Food and Ingredient Preparation and Food Innovation Laboratories
In the food product development team, we are equipped to prepare and test a wide range of food product categories from baked goods to ice cream to confectionery.
Food Innovation Laboratory
Our food product development laboratory is complemented by state-of-the-art facilities at the Food Innovation Laboratory, a commercial-style kitchen space, based at Waite campus.
Within the labs, we are equipped to perform food product development for a wide range of categories from baked goods to ice cream to confectionery.
Our equipment
Equipment available includes (but is not limited to):
- blenders and food processors
- probe homogenisers
- overhead stirrers
- stand mixers
- pasta makers
- commercial style gas stoves
- induction cookers
- ovens (proving, combi, fan-forced, and microwave)
- sous-vide circulators
- deep fryers, air fryers
- dehydrators
- freeze dryer
- snap, standard, and walk-in freezers
- soft-serve machines
- vacuum sealer
- a bench-top autoclave and canning press for canning
- a plethora of domestic and commercial cookware
Milling facilities
Size reduction is an important step in ingredient preparation and product testing. We have several pieces of milling equipment available for small-scale size reduction depending on the application.
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Milling equipment
Perten 3100 Laboratory Mill
A workhorse hammer mill for milling laboratory samples >50 g. The hammer mill is powerful enough to mill extremely hard seeds including hulls down to a particle size of <0.8 mm or <0.5 mm. The mill also works well for homogenising vegetative mass including leaves and stems for further analysis.
UDY Cyclone Mill
A smaller version of the Perten 3100 that is easier to clean between samples and is ideal for sample preparation.
Retsch ZM200 Ultracentrifugal Mill
A general duty mill for homogenisation of soft to medium-hard and fibrous materials. This mill grinds to <0.25 mm and is useful for preparing samples for nutritional analyses.
LHB 6SM14A-Type Grinding Machine
Suitable for wet milling of fibrous materials like leaves and stalks or dehulling/polishing of grains like rice and soybeans
M70 Oil Screw Press
A workhorse screw press suitable for cold-pressing oil from various feedstocks like oilseeds. This screw press is suitable for continuous oil pressing rather than small scale batch testing.