating the cooling device 7 using a refrigerant. Then, this brine is sprayed from the liquid spray devices 4 and 5 by the pump P, and after adjusting the gas (air in this example) temperature to +2°C, it is sent from the gas temperature device to the drip removing cylinder 12 to remove water droplets. Remove from gas. Drop removed +
When air at 2° C. is sent to the thawing chamber 14, it comes into contact with the frozen beef M in the room and the temperature drops. If the air circulation continues as it is, the temperature at the outlet of the freezer compartment will drop to -1°C. At that point, the operation of the cooling device 7 will be stopped, the steam generator will be activated, and the steam will be sent to the steam outlet. Steam is blown in from S to raise the temperature of the air to +3°C. When air is circulated at this temperature, the temperature reaches the appropriate temperature of +2°C as it comes into contact with the frozen beef, and the air continues to circulate to thaw the beef. The thawed beef was comparable in color, texture, and elasticity to the beef before freezing.

Example 2 Frozen macro was used instead of frozen beef, but since the temperature of frozen macro was even lower than that of beef, heating device 8 was used from the beginning.
is activated to raise the water temperature to 25°C, spray this water, adjust the temperature of the gas (air in this example) to 20°C, and send it to the drip removal cyclone 12, where a little steam is released. Add in portions and raise the temperature of the air to 25°C.

If the air is continued to circulate, the temperature at the outlet of the defrosting chamber will drop to -2°C, so the steam generator V is activated strongly and steam is blown in more forcefully to reduce the air temperature inside the dripping cyclone 12 to 25°C. Adjust to. Circulating air at this temperature,
As thawing progresses, the temperature of the air at the outlet of the thawing chamber begins to rise, so when this reaches approximately +3°C, gradually reduce the amount of steam blown in to maintain the air temperature at -1 to +2.
Defrost at a controlled temperature of °C. By thawing in stages in this way, the quality of the macro meat is not degraded, the production of triplets is small and the yield is high, and the energy required for thawing is minimized. This provides the remarkable effect of being able to defrost the food within a short period of time. Moreover, since a delicate and sanitary thawing operation is possible, the present invention can be extremely advantageously used for thawing foods, medicines, microorganisms, and other foods.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a schematic sectional view of a thawing device used in the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a schematic sectional view of another thawing chamber. 1... Gas temperature device, 6... Temperature regulating liquid tank, 12... Dripping device, 14... Thawing chamber, M... Frozen body, F... Juan.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. Water is sprayed onto the gas in a cyclone, water vapor is directly added to the obtained saturated water vapor-containing gas, the obtained gas at a predetermined temperature is brought into contact with a frozen object, and the frozen object is thawed. A thawing method characterized by: 2. The thawing method according to claim 1, wherein the temperature of the gas upon leaving the thawing chamber is controlled to between -1 and +2°C, and the gas is circulated. 3. The method according to item 1, wherein the gas containing saturated water vapor at a predetermined temperature is sent in a planar shape. 4. The method according to item 1, wherein the frozen object is thawed while being rotated. 5. The method according to item 1, wherein the gas is an inert gas.