Humidity Control for Convenience Food

Our eating habits have undergone a transformation due to changes in lifestyle, technological advancements, and time constraints, particularly in urban areas. The shift towards convenience and snack foods has become more prevalent.

Convenience food, also known as tertiary processed food, refers to commercially prepared food designed for easy consumption. These products are often available as hot, ready-to-eat dishes, room-temperature shelf-stable items, or refrigerated/frozen products requiring minimal preparation.

How Humidity Impacts Convenience Food?

Many processed foods, such as candies, biscuits, fruit powders, dry soup, instant coffee, tea, sugar, powdered drink mixes, dried vegetables, soup concentrates, and milk powder, share a common characteristic—they are hygroscopic and susceptible to high relative humidity. Moisture absorption alters their appearance and makes them less appealing, turning them soggy or rubbery.

Uncontrolled humidity during processing, packaging, and storage can be problematic in various aspects of the food industry, including storage, production, packing, and processing. Despite high-temperature processes during food production, exposure to humid environments can lead these products to absorb moisture from the surrounding air.

On humid days, issues like salt clumping in shakers or sticky powders hindering machinery operation can arise. Even a simple task like packaging cake mix becomes challenging in humid conditions, affecting both the flow of the mix and the machinery’s functionality.

Moisture in the air can lead to lumping or caking of powdery health foods during processing, affecting their free flow in manufacturing or packaging. Granular or powdered materials transferred through pneumatic conveying, also known as airveying, can face challenges due to humidity.

How Bry-Air Can Help?

The solution lies in conditioning the air in the packaging area, similar to the processing and manufacturing stages, to prevent changes in the food’s state from the raw material to the final packaged product.

Maintaining stringent temperature and humidity conditions and surrounding processing, packaging, and storage areas with dry air is crucial. Bry-Air’s desiccant-based dehumidifiers effectively reduce the moisture content of the surrounding air, maintaining a low relative humidity (RH) as low as 1% consistently. This ensures optimal conditions during production, storage, and packing, contributing to improved food quality and prolonged freshness of processed products. In addition, it allows free flow of the concentrates, preventing moisture regain during storage, retaining original taste and flavour, and extending the shelf life.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is humidity control important for convenience food manufacturing?

Humidity control for convenience food helps maintain product quality, texture, and shelf life by reducing excess moisture exposure during processing, packaging, and storage.

How does moisture affect tertiary processed food?

Tertiary processed food — another term for convenience food, referring to commercially prepared products designed for easy consumption — is often hygroscopic and susceptible to humidity. Excess moisture can affect the texture, quality, and shelf life of these products. Effective moisture control in tertiary processed food helps maintain suitable environmental conditions during handling and storage.

What causes moisture absorption in processed food?

Moisture absorption in processed food can occur when hygroscopic products such as candies, dry soup, sugar, and dried vegetables are exposed to humid air during processing, packaging, or storage. Controlling surrounding humidity helps minimise unwanted moisture uptake.

How does packaging humidity affect convenience food products?

High humidity during packaging can increase moisture absorption and affect the texture and quality of convenience food products. Maintaining suitable convenience food packaging humidity helps protect products during packaging.

What is dry air conditioning for food packaging?

Dry air conditioning for food packaging involves supplying controlled, low-moisture air to packaging areas to help reduce moisture exposure and maintain the quality of food products.

Can dehumidification reduce moisture absorption in processed food?

Yes. Dehumidification removes excess moisture from the surrounding air, helping create controlled conditions that can reduce moisture absorption in processed food during manufacturing and packaging.

What products commonly require moisture control in convenience food manufacturing?

Many processed foods are hygroscopic and require moisture control, including candies, biscuits, fruit powders, dry soup, instant coffee, tea, sugar, powdered drink mixes, dried vegetables, soup concentrates, and milk powder. These products can turn soggy or rubbery and lose their appeal if exposed to uncontrolled humidity.

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