What are the solid beverage basics and processing FAQs?

Solid beverages are products for brewing and drinking that are processed with food raw materials, food additives, etc. to make solid material in powder, granule or block form. Such as juice powder, soybean powder, tea powder, coffee powder, fruit-flavored solid drinks, solid state soda (effervescent tablets), ginger powder. Solid beverage is relative to the physical state of the beverage. It is a special variety of beverage. It is characterized by small volume, good quick solubility and good preservation.
Commonly used raw materials and auxiliaries
Fruit juice: Fruit juice is the main raw material of fruit juice type solid beverage.
Maltodextrin: Maltodextrin can be used to improve the viscosity of the beverage and reduce the sweetness of the beverage, but also has the role of turbidant, and pigment, flavors, etc. in the appropriate proportion with the use of the product’s sense of transparency disappears, the appearance of fresh fruit juice to give a person a sense of reality.
Sweeteners: Sweeteners (including sucrose, glucose, fructose, maltose, etc.) are one of the main raw materials of fruity substitutes, and are the main source of sweetness for such products.
Dairy products: including sweetened condensed milk, milk powder, cream, etc. It is the main raw material of protein-based solid drinks.
Egg yolk powder: made from fresh egg yolk or mixed with ice egg yolk by spray drying, it is yellow powder with normal odor, no bitter taste and other peculiar taste, and good solubility.
Cocoa Powder: made from fresh cocoa beans after fermentation and drying, and processed by stir-frying, shelling, oil extraction, drying, etc. It is dark brown in color, with natural cocoa aroma, and is used for the production of cocoa-type Cream of Wheat.
Baking soda: used to neutralize the acidity of raw materials in the production of protein-based solid beverages in order to avoid precipitation and floating of proteins by the action of acid.
Vitamins: used as nutritional enhancers in the production of fortified Cream of Wheat, often with Vitamin A, Vitamin D and Vitamin B1.
Other food additives: including flavors, colors, acidity regulators, sweeteners, etc.
Production process
2.1 Key control links Quality control of raw and auxiliary materials and packaging materials; hygiene management control of production workshops, especially cooling and packaging workshops; cleaning and sterilizing of equipment; batching and measuring; control of dehydration and packaging processes; hygiene management of operators.
2.2 Easy quality and safety problems Inadequate management and control of equipment, environment, raw and auxiliary materials, packaging materials, dehydration and drying, cooling and packaging, personnel, etc. will easily make the products unqualified in terms of moisture and hygienic indexes, etc.; the control of ingredients and other links will easily lead to the use of food additives in excess of the scope and the amount of food additives.
2.3 Product Common Problems 1) Flavor change, color change: solid beverage products appear flavor change is mainly caused by oxidation. For example, the fat oxidation in the product makes the product have a fat oxidation flavor.
Preventive measures: 1, strict control of the process parameters, especially sterilization temperature and holding time, must make the activity of lipolytic enzyme and peroxidase loss. 2, strict control of the moisture content of the product. 3, to ensure that the sealing of the product packaging. 4, the product is stored in a cool, dry environment.
(2) Impurity solid beverage products impurity over the phenomenon, the reasons are as follows: 1, raw material purification is not complete. 2, the production process is subject to secondary pollution. 3, drying room hot air temperature is too high resulting in the production of burnt powder around the wind cylinder. 4, improper regulation of the hot air distribution box, resulting in eddy currents, so that the milk powder localized heat excessively and produce burnt powder.
(3) Poor speed solubility of solid beverage products with poor speed solubility, the following measures can be taken: 1, spray lecithin on the product particles. 2, increase the diameter of the particles appropriately, and try to make the product particles of a uniform diameter.
(4) Caking solid beverage packaging after opening, the contents are easy to caking. This is due to the fact that the general water content of solid beverages are relatively low, in the external environment when the humidity is slightly higher, it will absorb water.
At a certain temperature, a variety of food materials and the relative humidity of the external environment have an equilibrium moisture content. When the moisture content is lower than the moisture content, that is, hygroscopicity leads to caking. So solid beverages from production to packaging, transportation, storage, should pay attention to prevent its moisture absorption.
The relative humidity of the general packaging room should be controlled below 45%; good air barrier materials or composite materials should be used to make packaging; when using acid in the ingredients, anhydrous citric acid or tartaric acid should be used.