This is a continuation-in-part patent application of

United States patent application Serial No. 477,149 filed

March 21, 1983.

Background of the Invention

Field of the Invention

This invention relates to a process for manufacturing candy bars containing baked wafers to which a cream ingredient is applied and in which a stack of creamed wafers is covered by a coating which is protected from cracking or delamination by controlling the moisture contents of the baked wafer and the cream whereby moisture transfer from the cream to the wafer is minimized so that the wafer does not exert delami- nating stresses on the exterior coating by expansion of the wafers due to moisture addition thereto. The invention also relates to the product produced by the process.

Description of the Prior Art

The process of manufacturing candy bars made up of creamed wafers which are then covered by a final coating, such as chocolate, is complicated because of changes which may occur in the structure of the wafers after the wafers have been covered. In the prior art various attempts have been made to avoid cracking or delamination of the final coating by producing stacks of wafers coated with a suitable cream when the wafers have a relatively low moisture content as they come from the ovens in which they are manufactured. One such pro¬ cess involves the provision of a relatively large, controlled atmosphere room in which the wafer stacks are stored for rela¬ tively long periods of time, such as several days, during which the stacks of creamed wafers are moved through the room, commonly referred to as a maturing room. At the end of this period of time the matured stacks are moved out of the

maturing room and are fed to a coating machine which covers the matured wafer stacks with a coating which frequently con¬ sists of a chocolate mixture. The exact mechanism of such maturing is not precisely known. The time required in the maturing room presents a very real disadvantage since large numbers of such wafer stacks must be held in such maturing rooms for long periods of time, and it is not always easy to determine exactly how long this period of time should be.

One of the ways proposed in the past to avoid these dif¬ ficulties was to provide a maturing tunnel for the wafers which were then coated with a cream, cut to the appropriate candy bar sizes and then enrobed. However, the prior attempts involving the use of such maturing tunnels were not successful due to the fact that the final candy bar product, after being coated or enrobed, would ultimately undergo cracking and dela¬ mination of the final coating if the resulting candy bars were stored for any significant length of time. Significantly, the shorter time provided by the use of such maturing tunnels was more than offset by the shortened shelf life of the final pro¬ duct. The process of the present invention makes possible the elimination of the long holding times involved in the use of the prior art maturing rooms and at the same time avoids the cracking and delamination involved in the use of the maturing tunnels of the prior art.

Summary of the Invention

A process for producing stacks of creamed wafers and coated creamed wafer candy bars made from such stacks, is disclosed. Wafer sheets and cream are provided wherein the moisture content of the wafers is greater than that of the cream. A cream layer is applied to the wafer sheets in a man¬ ner such that the water vapor partial pressure of the cream is maintained below that of the wafers to favor moisture transport from the wafers to the cream. The preferred way of doing this is to treat the wafers to increase their moisture

content, which may be accomplished by passing the wafers through an in-line maturing tunnel or moisturizing chamber and then applying the cream layer. It is preferable that the cream layer be prepared and applied in a warm and dry atmosphere, as, for instance, air temperature about 65°F. to about 80°F. and a relative huimidity of 30% or less. Wafer- cream stacks, or books made up of a plurality of such creamed wafer sheets, are thus formed. These books are passed through a cooler and are then cut into smaller stack units and then coated or enrobed with a paste. After the coating step, . the final enrobed candy bar products are cooled, packaged and shipped to the customer or added to inventory.

Objects of the Invention

It is therefore an object of this invention to provide a process for producing wafer-cream stacks for use in the manu¬ facture of coated, creamed wafer candy bars in which the coating does not undergo delamination or cracking during nor¬ mal storage.

It is a further object of the present invention to pro¬ vide a process for production of wafers that involves in-line maturing of these wafers with substantial increase in moisture content of such wafers during the maturing step.

It is a still further object of the invention to provide a process, and a candy bar produced thereby, for producing a chocolate enrobed wafer creamed candy bar wherein the water contents of the cream and of the wafers are selected so thet the resulting partial pressure of the cream water vapor is substantially less than that of the wafer water vapor.

These and other objects of this invention will appear as limiting the scope of the invention, since, in view of the disclosure herein, others may be able to develop additional embodiments within the scope of the appended claims.

Description of the Preferred Embodiment

The steps for a process of making a chocolate enrobed

creamed wafer candy bar are shown in the attached block diagram. The process begins with a mixing of various batter ingredients 11 with water. This mixing is designated a batter mixing step 14 and starts with mixing sugar and water for 30 seconds. This is done to make sure that the maximum amount of sugar is dissolved in the water. Next, a quantity of sodium bicarbonate, soft wheat flour, refined palm kernal oil and lecithin (a release agent) are added in the proportions shown hereafter in the example. Batter mixing 14 is done by a stan¬ dard commercial mixer, such as Batter Mixer Type TM 120 made by the Franz Haas Waffelmaschinen Industriegesellschaft mbH, hereinafter Franz Haas Co. , in which these ingredients are mixed for an additional 3% minutes. The batter viscosity should now be about 1500-3000 centipoise as measured by a standard viscosity measuring instrument. The batter tem¬ perature should be approximately 75° plus or minus 5° Fahrenheit during the mixing seep.

