Cooler flour makes for better 'goodies'
system from Buhler which is said to produce better baking results.
Hug's main product lines include the traditional biscuits commonly known as 'Guezli' - loosely translated as 'goodies', and the company is thought to be the only Swiss baker using cooled flours.
According to the company, the flow characteristics of cooled flours are better than those of conventional flours, in turn meaning that less dough sticks to the mixer and the quality of the finished product is improved.
The Buhler system installed at the Hug factory also includes automatic weighing of the main ingredients, sugar and flour, and a new process control system called WinCos which controls the dough mixers and their recipes.
Other benefits for Hug include new outdoor bins, which eliminate the need for bag handling for the main products and allow economies of scale by purchasing larger quantities at a time. The new low-noise discharge hoppers in the dough mixing section of the plant have also been welcomed by plant operators.
The outdoor bins, the sugar and flour weighing system, the discharge hoppers, the flour cooling installation, and the WinCos plant control system were installed and made ready for service by Buhler in just two weeks, with few major changes to the layout of the plant. For example, the new flour cooling system was placed exactly where the flour passed through anyway, with the result that no additional lifts were needed.
As well as Guezli, Hug also produces crackers, cookies, tartlets, frozen snack foods, and speciality wafers. It has two production sites in Switzerland at Malters and Willisau and generated sales of SF75 million in 2003.
