Sharp Vs Blunt Blades
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SHARP Soft Serve Machine Scraper BLADES vs BLUNT BLADES
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Imagine an ice skater gliding effortlessly over the ice. The rounded tip of the
ice skate glides over the ice with minimal resistance. That is exactly what a
blunt blade does on the inside of the barrel of your soft serve machine. It
glides over the frozen soft serve instead of scraping it off.
Now imagine that same skate going sideways and the sharp edge biting into the
ice. You just see ice flying as the skater comes to a halt! That is what a
sharp blade does - it bites into the ice!
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The difference is this: soft serve scraped off the side of the barrel by a
sharp blade is at minus 8º Celsius. If however the blades become blunt, a thin
layer of soft serve is left on the inside of the barrel. This layer actually
insulates the sides of the barrel and only half-frozen soft serve is
scraped off somewhat further away from the side of the barrel, which is at
minus 6º Celsius.
Blunt blades result in:
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A very wet-looking cone - ‘good’ cones have a dry appearance. |
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A sloppy cone that won’t stand up. |
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Soft serve that can’t be aerated as much and is less profitable. |
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Soft serve that can’t be dipped in dipping chocolate. |
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Soft serve that doesn’t taste light and fluffy, but icy. |
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Soft serve that will start melting almost immediately over your annoyed
customer’s hand. |
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Extra power consumption, because it will take longer to freeze down.
Freeze-down time should not exceed 10 minutes. |
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The amount of aeration of soft serve will affect the quality, texture and taste
of your soft serve.
The amount of air captured in the soft serve is dependent on:
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the mix, |
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the settings of the machine (temperature and overrun settings),
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the condition of the blades (most common problem),
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the condition of the machine, and
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the air orifice size on the mix-feed tube or pump. |
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Badly formulated mixes can’t take high aeration (overrun) and should be avoided
even if they are cheaper, because you will most often get less cones per mix.
Let us for one moment speculate that you get only 10 cones less per box.
Selling these cones at just $1.00 each, you would have lost $10.00. If you had
paid $5.00 more for a quality box of soft serve, you would have been better off
by $5.00.
Another difference is: badly formulated mixes usually also taste bad, so
who knows how much business you will lose or have lost using a 'cheap' mix.
Something to remember: Shop owners (retailers) usually buy on price, but the
public buy on quality and taste. If you sell them anything less than the best,
you will lose customers.
By selling more air through a top-quality, well formulated mix, you are both
saving money and also making more money. Good aeration is probably the most
important aspect of a good cone as air in frozen product enhances the taste and
changes it into creamy, fluffy soft serve, whilst lowering your cost per serve.
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