Freeze concentration of Dairy Products
The advantages of freeze concentration can be applied for a variety of dairy products.
Thanks to the low temperature processing the original characteristics are not abused e.g. proteins.
Freeze concentration of dairy product is potentially interesting for following purposes:
- To concentrate consumption milk, which after reconstitution is marketed as consumption milk with the same fresh notes as "fresh" milk. This might be interesting if the production area is far away from the consumption area (country site to big cities). This will save transportation cost. The concentrated milk also can be kept in frozen storage and used in period of low availability.
- Freeze concentrated dairy product can be used as ingredients to improve dairy flavor, overall flavor and, mouth feel and texture for e.g. low fat "Ice Milk", sour cream, cream cheese, white sauces, ice cream and milk chocolate.
- In the production of cheese it opens opportunities to make cheese out of milk with reduced water content.
- Create novel concentrates for beverage use.
- To be used for pre-concentration to functional improvement of dried dairy products.
The practical achievable concentration levels are:
Whole milk 38-40% d.s.
Skimmed milk 34% d.s. Limited due to lactose solubility
Skimmed milk 40% d.s. With 50% reduction of lactose
WPC 44% d.s.
Sweet Whey perrmeate 50% d.s.
The concept of freeze concentration is explained in the chapter "Technologies" and "Documentation"