Cutter (food production)
A cutter or cutters ( engl. Cut , cut ') is a machine , which in the food industry , in butcher shops and commercial kitchens the strong crushing and blending foodstuffs , in particular meat , is used.
Use and structure
The cradle was the forerunner of the cutter . It consisted of two or more parallel, interconnected knives with curved blades and handles on either end. Two people standing opposite moved her in rocking motion on a large wooden stick. The meat was chopped up until a sausage meat was produced, the fineness of which depended on the duration of the weighing. The much smaller chopping knife that is still in use today works in the same way.
A cutter grinds finer than a meat grinder . While the cell structure is preserved there and coarse size reduction is to be achieved, the cutting process is designed to damage the cell membranes of as many cells as possible. In contrast to coarse minced meat , depending on the duration, a fine, even mass is created that is used, for example, to make sausage or farces . Smaller versions of cutters for domestic use are called table-top cutters.
The cutter consists of a horizontally rotating bowl (in various sizes from one to a thousand liters) in which several knives rotate vertically at a very high speed. In order to reduce the risks, the knives are covered by the knife protection hood during operation. This must be locked so that the knives cannot run open (risk of serious injuries). Since the knives reach very high speeds, cutters are equipped with a noise protection cover. The ingredients are shredded so much that a pulp is formed, called sausage for raw meat .
Since the high speed of rotation generates heat, ice or ice water is often added to the mass in order to keep the temperature low and thus prevent the protein from coagulating . It can be seen that the addition of a large amount of water also serves to increase the volume and weight at low cost. In the past, chilled broth could also be used for flavor enhancement, but this brings with it hygienic problems . In many modern designs, the vessel is cooled directly. In some cases, nitrogen is also used for cooling.
An optimally set temperature ensures that the knife moves through the fibers rather than through the broken pieces of dough. In order to process the product, individual cutters also offer cooking devices, also in connection with a vacuum. In order to influence the properties of the resulting sausage meat, cutter aids can be added. A Schlesinger is used to bring adhering spices from the bowl to the sausage meat .
Vacuum cutter
For better color (less oxidation by oxygen), better chopping of the meat ( the cells swell in a vacuum ) and to reduce small air inclusions in the mass (bubbles), the air can be removed in vacuum cutters in the bowl area.
The surrounding air pressure puts pressure on the evacuated bowl. As a result, a higher structural effort is necessary.
Koch cutter
In the Koch-Kutter the cutter bowl is heated by hot steam with a nozzle system underneath the bowl. This means that cooking and chopping can be carried out in one operation, eliminating the need to cook the pieces of meat separately in the kettle. Flavors and aromas as well as proteins that would otherwise be lost with the cooking water in the kettle are retained.