After the batter is thoroughly mixed, a wafer sheet is produced. The batter is delivered into an Automatic Wafer Baking Machine, such as Type SWAK 32G made by the Franz Haas Co. This machine consists of a series of waffle-like plates that are attached to a moving conveyor which carries the pla¬ tes through a heated oven. For each wafer sheet approximately 145 grams of batter are baked at temperatures between about 325°F. and about 350°F. for about 2 minutes. This gives a wafer sheet thickness of between about 2.2 and about 2.3 millimeters with a weight of 57 to 59 g. The dimensions of these wafer sheets are 445.5 mm long by 317 mm wide. The moisture content of the wafers as they emerge from the oven is from about 1.5% to about 1.8%.

The wafer sheets automatically drop out of their waffle iron-type baking plates to a delivery belt which immediately feeds the sheets to an arch cooler 23 such as the Wafer Sheet Cooler, Type TBK 2.0 manufactured by the Franz Haas Co. The

passage of the wafer sheets up and over the arch and down other side, takes about 5 minutes. The wafer sheets now pass immediately into an in-line maturing tunnel 26 such as the model KT160 made by the Franz Haas Co. In step 26, the con¬ ditions are carefully controlled at a temperature of about 57°C and a dew point of about 43°C. At this time the wafer sheet weight is between 59.8 and 61.3 g with a moisture con¬ tent of between about 3.0% and about 6.0%. The length by width dimension is now 450 mm by 320 mm and the warpage is between 12 to 14 mm. The time the sheets spend in the maturing tunnel is controlled to about 21.5 minutes. On emerging from maturing tunnel 26 the wafers pass immediately into a controlled environment room where the temperature is maintained in the range from about 65° F. to about 80°F. and the relative humidity is maintained at about 30% or less. The controlled environment room is an enclosed area sufficiently large to contain all of the apparatus from the exit from the in-line maturing tunnel to the exit to the enrobing apparatus and may include the enrobing apparatus as well.

At this point in the process, the cream 27, for example, a flavored peanut cream, is applied as at step 28. The cream should be prepared and applied in a relatively dry environment (relative humidity below 30%). The wafer sheets receive a cream coating from a Franz Haas Co. Cream Spreading machine. Type FSTM 5. In the case of flavored cream, there is a fla¬ vored cream to wafer ratio of about 72:28. The flavored cream temperature is about 81°F. to about 84°F. We have discovered that the ratio of the water content of the wafers to the water content of the cream is of great importance in avoiding sub¬ sequent delamination of the final coating. Apparently water ab-sorbed into the wafer book units after they have been finally coated results in expansion forces which put stresses on the final coating which ultimately results in cracking and delamination of the final coating. There are two principal

sources of moisture for water absorption into the wafers con¬ tained in the enrobed candy bars. First, there is the moisture contained in the ambient air which may pass through the wrapper and through the final coating. Second, there is the moisture contained in the cream. The water vapor partial pressures for the cream and for the wafers are related to the moisture contents of the cream and of the wafers. We have discovered that it is important to keep the cream water vapor partial pressure below the wafer water vapor partial pressure. This is accomplished by keeping the moisture content of the cream below about 2% at the time the wafers are creamed and keeping the moisture content of the wafers above about 3.0% at the time they are creamed. This results in water vapor par¬ tial pressures of the cream and wafers being such as to favor moisture transport from the wafers to the cream. After the wafer sheets receive the cream, books or layers of wafer and cream are formed and these books are cooled to a temperature of about 55°F. by passing them through a Franz Haas Co. Wafer Cooling Press Type WK60, as at step 30, for a period of about 20 minutes.

The next step after the cooling is to cut the books into smaller units. The books are cut as at step 32 by a Franz Haas Co. Wafer Cutting Machine, Type AWD-2, into dimensions of 102 mm long by 36 mm wide by 14.5 mm high which produces a weight for each unit of about 26.8 g. After the books have been cut into candy bar size, an enrobing process, such as at step 34, is carried out. In this process, a chocolate paste is spread over each book unit The book unit to chocolate ratio is about 65:35. The standards for identifying the cho¬ colate used are prescribed by the U.S. Food and Drug Adminstration as published in 21 C.F.R. 163.111, .123 and .130. This is the end of the time period that the wafers and other ingredients remain in the controlled room conditions, from steps 23 through 34, and a total time of only about 46

minutes has elapsed. Alternatively, the enrobing step may be carried out outside the controlled environment room provided this be done quickly, within a very few minutes after emerging from the room, and provided the moisture contents of the cream and the wafers are carefully controlled as described above. It has been discovered that when these conditions are main¬ tained, the resulting ultimate wafer-cream layered and enrobed candy bar does not become delaminated for long periods of time after the packaging step 38.

The wafer enrobed candy bars are sent on a conveyor to a cooling tunnel as at step 36 that has 3 zones. Zone 1 tem¬ perature is about 55°F., Zone 2 temperature is about 55°F., Zone 3 temperature is about 64°F. The enrobed candy bars spend approximately 5 minutes in each zone. Candy bar weight is now about 42.3 g and the dimensions are 106.9 mm long by 40.6 mm wide by 17.2 mm high.

After the bars come out of the cooling „tunnels, they are sent to a packaging area and are immediately wrapped and packaged as at step 38. Preferably, a foil wrapper is used in order to further minimize absorption of moisture into the wafers.

EXAMPLE

The specific batter formula used in step 14 to make the wafer batter is as follows:

%

1. soft wheat flour (unenriched) 30.00

2. Refined Palm Kernel Oil 0.25

3. lecithin (oil) 1.50

4. sodium bicarbonate 0.06

31.81

5. H ₂ 0* 50 liters

*Flour/water ratio is adjusted to achieve proper viscosity for processing.