A method may include grinding raw whole muscle meat into a ground meat material and heating the ground meat material to cook the ground meat material into a cooked ground meat material suitable for consumption. The method may also include freezing the cooked ground meat material and mixing the frozen and cooked ground meat material with an additive comprising a starch to produce a meat mixture. The method may further include pressing the meat mixture into a formed shape and slicing the formed shape into meat portions of a predetermined size.

A rocker chiller includes a chilling tank and a baffle assembly. The baffle assembly includes a drive shaft, a baffle blade extending along a bottom of the tank and a plurality of spaced-apart and elongate baffle members extending in a radial direction from the drive shaft towards the bottom of the tank. The elongate baffle members contact the drive shaft at spaced-apart locations along the drive shaft and define a plurality of openings therebetween. The elongate baffle members are sized and shaped to push at least a majority of the carcasses laterally through the heat exchanging liquid in a direction generally orthogonal to a lengthwise forward movement of the carcasses from the first end of the tank to the second end of the tank.

A method for processing or manufacturing a meat product is disclosed. Frozen meat is provided into a meat grinder having a grinder plate having a first surface and a second surface defining apertures of different sizes and shapes extending between the first surface and the second surface. The meat is urged through the apertures by a coolant and chopped or broken into frozen pieces by a blade rotating a spaced distance from the second surface of the plate. The frozen pieces are then provided into and conveyed by an auger conveyor as more coolant is provided into the conveyor to further cool the meat pieces. The meat pieces are then sifted to more optimally obtain desired pieces sizes or range of sizes and/or sublimate the coolant.

A contact drum freezer system includes a contact drum freezer, an endless product wrap belt and a cross feed conveyor. The contact drum freezer is mounted to revolve about an axis generally parallel to a main lane of transit. The endless product wrap belt has an intake shelf, an inner product-compressing run encircling most of the drum and an outer return run looping back to the intake shelf. The cross feed conveyor is situated in the main lane of transit and has a return run a and product-carrying run for transferring product laterally out of the main lane of transit and onto the intake shelf of the product wrap belt.

A method for grasping a row of multiple separate blocks of frozen food originating from a plate freezer, the row extending in a longitudinal direction corresponding to the longitudinal direction of the plate freezer, includes the steps of grasping the row of blocks along its opposing lateral edges by closing a clamp (1) having two grasping elements (2, 20) that extend along the opposing lateral edges of the row, wherein at least one of the grasping elements along its length includes multiple separate pinching elements (4, 40), each element for pinching one or more of the blocks, the pinching elements being individually movable with respect to the at least one grasping element in a direction perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of this grasping element, the method further including adjusting the lateral position of each pinching element when closing the clamp, by individually moving each pinching element.

An equipment body of an ultrasonic rapid freezing equipment is provided with a placement cavity, and the placement cavity is provided with a first electric telescopic rod. The bottom end of the first electric telescopic rod is provided with a receiving plate connected to a movable plate, and the movable plate is driven by a motor to rotate. The equipment body is provided with a first conveyor belt, and the inner end of the first conveyor belt is equipped with a second conveyor belt. The second conveyor belt is located on a mounting frame, and the bottom of the mounting frame is connected to a second electric telescopic rod. The bottom end of the second electric telescopic rod is connected to a moving block, the roller at the bottom of the moving block is located in the track on the top surface of the supporting block.

Disclosed is a fast chilling method for improving beef tenderness, including the following steps: step 1, sample pretreatment: taking beef longissimus dorsi muscle after slaughter, removing surface fat and connective tissue, and vacuum packaging; step 2, rapid chilling: rapidly transferring the pre-treated sample completed in step 1 to a chilling equipment for chilling to a sample temperature of −3 degrees Celsius (° C.), where the chilling is completed within 5 hours (h) after slaughter; step 3, chilling and aging at super-chilled temperature: transferring the samples rapidly chilled in step 2 to a chilled warehouse, and continuing to chilling and aging until 24 h after slaughter; and step 4, chilling storage and aging: cutting the sample equally into 2.5 centimeters (cm) thickness 24 h after slaughter, and then completing a vacuum skin packaging and refrigerating for aging.

Method and device for freezing food items in a gradual process, where the food items are first put through under-cooling before the food items are placed in a container or receptacle for freezing. The method and device are particularly suitable for freezing freshly slaughtered and bled fish for later processing.

A freezing installation for freezing food articles in blocks, particularly seafood, said freezing installation comprising a pre-pressing apparatus and one or more horizontal plate freezers, said horizontal plate freezer having one or more horizontal freezing plates: means for introducing trays into the pre-pressing apparatus; the pre-pressing apparatus comprises a plurality of horizontal shelves onto which in use the trays are placed, and a top plate, said shelves and top plate are stacked on top of each other; means for transferring the trays from the shelves of the pre-pressing apparatus to the horizontal freezing plates of the one or more horizontal plate freezers; one or more plate freezers, each having a plurality of freezing plates stacked on top of each other means for emptying the plate freezer, and transferring the tray for further processing.

A method for grasping a row of multiple separate blocks of frozen food originating from a plate freezer, the row extending in a longitudinal direction corresponding to the longitudinal direction of the plate freezer, includes the steps of grasping the row of blocks along its opposing lateral edges by closing a clamp (1) having two grasping elements (2, 20) that extend along the opposing lateral edges of the row, wherein at least one of the grasping elements along its length includes multiple separate pinching elements (4, 40), each element for pinching one or more of the blocks, the pinching elements being individually movable with respect to the at least one grasping element in a direction perpendicular to the longitudinal direction of this grasping element, the method further including adjusting the lateral position of each pinching element when closing the clamp, by individually moving each pinching element.