Heat and Mass Transfer during Baking: Product Quality aspects

Abstract

Most food product qualities are developed during heating processes. Therefore the internal heating and mass transfer of water are important aspects in food processing. Heating of food products is mostly induced by convection heating. However, the number applications of convective heating in combination with microwave heating are growing. Convection heating only promotes heating on the surface while microwave induce internal heating. This paper focuses on effect of convection heating sources to changes of quality properties in bakery products such as brownness and texture. Heat convection and conduction, and moisture migration due to diffusion and convection are the key to changes (transformations) in physical, chemical and structure properties in products. A 2D model for heat and mass transfer within bread is presented and a numerical FEM approach is used to solve the model and to predict the product qualities.