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Cornell professor of food science engineering Syed Rizvi and Michael E. Wagner, Ph.D. have received a patent on a process for producing Ice Cream instantly (within 3 seconds).
In the traditional method of making ice cream, the dairy-based mix flows through a heat-exchanging barrel, where ice crystals form and get scraped by blades.
With this new method, highly pressurized carbon dioxide passes over a nozzle that, in turn, creates a vacuum to draw in the liquid ice cream. When carbon dioxide goes from a high pressure to a lower pressure, it cools the mixture to about minus 70 degrees C – freezing the mixture into ice cream, which jets out of another nozzle into a bowl, ready to eat.
Instant ice cream can be served right on the spot, all without the challenges of commercial transportation “cold chains,” in which the product must be frozen and maintained at minus 20 degrees Celsius. To guard against failing spots in the cold-temperature transportation chain, commercial ice cream makers add stabilizers and emulsifiers.
The cold chain is energy intensive, making the new process desirable from an energy and cost perspective, as well as reducing undesirable additives.
Cornell is currently exploring licensing opportunities.
The patent "Process and apparatus for rapid freezing of consumable and non-consumable products using the expansion of dense gas " is available on-line.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 01 2020, @04:00PM (1 child)
That sounds really cool (haa... haa...), but it also seems really silly and reckless.
In the minimum, fire extinguishers are not cheap. A consumer one for home use is some $40, and I'm not sure if there is a special one needed for a boat. That seems like a lot to pay for some cold beer.
That's not even considering the danger of if there is a fire, suddenly reduced resources to fight it. Admittedly it is very rare to have a fire, but it is a risk.
How much did you pay for this trip? Was this one of those "charge tourists a lot, and cater to their every whim" type things?
(Score: 1) by anubi on Tuesday June 02 2020, @02:12AM
I pay about $20 to refill my 20 pound ( of liquid CO2 ) jug that runs my homemade beverage carbonator.
Although one jug lasts me about a year, I can go through that jug in minutes if I vent the CO2 as a refrigerant.
Remember those frosty mug coolers and how fast they used those expensive little seltzer water cartridges? Or those really lossy sodapop makers and how fast they used CO2. That was why I built my own carbonator. Those things advertised on TV have really expensive consumables.
Incidentally, I think "Mini Melts" and "Dipping Dots" are also cryogenic ice cream. Patented in 1992 or so?
Releasing large quantities of CO2 in confined areas is not a good idea. Air is already about 4/5 nitrogen already.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]