Baking & Snack - September 2014 - 46

HILL COUNTRY BAKERY

The new Coffee House Cafe
brand targets c-stores and
other retailers.
Hill Country Bakery

Coffee talk
When it came to developing the Coffee
House Cafe brand, Hill Country Bakery
created a portfolio of 30 products,
12 of which will be promoted at the
National Association of Convenience
Stores trade show this fall.
Currently, the company has four individually wrapped, sliced loaf cakes,
including top-selling Lemon and
Banana Bread as well as Reduced Fat
Cinnamon, Pumpkin and Marble Loaf
varieties, according to David Nolan,
the bakery's co-managing partner
who spearheaded the product development effort.
Muffins come in perennially popular Banana and Blueberry flavors
- both made with real fruit - as
well as the line's signature Chocolate
Chip Crumb, Triple Chocolate Crumb
and Cinnamon Crumb options. Mr.
Nolan noted that the unique crumb
toppings, similar in texture to streusel, add a distinctive crunch and a
foodservice touch to the moist baked
goods. "All of the [signature] flavor
profiles are big because chocolate
and cinnamon go so well with coffee, he explained.
"
Currently, the company is finetuning its Danish line, which will
likely include blueberry, cherry,
apple, strawberry or cheese fillings
along with a cream cheese icing.

46 Baking & Snack September 2014 / www.bakingandsnack.com

can produce up to 9,600 lb an hour. "All of our products
were developed for rack ovens," Mr. O'Donnell noted.
"We found out that an impingement oven best replicates
what we were trying to do in rack ovens because of how
the forced air circulates." He added that tunnel ovens
bake the large loaf cakes in about 35% less time than the
rack ovens do.
After baking, the pans travel around a G&F spiral
ambient cooler for 20 to 40 minutes, depending on the
product. The loaf cakes are manually depanned and enter a dual-spiral blast freezer set at -30°F for a 150-minute dwell. In comparison, products placed in the older
rack or static systems take up to 12 hours to freeze.
Installed in 2011, Line 4 for mini loaf cakes also
uses a slurry system as well as a Peerless double-sigma
mixer to create streusel. After pan washing and oiling,
the 24-piece pans pass through a Tromp twin depositing and topping line. Specifically, batter is deposited,
topped with streusel and the process is repeated to create the multi-textured product. Line operators manually
smooth out the streusel to ensure full coverage on the
top of each piece.
After baking in a BABBCO120-ft air-impingement
oven, the loaf cakes receive ambient cooling before
manual depanning, entering a JBT Frigoscandia singlespiral blast freezer and traveling down a spiral lowerator to the floor level. Mr. O'Donnell noted that the
newer freezer cost about 35% more than the older one,
but the footprint is half the size as the older one and
easier to clean. It's also 50% more energy efficient than
industry standards.

That's a wrap
Because of San Antonio's hot and humid climate, the
entire operation is air-conditioned. The bakery keeps
the makeup and oven room around 80°F, the warehouse approximately 70°F and the cooler, freezer and
packaging departments at about 60°F. In addition to
providing employees with a comfortable working environment, the filtered-air, temperature-controlled
operation maintains quality control and optimizes the
freezing systems.
The newest capital additions can be found in the slicing and packaging department, which consist of two
separate rooms - one for each high-speed production
line. Loaf cakes from Line 3 enter a Matiss ultrasonic
slicer that can be automatically reconfigured to cut
products in 12 different ways. Before purchasing the
ultrasonic slicers - a second one serves Line 4 - the
bakery relied on 26 FoodTools mechanical slicers.
"This machine is processing three times the amount
of product with just one person and almost no waste,"
Mr. O'Donnell said. "You can cut a half or full sheet

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Baking & Snack - September 2014

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