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“For a stew product or a chili, companies want every one of those vegetables, beans, or pieces of meat to be intact so that it looks just like you might make in your home kitchen, but on a much larger scale. We have a steam jacket, much like you do in your kitchen where you have a pot sitting on top of a heating element, and you’re heating that pot indirectly,” says Tom Ho man, director of sales at Mepaco.

Ho man adds that the ThermaBlend batch cookers come with direct steam injection as well as a steam jacket for the full range of steam and cooking options. ThermaBlend also has CIP capability, and the option to batch chill as well.

“You can bring a product up to 180 degrees, cook it, and hold it through an intervention step if necessary,” he says. “Then, you can actually bring it down to whatever temperature you want all the way down to 40 degrees in a relatively quick period of time.”

New dicer for meats, veggies

The new Urschel M VersaPro Dicer (MVP) rolled out at PACK EXPO International with a slate of cutting-edge features for creating dices, strips, and shreds from meats and vegetables (18). The MVP is the fourth generation in Urschel’s M-series, with 33% increased feeding capacity compared to Urschel’s M6 due to wider, 12-in. infeed and takeaway belts, and increased horsepower.

The MVP features stainless-steel construction throughout, with an IP69K certifi ed electrical enclosure and double-sealed door for extra protection during washdowns, while the cutting spindles have a sanitary design and are cantilevered for quick changes. Speaking of cutting, the width

Process is determined by a gang of circular knives followed by a series of cross-cutting knives that determine the length. The machine has the option of 5-in. diameter knives for 1-in. thick product, or 6-in. diameter knives for product thickness of 1.5 in.

“In addition, on the machine we have an optional HMI that gives you the ability to set cut sizes along with reci-